Nandita Das with Sabitri Chatterjee on the sets of Padakhkhep. Picture by Aranya Sen

Waiting for her Padakhkhep crew to set up her next shot, Nandita Das is getting goosebumps recalling Philip Seymour Hoffman breaking down in the last scene of Capote. Catching up on films ? she is dying to watch Being Cyrus and Brokeback Mountain ? heads Nandita?s priority list during her 15-day stay in the city. And when she is not making or watching movies, Nandita has been lunching with Mrinal Sen and dining with Amartya Sen.

?I do really get along with old folks,? she states. ?Most of my friends are seventy-plus people. Here in Calcutta, I have three nice ol? friends ? Mrinalda, Tapanda (Sinha) and Samirda (Mukerjee). They have been there and done that and they have so many stories to tell. Majhe majhe aamar money hoy aami buro hoye jachchi... My friends tell me I swing between 12 and 60. Of course, I wouldn?t like the childlikeness about myself to fade away.?

In fact, the reason Nandita agreed to do Padekhkhep was the fact that she was getting to work with another oldie ? Soumitrada. ?At first I told the director Suman Ghosh that I have nothing to do in this film and almost turned the offer down,? she recalls. ?Then I thought it was just 15 days of my life but it was his first film. So, I agreed to do the film despite it essentially being about the loneliness of old people.?

Padakhkhep will be Nandita?s third Bengali film after Mrinal Sen?s Aamar Bhuvan and Rituparno Ghosh?s Shubho Mahurat. ?I understand Bengali well but don?t speak it that fluently,? she reveals. ?What I do is keep speaking wrong Bengali shamelessly on the sets. Since I am never corrected, I keep making the same mistakes.?

It?s a slightly more complicated scenario when it comes to other languages. ?I have done films in Tamil, Telugu, Kannada, Gujarati, Marwari, Marathi... and it?s really a big struggle shuttling between languages,? Nandita feels. ?I still get nightmares and I start feeling that I shouldn?t have said yes to the project. It?s like an exam for all those 20 days of the schedule and you can never really have fun on the sets.?

But Nandita, who recently did a Malayalam-English bilingual film by Santosh Sivan co-starring Rahul Bose and American actor Linus Roache, has her reasons for doing regional films. ?There is a lesser commercial compromise, more sincerity and better stories and talent,? she quickly rattles off. ?I can?t relate to the hardcore commercial films that are made in Mumbai. And I have had some bad experiences. I couldn?t imagine then, to what extent a producer can interfere or how much an actor can change the script.?

In fact, her mere presence changed the way people perceived the Hindi movies Nandita starred in. ?When I did Pitaah, people asked Sanjay Dutt why he is doing an art film and people asked me why I am doing a commercial movie. For 1947 ? Earth, people became busy labelling the film, rather than watching it.?

For Nandita to sign a film now, one or all three factors of a good script, a good director and a good role have to be in place. ?It?s very rare that you get all three,? she explains. ?I just did a Marathi film by Chitra Palekar, based on Mahasveta Devi?s story, because I have an extremely powerful role there. You, of course, feel more safe when you are working with an experienced director. I have had the good fortune of working with the likes of Shyam Benegal, Govind Nihalani, Mani Ratnam and, now one can say, Rakeysh Mehra but then half my work I have done with first-time directors.?

In her quest to do quality work, Nandita also has had to turn down big directors. ?They pleaded with me not to tell people that I rejected their offers,? she whispers. ?But yes, I have my baggage, my hang-ups which people take personally. The media also have labelled me as someone arrogant who doesn?t want to do work at all.?

But it does hurt her when Nandita finds herself missing from the cast of a film she had got emotionally attached to. ?I will be lying if I say I am not sad for not being able to do Water,? she admits. ?I gave a lot of myself into the project. I shaved off my head and then our freedom of expression was challenged in Varanasi. It would have also finished my trilogy of Fire, Earth and Water. At different stages, I was supposed to do different characters in the film. First the one Lisa Ray plays now and then the one Seema Biswas has done. But I am excited to see the film now that it has gotten made. Then again, these things keep happening in the film industry. I am a person who doesn?t regret much in life but I do miss not being part of Water and Chokher Bali.?

A pause later, she looks forward. ?I am awaiting the release of Jagmohan Mundhra?s Provoked,? Nandita sounds excited again. ?A journalist attacked me as to why I was trying to ruin my career by playing second fiddle to Aishwarya Rai in the film. But that was his perspective of looking at things. I had worked with this director before (for Bawander) and I was broke at that time having not done a film for a year. Also, I was playing a character, not second fiddle to someone.?

Her acting assignments taken care of, Nandita will embark on her own directorial venture in the near future. ?I have just finished the basic structure of the script and it?s really too early to talk about the project,? she smiles. ?But yes, it will be about things that bother me all the time.?