Yellow cabs, trams, the lanes and bylanes of south Kolkata have become synonymous with Kolkata and its culture, and give the latest music video of Kochi-based independent band, When Chai Met Toast, its oh-so-relatable romantic moments. But that’s not all! The crew also chose a few spots that have seldom been seen in mainstream media. My Kolkata caught up with the people behind the music video of So beautiful, with you, which has already received a lot of love and praise from netizens.
The video was conceptualised in December 2022 by Jerrin T. Joseph and Ria Singh, both of whom have had a strong association with Kolkata since their childhood. “Kolkata was always on our mind. Having spent my childhood in this city, it felt like a no-brainer to bring together the old-world charm — the streets, trams and yellow cabs — that makes Kolkata what it is. I think the video is not just a love story between our characters, but also between them and Kolkata. It just felt right to make this video as an ode to the city I call home,” said Singh.
The video has already notched more than 570,000 hits on YouTube
As executive producers, Joseph and Singh shared their vision of this magical love story in a magical city with directors Kush Kush and Heem Verma at the helm of affairs. The team got in touch with Kolkata-based trio Ishan Ghosh, Priyarupa Thakur and Indranil Bagchi, so that they could shoot at authentic locations. While Ghosh line-produced the video, Thakur and Bagchi oversaw the production design.
“We wanted to capture the enchantment of falling in love, while exploring a new city with them,” said Kush and Verma. The duo added that they decided to shoot in Kolkata because it offered the perfect combination of retro charm with modern-day glitter. “You see, the lanes here, the architecture — it’s all very romantic. It’s like the city is in love with itself. And that was the backdrop we wanted to paint as we captured the beauty of two strangers falling in love.”
The crew after completing the shoot in Kolkata
“This video could have been shot anywhere, but the vibe was about first love, and Kolkata is an amazing place to fall in love,” smiled Ghosh. However, moving away from portraying Kolkata’s stereotypical image was challenging enough. “Our goal was to show something more metropolitan and cosmopolitan, while preserving the old-Kolkata charm. So we went with old bungalows and lanes around Southern Avenue-Dover Lane, instead of shooting in north Kolkata. The idea was to keep it subtle, instead of making it cliched or flashy,” explained Thakur.
The crew completely transformed Kolkata’s iconic tram
The band was particular about making the video relatable to a young audience. “You won’t see people like us sipping tea under the Howrah Bridge every day. If we want to take someone on a date, we would probably go to one of the cafes at Hindustan Park and walk around the streets. That inspired a major chunk of the sequences, moving away from the typical narrative of a ‘city stuck in time’,” Bagchi said, bringing attention to how a boat ride at Prinsep Ghat was replaced by a roll on Park Street.
The costume department similarly decided to do away with kurtas or panjabis — instead choosing a look that was chic and modern. “The idea was to see the city through the eyes of the characters, as opposed to an outsider’s gaze. As for the actors in the video, we see Aamna is visiting Kolkata, but Ved is a local. So, all the places they go to are a mix of small hidden restaurants, lanes that Ved knows of or late-night walks on Park Street because that was on Aamna’s Kolkata checklist,” explained Siddhanth Khemka, the DOP.
The goal wasn’t just to put forth a fresh look of the city, but also to integrate it with its classic side. While the video incorporates Victoria Memorial, yellow cabs and trams, it has a refined treatment towards these elements. The crew shot with the support of Tram World Cafe at Gariahat and lit up an antique tram in a completely novel way. “Shooting on the tram was definitely the most memorable experience. We ended up shooting on an actual functional tram that runs between Esplanade and Ballygunge. Getting all the shots in the midst of a bustling street was both chaotic and fun,” the directors reminisced.
For the yellow cab, they came armed with a folder of the desired interiors they needed in the taxi. “Our directors insisted on finding the perfect cab to shoot in, and we must have approached around 40 cabs before we got the one we wanted,” Thakur laughed. They decided to shoot Victoria Memorial through the cab’s interiors too, just to give the iconic monument a more intimate look and feel. “Shooting in these iconic locations made the video so much more memorable. We wanted to hit the audience with a certain sense of nostalgia with these locations,” the directors explained.
The Broadway Hotel and (right) the quintessential yellow cab also received a fresh treatment in the video
One of the most pleasant experiences of the crew was shooting at the popular Broadway Hotel in Chandni. “We’ve all had that one meet at a bar. That was the essence we wanted in the shot where the couple first met, which is why we chose Broadway,” said the directors.
“We wanted a setting for their first meeting that was essentially very Kolkata,” Ghosh smiled. The crew lit up the place and shot not just in the lounge, but also in the lifts. “The DOP, who collaborated with us, had another shoot afterwards, and he liked Broadway so much that he took his entire Bombay crew there for lunch. The owner was also very supportive,” he added. Khemka confesses that food was the favourite part of his Kolkata trip. “Every single day, Jerrin and Ishan would introduce us to a new local food joint — be it in the middle of location scouts, meetings or during shootings.”
This was a recurring theme throughout the two-day shoot, and the crew found immense support from the people in the city. “We shot inside the house of an architect in Salt Lake. He generally runs it as an Airbnb, but was very accommodating in helping us redo the place to make it feel lived in. Kolkata Police was also very helpful during outdoor shoots,” said Ghosh. “Kolkata is always so much fun. Since it was a January shoot, the winter food culture was a bonus. It felt like I was home,” Singh gushed.
The final shot outside the Broadway Hotel was amongst the most challenging ones, since they had to shoot on a packed central Kolkata street at noon on a weekday. “Before the shot, Indranil and I literally cordoned the footpath and there was a sea of people on both sides.” Some people even tried to go the extra mile. “People kept asking us which serial we were shooting for. A guy even told me, ‘I’m an actor, can I be an extra?’,” Bagchi laughed.
Another challenge was to constantly innovate and adapt in keeping within the tight budget. The locations were finalised less than a week before the shoot in January. “We shot a lot of impromptu sequences in the lanes around Park Street, between Allen Park and The Park hotel. It was a beautiful Mumbai-Kolkata collaboration,”Ghosh said. Bagchi added that there can often be a gap between the sensibilities of both cities, but here, the two units were extremely collaborative. “We wanted to capture the nuances that only come from living in the city, and the Mumbai unit was quite accepting of our ideas. Our vision aligned with both Kush and Heem, and we could bring out this element of nostalgia on a national and international scale.”
The video’s core vision was to make Kolkata feel like a great city to fall in love in
The comments on the video made the crew very happy. “One YouTube comment stated that ‘Kolkata’s afternoons and midnights echo the peace and calm which the song holds’ (sic). Someone even commented that the video gave them a sense of the film, Before Sunrise, which is exactly the theme of simple love that we wanted to express,” Kush and Verma signed off.
