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Jisshu was in a Trance for Most Part of the Shoot: Srijit

RBN Web Desk: Filmmaker Srijit Mukherji has said that Jisshu Sengupta was in a trance for most part of the shoot of Ek Je Chhilo Raja, especially when the scenes featuring the person who returns to claim his estate were canned. The film is inspired from the famous Bhawal case, where a probable imposter claiming to be the second prince of the estate, returns a decade after being presumed dead.

Speaking to the media Srijit said, according to recorded history, the prince of Bhawal became a Naga sadhu and travelled to the Himalayas, the deserts, the seas, and various religious places across India. Jisshu, in a major part of the film, will be seen only in a loin cloth and walking bare feet since that’s how Naga sadhus live. Jisshu shot the film in that costume both in subzero temperatures at Tsomgo Lake in east Sikkim and in the burning heat of Jaisalmer where the daytime mercury often touched 50 degrees Celsius. The image of the ascetic with flowing robes, ingrained in the minds of the audience largely because of the 1975 film Sanyasi Raja, is fictional. Ek Je Chhilo Raja is based on the facts of the court case, with thriller elements, Srijit added.

Jisshu, earlier, had told the media that Ek Je Chhilo Raja was the most physically exhausting film he has ever acted in.

According to Srijit, whenever Jisshu canned the scenes of the sadhu, he would mentally quarantine himself from whatever happened around him.

The prince of Bhawal led a lecherous life and had several wounds on his body (possibly because of syphilis). Jisshu’s makeup, to forge the real look, took hours.

Ek Je Chhilo Raja is based on historian Partha Chattterjee’s bestselling book ‘A Princely Imposter’, which recalls one of the most extraordinary legal battles ever fought in India. The narrative history is an incredible story that unfolded in the courts of Dhaka, Kolkata (then Calcutta), and London, and was replete with family intrigue, squandered wealth, and sexual debauchery.

Ek Je Chhilo Raja releases this Puja.