Anindya Sarkar, Tota Roy Choudhury, Arunima Ghosh and Oishani Kar. PHOTO: PRABIR MITRA

If Uttam Kumar and Suchitra Sen did a Pothe Holo Deri decades ago, we replicated that, in a sense, on our drive to Falta where Anindya Sarkar and his crew were in the last phase of shooting in the one and only ‘Mejda’s hotel’. It was being slapped into place at a hectic pace because the previous day things had got inordinately delayed in Falta, and the last-day shoot, scheduled in the city, had to be relocated in Falta instead. Naturally, everyone’s plans got thrown out of gear. And thrown out of gear was the driver, too, on the rain-deteriorated roads and traffic bottlenecks and pitch darkness (on return). Which made the going tough and naturally, pothe holo deri for us, too, both ways.

What went wrong the previous day, nobody was keen to elaborate but with an artiste reputed for her starry airs around, it didn’t take much to guess.

No sooner had we put foot to soil, Arunima hustled Anindya into allowing the photoshoot rightaway never mind the fact that a shot was being taken with two artistes, one of them Tota Roy Choudhury. Anindya kept her at bay, finished the shot and smilingly explained to us that the two guys in the scene were both doctors, and grinned that “Arunima isn’t the patient, she is impatient”. Touche!

Time for Arunima to again go, hurry hurry hurry, barge in, click click click, barge out, and vanish into the darkness. Have seen her purring as a cool cat. But this time she seemed to be on a hot tin roof. Oh, yeah, the shoe pinches the other foot, too...

The tin roof cooler now, Anindya got into snapshot mode, quick closeups from various angles and filler shots, and the rest, drawing the shoot of Pathe Holo Deri to an end. The calm after the storm, in the Oti Uttam series of Uttam Kumar films being made into telefilms by Arjoe Entertainment. Anindya took one last casual look at the set, and eyes lingering on the plant tubs, he muttered good-humouredly, “All these ‘green’ prop guys love to do is push a plant tub onto the set. One would think we are always shooting our telefilms in a nursery!”

Scheduled telecast: ETV Bangla; Nov 26, 9:30pm