The Last Lear team had picnic at Toronto

By: Subhash K. Jha, IndiaFM
Wednesday, September 19, 2007

Rituparno has never been happier. Ritu and his entire Last Lear team had a picnic in Toronto. "I've never seen this kind of ovation for any of my film. And we were all so relaxed."

Laughs Ritu, "All of us from The Last Lear team were completely cut away from the Festival crowd because we were put up at the Royal York because Amit-da wanted to stay there. But there was a stunning solidarity among us. The entire team—Amitji, Arjun, Preity, newcomer Jisshu Sengupta, then the producer Arindam Chowdhary and executive producer Shubho Shekhar—were all there. And then Presanjeet who was there for Buddhadeb Dasgupta's Kaal Purush joined us because he has a cameo in Last Lear. Arjun had come with his wife Meher and Prosenjeet's wife was also there, also the producer's wife. So the ambience was relaxed."

Ritu recalls the journey to the 'Gala' event at the Toronto Film Festival. "All of us got into three stretch limos as though we were proceeding to picnic. I was wearing black, Amit-da was wearing an off-white band –gala for the Gala, Arjun was wearing a suit, Preity was wearing grey. So it was a perfect 'Grey Card' situation for television."

Ritu sobers down. "There was only one reason why I was very hassled. I was seeing The Last Lear for the first time. I've been to innumerable festivals. But this was a unique experience. They kept asking why Shakespeare was part of an Indian film. I had to keep explaining, I grew up meeting Shakespeare on the streets of Kolkata. Theatre Road was renamed Shakespeare Sarani. Shakespeare is lodged permanently in Kolkata. Anyway, Deepa Mehta and Vishal Bhardwaj and his wife were among those who really loved The Last Lear."