Shyam Benegal

In keeping with the growing trend in Bollywood, veteran director Shyam Benegal returns to making a comedy film -- after quarter of a century -- through his latest work Mahadev Ka Sajjanpur to be released commercially in March-April this year.
The film, starring Amrita Rao and Shreyas Talpade, considered an emerging poster boy of off-beat cinema after acting in Nagesh Kuknoor's Iqbal, is the story of an educated youth in a village who makes a living by writing letters for the illiterate. The youth aspires to become a novelist and puts his own emotions into the letters he writes for others and the result is rib-tickler.
While Talpade, who also acts Kuknoor's forthcoming movie Bombay to Bangkok, plays the role of the village youth, Amrita essays the role of his wife. Both are clearly appear in de-glamourised roles.
If you think that Benegal's latest movie will be a pure laugh-riot, you are wrong. Like all his films, Mahadev Ka Sajjanpur will send out a message couched in humour, indicates the director.
Benegal, who has pioneered a new genre of Hindi films with work like Ankur, Bhoomika, Manthan, Nishant, Sooraj Ka Saatwan Ghoda, Mandi, Junoon, Mammo and Zubeida had been waiting for several years to make the comedy after he saw an illiterate man in his office getting someone else to write letters to his wife and read the letters to him from her.
The director said that the real story held out the promise of turning into an interesting comedy.
The last time Benegal had made an out-and-out comedy was in 1974 Charandas Chor and he made it a point out that even Mandi, a story about nautch girls starring Shabana Azmi, Naseeruddin Shah and Om Puri, had elements of light-hearted satire.
Therefore, when a television journalist had recently told Benegal that Mahadev Ka Sajjanpur was his first attempt at making a comedy, the director appeared to have got a little annoyed and shot back “no this is the third time I'm making a comedy film”.
Apart from his comedy, Benegal is making at least two more films -- including one based on George Bizet's Spanish opera and another on Buddha.