One of Bengali cinema’s finest character artists
Dhritiman Chaterji
now leads a quiet life in Goa. He recently brought life to Professor Shonku,
Satyajit Ray’s iconic creation, on the celluloid. The seasoned actor played the titular role in
Sandip Ray’s ‘Professor Shonku O El Dorado’. Interestingly, Dhritiman made his acting debut with Ray’s ‘Pratidwandi’ in 1970 and went on 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, Dhritiman tells us in an exclusive chat.
I was being called an ‘angry, young rebel, anti-establishment’ actor “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’.
The unforgettable memories with Ray “My experience with every director is valuable to me. But Satyajit Ray was a complete filmmaker with full control on all aspects of cinema whether it was the screenplay, costumes or cinematography. The most distinguishing characteristic of Ray was that he was extremely planned. Before the shoot of a film would begin he would have worked out all the details,” recalls the veteran actor.
Why say ‘no’ to Mainstream films The versatile actor feels mainstream films those days were not for him, “The roles I was offered from the commercial films didn’t have the necessary scope to show my acting merit. Frankly speaking, it would have felt uncomfortable for me to do such roles and I also didn’t want to be typecast in my early days.”
No serious political films being made now “There was a healthy trend of political films in the ’60s and ’70s. I was witness to that time from close and had been a part of cinematic works on the subject. Agitations, movements - that was a critical phase. But sadly no more such work these days. Perhaps the form of airing views has changed. Perhaps streets have been replaced by social media. Maybe the level and type of political consciousness have also undergone a change in all these years. But that can also come up in our films. That is why I don’t find most of the scripts here exciting enough,” said the actor who has also been a regular in Hindi films.
Challenging roles I'd say Ray's last three films (Ganashatru, Shakha Prashakha and Agantuk), which he made after a severe, prolonged illness.
In Ganashatru, which was his version of (Norwegian playwright Henrik) Ibsen's Enemy Of The State, it was a difficult role because I played a negative character for the first time.
Then again, I was a bit of a b*****d (laughs) in 36, Chowringhee Lane (1981), just before that. But Ganashatru was as negative as it gets, which was quite a challenge.
And (director of Bengali art-house films) Ashok Vishwanathan made a film called Sunya Theke Suru in 1993, when I really had a tough time. My character was of an academic, who joins Left-wing extremists, is jailed and forgotten. He goes through insanity and rehabilitation.
The deranged part of it was quite torturous - I had to roam the streets of (Kolkata's) Sealdah in filthy rags!