7/31/2019 Churni Ganguly for CalcuttaTube.Com [Interview-Bengali Film Actress)

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Profile

CHURNI GANGULY

Shoma A. Chatterji

WORD-COUNT: 639Churni Ganguly is one of the most outstanding actresses who made her small screen debut

when Bengali satellite channels appeared on the small screen. But no one noticed her talent and her

glamour for the big screen. It was left to her husband, filmmaker-actor Kaushik Ganguly whoutilized her talent to the best advantage for the big and small screen. She talks about her work in

Laptop directed by Kaushik. Laptop has been acquired by Databazaar Media to fulfill theresponsibility it has taken on to entertain the NRI Bengalis of North America and Canada.

Churni won the Bengal Film Journalist Associations Best Actress Award for her portrayal inWaarish directed by Kaushik Ganguly.

I have never been crazy about stardom. I love to act and therefore, have not chased roles

and tried to remain content with some very good and significant work with Kaushik in televisionand for films. I met Kaushik through theatre and soon observed how talented he was. In all his

films, I have done varied roles. Now that I have graduated to character roles, the possibilities haveexpanded, said the very educated, warm and well-read Churni who had to give up offers from

Bollywood because of personal constraints and time clashes.

I personally think that Laptop is a very quiet, understated and intense film. This has made

the background music an independent and unique point of expression in the film. It is narrated and

unfolded in a very low key, says Churni.

I play Durba. Durba is married to a tea planter in North Bengal and they have an eight-

year-old son. The boy, Pratyay is my younger sisters son in real life. We had a good comfort zone.Saswata Chatterjee plays my husband. The character I portray has a slight nervous streak and thereason is spelt out in the film. I am decked up like a planters wife should and though I try to

appear confident and happy, inside, I am neither. I feel alone in that small world of luxury and

affluence, she explains.

Asked about the role of the laptop in her cloistered world in the film Churni says, The

laptop happens independently in each different story in the film. Relationships do not have a

definite closure in this film. Saswata plays my husband, Rahul Bose plays another very unusualcharacter and Pratyay plays my son. The relationships are not clearly etched out but explained in

suggestion and through the scenes. The laptop disturbs the seemingly peaceful harmony in her life

and in the life of her family. I do not think to reveal more will be fair to those who have yet towatch the film.

What place would she give to Laptop among the films directed by Kaushik Ganguly? Ithink this is a very different film from his earlier films including his latest Rang Milanti. In his

other films, he has articulated his narratives very clearly. In Laptop, the story is shown through

incidents, hints, suggestions, etc and not told, if you know what I mean. Laptop is a film I can sit at

7/31/2019 Churni Ganguly for CalcuttaTube.Com [Interview-Bengali Film Actress)

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home and watch alone comfortably. His manner of holding the story within the script is different

and leaves some answers for the audience to draw. It is a very mature film.

What about assignments in Mumbai? Factors other than choice have determined my

visibility on screen. When I won the Onida Pinnacle Award for Best Actress at the national level, I

was flooded with offers from Mumbai I had to let go, the only constraint being time, and notchoice. Anupam Khers company that made my career plans wanted me to meet Priyadarshan. I

was away for a month-long shoot in Rajasthan. So I lost due to bad timing. When I became a

mother, I had to forego Mumbai offers, she sums up cheerfully.

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Sunday, June 24, 2012

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