Shaheen Parkar (MID-DAY; July 28, 2014)

Sushmita Sen is currently in Kolkata shooting for her first Bangla film, Srijit Mukherji’s Nirbaak. She describes it as a coming-back-home experience.

Nostalgia seems to have gripped her as Sushmita recollects how she’d visit the City of Joy during her childhood to meet her grandparents who lived there. So even as she shoots at various landmarks in the city, she says, “Every road here seems to speak volumes.” The actress was last seen on the big screen in the 2010 Bollywood film, No Problem. She apparently took a while to do a film in Bangla because she wanted to take on a project in her mother tongue only when she felt she was “ totally ready for it and now is the time.” Sush will be shooting in Kolkata till mid-August. Once she is back in Mumbai, she will get busy with her fitness venture. While in Kolkata, she is also savouring the city’s local specialties — another childhood connect.

Meanwhile, there has also been a lot of speculation about Sushmita doing a television show. The actress says, “I look forward to being a part of the TV space. I respect this medium a lot. But things are still being discussed and nothing has been confirmed yet. So any speculation at the moment is untrue.”

It may be pointed out that Sush, along with former Pakistani cricketer, Wasim Akram, had judged the dance reality show, Ek Khiladi Ek Hasina in 2008.

Upala KBR (DNA; June 9, 2014)

The lines between the big and the small screen are blurring. Telly actors (Sushant Singh Rajput, Shiv Pandit, Gurmeet Singh) have moved from serials to cinema, while Amitabh Bachchan, Madhuri Dixit and Karan Johar have embraced the chota purdah. More and more actors who never considered television as an alternative are now open to offers. One such actress is Sushmita Sen.

Says Sush, “Television never lost hope in me. TV has always been around with different production houses coming with different contents which they still don’t have on air but have interesting ideas. The reality shows have approached me, they always have that range of actors they want to work with but somehow for some reason or the other I have not been ready to do it.”

She reveals that she was even approached to do a daily soap, “Yes, something interesting had come up as a daily soap but not a typical one. It’s on air now but I couldn’t do it then as I had my reasons. There’s a reason I am so selective... I want to do a Sushmita Sen chat show one day... I want to do knowing fully well that I have never hosted anything before including award ceremonies or events because that is what I want to save for my show. It will be a chat show with a twist — something that inspires the hell out of me! This is a kind of concept that will happen in due course.”