Pooja Hegde on her dream debut at Cannes 2022 – “I have come as a representative for India; there cannot be a bigger honour for me”
Written by Sneh Chaudhry on May 19, 2022
Pooja Hegde made her dream debut at the 75th Cannes Film Festival on Wednesday evening on the red carpet of Top Gun: Maverick premiere. Ahead of her appearance, she attended the Indian Pavilion event where she talked about representing the culture of India and how honoured she is to become a part of it.
The Indian Pavilion was attended by film industry members like Tamannaah Bhatia, R Madhavan, Deepika Padukone, Nawazuddin Siddiqui, AR Rahman and Prasoon Joshi, including others. Hegde thanked Anurag Thakur, the Union Minister of Sports and Youth Affairs as well as Information and Broadcasting, and said, “It has always been a dream to work at Cannes and I think what’s amazing sir – thank you Anurag sir for making this happen – is that I have not come with a brand but I have come with brand India. I have come as a representative for India. There cannot be a bigger honour for me to be very honest, to come as an Indian actor celebrating Indian cinema.”]
Hegde said, “We have many stories in India.” Speaking about renowned filmmaker, Satyajit Ray, she continued, “What the West loves about India is Satyajit Ray sir’s films, whether it is the Apu series or whether it is a film like ‘Nayak’ which is about a hero and his personal struggle and it has just been shot so beautifully. It’s got so much skill, so much craft and we have that talent in India, we have it. We just need to stop aping the West and we need to embrace our personal stories whether it is ‘Charulata’. These are like films that are from India which have been celebrated across the globe.”
Pooja Hegde also mentioned AR Rahman, Nawazuddin Siddiqui for their contributions to Indian cinema and paid tribute to late Irrfan Khan. She said, “Rahman sir, you have put India on the map. Nawaz sir, you are doing amazing work whether it is working with the West or like, if Irrfan sir was not here today, who also kind of put India on the map.” The actress finished her statement by saying, “So I just feel like we should stop aping the West.”
