Anasuya Sengupta on Her Cannes Un Certain Regard Best Actress Triumph: ‘I Went for a Film Festival and Came Back the Darling of the Nation’

Cannes 2024 was a life-changing journey for Indian production designer-turned actor Anasuya Sengupta who won best actress at the festival’s Un Certain Regard strand for “The Shameless.”

Sengupta made her acting debut alongside several of her friends in Anjan Dutt’s music-themed “Madly Bangali” (2009) and served as director’s assistant to Claire McCarthy in Australian production “The Waiting City” the same year. Kolkata native, Sengupta then moved to Mumbai, home to the vast Bollywood industry. She wasn’t impressed by Bollywood and became a noted production designer and artist instead. Her credits in that field include Netflix’s “Selection Day” and “Ray” and feature films “Chippa” and “Good Morning Sunshine.” Acting stayed alive in the shape of the occasional commercial or short film.

Acting became front and center again when Bulgarian-American filmmaker Konstantin Bojanov was prepping for “The Shameless.” At one stage, when he was particularly disillusioned with the financing process for the independent film and was considering turning the live action feature into an adult animation, Bojanov turned to Sengupta for her character visualization skills. The filmmaker befriended Sengupta on Facebook and she soon started noticing his likes on her artwork posts.

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“Then one fine day in 2020, I saw him in my inbox. And he was potentially offering me a lead part in his feature film, and I was completely caught off guard. And a little bit suspicious, not in a bad way,” Sengupta told PvNew. But I was worried. I’m like, ‘Do you not know my background?’ ‘I don’t have a body of work as an actor. I don’t even have headshots. I can’t provide you with anything.’ But he was quite persistent, oddly enough. And I gave in, and I read the script.”

once she read the script, it was a “no-brainer” for Sengupta. She took her time but eventually sent a self-tape to Bojanov. “I kept coming across pictures of Anasuya. There was something in her attitude. I go with a gut reaction,” Bojanov told PvNew.

In “The Shameless” Sengupta plays protagonist Renuka who escapes from a Delhi brothel after killing a policeman, seeks refuge in a community of sex workers in a small town in northern India and develops a forbidden romance with Devika (Omara), a young girl condemned to a life of prostitution.

The PvNew review of “The Shameless” praises Sengupta’s turn as “an impeccably, self-assured performance, rife with enrapturing nuances that create a liberating sense of queer Indian femininity seldom depicted on screen.”

Sengupta’s physical prep involved martial arts and running three kilometers a day. An English honors graduate of Kolkata’s Jadavpur University, she also wrote copious character notes as a prequel to the script. Bojanov gave her the liberty to design the character. “I tried to design Renuka in a way that she’s gaunt, but strong. She doesn’t really prioritize square meals in the day. But at the same time, we needed her to look super-powerful. She’s a survivor, she survived on the street from when she’s a teenager,” Sengupta said.

“Besides that, this lone wolf angle that she had, I found that super attractive. It’s not something I, Anasuya, have at all, because, I’m surrounded by lovely friends and a supportive family,” Sengupta said. Apart from establishing chemistry with Omara, Sengupta kept to herself during the filming process and allotted different pieces of music she’d listen to on her headphones to suit the various moods of the film. “People rallied around me beautifully. I got all the support that I could have wanted. It was super collaborative,” Sengupta said. “I’ve never had such a good time every day at work. It’s never happened in my life before.”

Sengupta describes the reception to the film at Cannes as “magical” and found herself in the limelight for the first time. As a production designer, “You bust your ass behind the scenes, year upon year with little to no recognition. And you don’t even seek that, because with production design, if you’ve done your job well, it should not be noticed,” Sengupta said. “I still believe that even acting shouldn’t be that noticeable.”

Nevertheless, post screening, Sengupta was constantly stopped on the Croisette by admirers. “It’s not like people noticed my acting, the praises that people came up to me and were giving me was about that they felt really in the skin of the character.”

As for the award itself, Sengupta was hoping for the Queer Palm at best and the win made her “ecstatic,” particularly as the jury was headed by Xavier Dolan, one of her favorite filmmakers. “I couldn’t get over it. In fact, I told him, ‘Why have you stopped making films? And please do not and please make one with me.’ And so I’m waiting for that to happen,” Sengupta said.

It was a triumphant Cannes 2024 for India, with a record amount of representation and prizes. Payal Kapadia won the Grand Prix for “All We Imagine as Light.” Chidananda S. Naik won the best film prize in La Cinef short film strand with “Sunflowers Were the First ones to Know.” Santosh Sivan won the Pierre Angénieux honor for cinematography.

India’s Cannes renaissance was led by and was mostly about women. “People know the value in women coming to the forefront. But it’s still suppressed, we still have to fight for it,” Sengupta said. “So, when you get these strong signs from the art world, it gives such a rush of hope, Cannes for me was so much about that.”

For decades, billboards and advertisements for popular butter brand Amul have held up a mirror to current Indian events. Sengupta returned home to a hero’s welcome and saw herself on a giant Amul billboard in Mumbai.

“I went for a film festival and I came back being made to feel like the darling of the nation. I was absolutely not prepared for this,” Sengupta said.