SVF

Dhritiman Chatterjee: I never wanted to be an actor

One of Bengali cinema’s finest character artists Dhritiman Chatterjee now leads a quiet life in Goa but soon he will bring life to Professor Shonku, Satyajit Ray’s iconic creation, on the celluloid. The seasoned actor plays the titular role in Sandip Ray’s ‘Professor Shonku O El Dorado’ which will release on December 20. Interestingly, Dhritiman made his acting debut with Ray’s ‘Pratidwandi’ in 1970 and went to play crucial roles in Ray’s two other films ‘Ganashatru’ and ‘Agantuk’.

However, not many people know the veteran actor had never wanted a career in acting and only worked under Satyajit Ray and Mrinal Sen to understand their craft better.

“The main impetus in working with Satyajit Ray and then with Mrinal Sen was getting closer to people I revered. I was thrilled to be in the films that they did, but I didn’t see it at that point of time as a diving board into an acting career. I was starting another career in advertising and happened to be moderately successful at that. I had that luxury of being able to pick and choose, which was important to me because at that time, I just could not see myself as part of what was the mainstream then.

Later, it sort of changed. Actors get labeled. So there was this ‘angry, young rebel, anti-establishment’ tag that I got labeled with. As I got more and more into acting, I found it interesting to try various sorts of characterizations,” explains the actor whose notable works with Mrinal Sen were ‘Padatik’ and ‘Akaler Shandhaney’.

Speaking about the challenges he faced while playing Professor Shonku Dhritiman said: “The main problem was to adjust Shonku to the modern world as time and surroundings of Shonku have changed completely. I have to play the character keeping in mind every minute detail mentioned in the original stories. But I am also thankful to Sandip Ray for giving me the opportunity to enact such an iconic character.”

Produced by SVF, ‘Professor Shonku O El Dorado’ also stars Subhashish Mukhopadhyay as Nokurbabu.