Gulzar and Vishal Bhardwaj launch Abhishek Chaubey-Honey Trehan’s production house

6 Jan 2016 12:31 PM IST

The first production will be directed by Konkona Sen Sharma, titled 'A Death In The Gunj’.

Gulzar and Vishal Bhardwaj launch Abhishek Chaubey-Honey Trehan’s production house

Mumbai: Gulzar and Vishal Bhardwaj launched Abhishek Chaubey and Honey Trehan’s new production house - MacGuffin Pictures. Also present at the launch were Tanuja, Kalki Koechlin, Vikas Bahl to name a few. The first production will be directed by Konkona Sen Sharma, titled 'A Death In The Gunj’. The shooting of the film will start in January 25, 2016.

Konkana may have bagged many awards and impressed the audience with her performances but she said that she did not want to be an actress. The “Ek Thi Daayan” star is all set to go on floors with her directorial debut “A Death in the Gunj” but Konkona insists she had no plans of turning a director either.

“Honestly, I never wanted to be an actor either and I never thought I want to be a director. But it’s just that this particular story fascinated me for so long, a story that’s been with me for so long…I didn’t think I would write a script either. But it started getting bigger and bigger and at some point I thought ‘oh so this is how its going to be like’, I have to write and direct it,” she told reporters.

Apart from an ensemble cast of actors like Vikrant Massey, Kalki Koechlin, Gulshan Devaiah, Tanuja Mukherjee, Om Puri and Tillotama Shome, “A Death In The Gunj” also stars Konkona’s estranged husband Ranvir Shorey.

Asked if he was ready to be directed by Konkona, Ranvir joked, “I had said no (to be part of the film) but she insisted. And when someone insists you so much, specially when the director is the mother of your kid so…”

Ranvir, however, said Konkana is a very “tender” director, a quality which is rare in many filmmakers. Tillotama Shome, Gulshan Devaiah to play couple in Konkona Sen Sharma’s directorial ‘A Death In The Gunj’. “I think as an actress, and she is such a fabulous one, she understands what actors goes through. She is very gentle, almost tender I would say, which is a rare quality in a director…I think when she had not thought about making the film, I had told her to go ahead and do it because she had a fabulous idea…I didn’t know I would be a part of it.”

Legendary lyricist Gulzar, who was also present at the event, quipped about her latest slim-avatar by saying, “Direction may aadmi aksar dubla ho jata hai (Often people get slim because of direction)”.

Filmmaker Vishal Bhardwaj said he was happy Trehan and Chaubey, who have worked with him in many films, have now come on the “other side” – that of film production – and feels it will be a learning experience for the duo.