I aspire to be an artiste like Zohra Sehgal: Tannishtha Chatterjee

Tannishtha Chatterjee

Actress Tannishtha Chatterjee, known for her performances in films like "Rough Book", "Angry Indian Goddesses" and "Parched", says she wants to be like the late veteran actress Zohra Sehgal.

"I remember the day when I met Zohra Sehgal for the first time. She was 90 and I was 19. Even at her age, I was astonished by seeing her diligent, discipline and commitment to her work. That is a true taste of an artiste. My aspiration is to be that sort of an artiste," Tannishtha said here in an interview.

"I think for an artist, there is no scope of being satisfied. The day you are satisfied with your work, you are stopping yourself from exploring another avenue. It hasn't stopped for me and it is a continuous journey.

"I am learning and growing and this process should continue," added the acclaimed actress, often called 'princess of parallel cinema'.

Tannishtha's latest film is Garth Davis's "Lion", which received six Oscar nominations but didn't register any win.

On being asked about her experience of the film, she said: "I have a very nice time working with Garth Davis. He is incredibly good with actors. Though I had a brief role, but the reason why I wanted to do it was because Garth wrote this role for me."

"I have always played a good girl in other movies. The shiftiness of this character actually drew me towards it. I really wanted to explore that," Tannishtha added.

"Lion" is based on a real life incident and all characters are from real life, while Tannishtha's character is fictional.

In her new project, the actress will be seen portraying a historic figure Doctor Rukhmabai, said to be India's first practising lady doctor. The 36-years-old says it's a multilingual film and she had to learn Marathi for it.

"Besides that, I will be doing another British and French film this year," added Tannishtha, who had also earlier featured in films like "Brick Lane" and "UnIndian".