As audience’s beloved Deepak da or Chiranjeet Chakraborty returns to OTT as the occult expert Bhaduri Moshai with Nikosh Chhaya 2, we catch up with him on the web-series, movies, what has changed from the glorious days of commercial cinema, the impact of the social media on content and more.
Excerpts:
Your co-stars have revealed that you always had a bagful of stories during the shoot. Tell us about that.
There were many situational stories that came to my mind, and I narrated. Maybe we are shooting a scary scene, and I narrated a ghost story. When I was travelling with Bumba (Prosenjit Chatterjee) for the shoot of Kakababu to Hampi, I was telling stories of our old days.
Have you personally ever experienced the supernatural?
No. I believe in the occult or the unexplainable, but not in ghosts.
How was the experience of working under the direction of Sayantan Ghosal for this season?
Sayantan is very easy-go-lucky. I am a director myself, and for over 50 years I have been working with several directors. Many a times, directors have an ongoing tension at the back of their mind, which I think is what Param (Parambrata Chattopadhyay) felt. He thinks a lot. Sayantan is very chilled in that sense. Also, since we know the characters and the personalities, we know what to do. Sayantan just briefs when required.
Does multi-format content creation today give an actor a chance to reinvent themselves?
Yes. I believe in progress and positivity. Evolution must be there. I appreciate it a lot. I don’t cling to the olden days. We have to change with time, take the help of the new facilities available, and accept the technological advances. Further, where is the gain in cinema today? We hardly get 60 halls. In our times, we used to get 750 halls and say one movie Beder Meye Josna is running for a year in a hall. That was a different time. Today, I am getting OTT and reaching out to people through devices. So, this is the future, and we are getting a lot of audience here.
But we also notice how people quickly form an opinion by just watching 15-sec contents…
Yes. Before a movie releases the trailer or the teaser is shown and people do form an opinion. This happened a few days ago with one of my movies – Hati Hati Paa Paa. People started commenting that it is drawn from the Hindi movie Piku. But there are no similarities. Just by watching the teaser which showed the father-daughter dynamics, people formed the opinion that it is similar to Piku. Due to these comments, others got discouraged. So, many people did not watch the movie and those who did, they really liked it. Also, since it’s not a very big banner, it couldn’t hang on to halls either. Christmas came, and it was replaced by other movies. But it is still running in halls in the interiors of Bengal. This was an unfortunate situation. People could have seen the movie. It was very nice. So, this effect is also a consequence of social media.
As an actor, you have lived almost 300 lives through your characters. How do you still keep Chiranjeet / Deepak alive?
That’s the way it is. I am keeping myself alive by changing. Every 30 days of shoot, I live one character for a movie, the next 30 days I imbibe another character within myself. We are blessed that we don’t have to sit in one office, in one chair and work all our lives. Everyday, my office changes. This change is the freshness, and that is how I have been able to keep going.
Is there a filmmaking process or part of the industry from your times, that you miss today?
Since today everything is in the digital format, one can take the same shot today, multiple times. In our times, we couldn’t do that. Taking multiple shots meant changing multiple reels which amounted to a huge budget. So, the effort that was put in by the whole cast and crew to okay a shot within one or at the most two shots, is relaxed. That perfection is more at ease today.
What kind of art are you practising today?
Since my father is Shaila Chakraborty, art is in my blood. I still paint, but it takes a lot of time to complete one piece of art amidst my other commitments. I have created a new social media channel and will give the audience glimpses of how I paint. I am currently working with the Dutch style of pouring colours.
Nikosh Chhaya 2 is streaming on hoichoi