More details on Tanuja Chandra's untitled film
- mid-day.com
Aishwarya Rai will play Kashiben, a woman who lived near the Gujarat border during the 1971 war, in a still-to-be-titled film directed by Tanuja Chandra and produced by Gayatri Telesoft. According to Chandra, Gayatri Telesoft approached her with a storyline to direct the film. “I liked the idea and suggested Aishwarya Rai’s name for the protagonist’s role. Her name came to my mind first for the simple reason that she has not done anything like this before. She will not have her usual urban look in the film,” says the director.
Chandra is working on the screenplay. The male lead has not been decided.
Chandra has also spoken to Aishwarya about her dates. “We met a couple of times and she liked the role."
"The film will be shot in Gujarat and be ready for release next year,” says Chandra, but refuses to share more about the film. “I can’t give it all away, but I can tell you that it will be an anti-war film where Aishwarya will depict the true life of Kashiben, who is one character who should have been remembered but has been forgotten."
"But a few cinematic liberties will have to be taken with the character as I don’t think there’s too much archival stuff available on Kashiben."
What remains to be seen is whether Rai will be given her market price or whether she will do the film on a revenue-sharing basis like she is doing with Rituparno Ghosh’s Raincoat.
“As for how much she’s going to charge, the producers would be the right people to tell you those details,” Chandra says.
Chandra’s Filmstar (Mahima Chaudhary, Priyanshu Chatterjee) is complete, and she is getting started on Hope and Sugar in September, which she says will be shot in New York in 35 days. Chandra has not yet finalised the cast though earlier, Urmila Matondkar and Emraan Hashmi were named.
