Abhishek Banerjee calls Stolen's win at Chetak Screen Awards a ‘big victory for independent filmmakers’

On April 5, at the Chetak Screen Awards, Stolen, starring Abhishek Banerjee, emerged as one of the biggest winners in the OTT category, taking home four major honours - ‘Best OTT Film’, ‘Best Director’ for Karan Tejpal, ‘Best Actor (Male)’ for Banerjee and ‘Best Script’. For the casting director-turned-actor, the film’s success is more than just a win - it’s a validation of independent filmmaking driven purely by passion, often without any certainty about its future.

Reflecting on the win, Abhishek Banerjee told SCREEN, “I think there is an immense level of satisfaction because when you work hard without knowing the future. I think that’s the extreme amount of passion anybody can put into any project. When you are doing a film from an ecosystem of Bollywood or the industry, you know it is going to release or come on OTT. But as an actor, when you do a film like ‘Stolen’, you don’t know if it is ever going to see the light of the day.”

He further added, “You are just taking a part. You are listening to the instinct and you are believing people whom you have never met. I think this whole experience of being able to do a film with completely unknown people and then making them your closest friend in life and then thriving like this in one of the oldest, legendary and credible award shows. I think it is a big win for all independent filmmakers. All youngsters. This shows that no matter where you are from, if you make a good film, you will get all the glitz and glamour attached to it.”

Abhishek also opened up about his versatility across genres - from making audiences laugh as Jaana in ‘Stree’, to leaving them unsettled as Vishal Tyagi in ‘Pataal Lok’, to portraying a tragic, vulnerable character in ‘Stolen’.

While he initially quipped, “I have multiple personality disorder,” he went on to explain, “I simply believe that we humans have all sorts of characteristics in us. It’s just that we don’t use it in day-to-day life and as actors, we are trained to evoke those emotions through our skill set. There is no extraordinary talent. It is years of practice that make you an actor.”