Moushumi Chatterjee | |
---|---|
Native name | মৌসুমি চ্যাটার্জী |
Born |
Moushmi Chattopadhyaya 26 April 1953 Calcutta, West Bengal, India |
Residence | Mumbai, Maharashtra, India |
Occupation | Actress |
Years active | 1967–present |
Spouse(s) | Jayant Mukherjee |
Children | Megha Payal |
Moushumi Chatterjee (born 26 April 1953; Moushumi Chāţārjī) is an Indian actress, who has acted in Hindi and Bengali cinema. Her on-screen pairings with actors like Rajesh Khanna, Shashi Kapoor, Jeetendra, Sanjeev Kumar and Vinod Mehra were popular. She was the third highest paid Hindi actress in 1973-1978.
Moushumi Chatterjee was born in Calcutta. Her father Prantosh Chattopadhyaya was in the Army and her grandfather was a judge. She had a sister and a brother.
She is married to Jayant Mukherjee (son of famous playback singer Hemant Kumar). They have two daughters, Payal and Megha. She started to act in Bollywood movies after her marriage, which was quite unusual for women during that time.
Chatterjee made her film debut in the Bengali hit Balika Badhu (1967) directed by Tarun Majumdar at the age of 14. In an interview Moushumi Chatterjee quoted, "After Balika Badhu, I was flooded with Bengali movies but I wished to complete my studies. However, movies were in my fate hence when I was studying in class X, a close aunt of mine was on her death bed and her last wish was to see me married. Hence, to satisfy her wish I got married."
Her debut as heroine in the Hindi film Anuraag in 1972 was directed by Shakti Samanta. The film became very successful. She played a blind girl who falls in love, and her performance earned her a Filmfare nomination as Best Actress. Anuraag won the Filmfare Award as Best Picture. About her Hindi film debut, she said in an interview "As my father-in-law was a renowned film celebrity many film personalities used to throng our house. One among them was filmmaker Shakti Samanta who insisted upon me to act in movies. I declined but both my father-in-law and my husband encouraged me thus I got Anuraag." When asked about her first role in Hindi films she said that "[w]hen Shaktida told me that I have to play a blind lady I was taken aback. I honestly told Shaktida that I may not do justice to the role as I have never studied a blind person but Shaktida assured me that he will take me to a blind school and train me ... he insisted to do a small Mahurat shot before. [...] After the shot Shaktida told me that I had given the shot so skillfully that there was no need to visit a blind school!"