Ranjan Ghosh introduces the 'Fabulous Four' of his upcoming Mahishasur Marddini

In Ranjan Ghosh’s upcoming film Mahishasur Marddini, conceived as a letter of apology to women who have been wronged, Sritama Dey, Aryuun Ghosh, Arunima and Abhyuday Dey represent the voices of the contemporary generation. Coming from a theatre background, these artistes were auditioned by the director himself and selected from among 50 candidates.

Starring Rituparna Sengupta, Parambrata Chatterjee and Saswata Chatterjee, Mahishasur Marddini presents a collage of narratives from a single night. In the film, the four characters hail from the suburbs and stay as paying guests in a house owned by Sengupta’s character. Sengupta and the four characters have some visitors on that particular night and, through their interactions, the entire film unfolds.

Ghosh did not want known faces for the characters and hence did the auditions himself. “I shared the shortlisted candidates with my producer and Ritu-di [Sengupta] as she was supposed to act with them, and they concurred with my choices," the maker of Hrid Majharey (2014), Rong Beronger Korhi (2018) and Ahaa Re (2019) said.

"These four were my first choices,” he added. “They were called the 'fabulous four' and we created a WhatsApp group called Fab4 in which they would interact in their avatars.” The director also put them through an extended workshop.

While Sritama, Arunima and Abhyuday have done smaller parts in films before, Mahishasur Marddini is Aryuun’s debut film. “This is not only my opinion, but Parambrata also used to call them the mainstay of the film," Ghosh said. "He even used to pull their leg calling the lead artistes supporting characters to these four young actors.

"Humour aside, what I mean to say is that they were a real pleasure to work with. Each of them has a different personality and lookwise also they have distinct appearances, and I didn’t have to do many takes with them,” he added. The youngsters were full of energy on the sets and always kept the spirits up, he said.

Ghosh has always been keen to launch fresh faces in his films. In Ahaa Re, he introduced Subhro S Das, who had a pivotal role in the film. Das is also part of Subhrajit Mitra’s upcoming Avijatrik.

Ghosh will begin the dubbing session for Mahishasur Marddini soon.

Correction, 24 September 2021: Aryuun Ghosh and Abhyuday Dey were misidentified in the photo caption in an earlier version of this report.