fascinated Ray. Robinson writes: "Their relationship had some echoes on a purely psychological plane for him". Ray was in particular moved by Banerjee's "daring and profound revelation", that "for some time after Sarbajaya's death Apu becomes familiar with a strange sensation ... his immediate reaction had been one of pleasure, like a surge of release ... a delight in the breaking of bonds ... there was no doubt he loved his mother, but the news of her death had at first brought him pleasure—he couldn't avoid the truth". Ray's wife Bijoya also voiced her concerns when she discovers the plot, asking him "Do you think people in our country will accept a son's relief at having won his freedom at his mother's death?" Ray was aware of the risk, saying "let's see what happens. After all, later Apu was full of regret at his initial reaction upon his mother's death. And as he realized, her death actually came as a very big blow to him". Script and crew The novels had a female character named Leela who influenced Apu's alienation from his mother when he was living in Calcutta. After rejecting two aspirants, Ray found one actress to portray the character, but the actress was not allowed to act in the film by her fiancé. Eventually, Ray removed the character from the script reluctantly. Ray himself later commented that he thought Leela, with whom Apu had an understated affair, was a strong reason behind Apu's attraction of Calcutta, and that without Leela's presence in the film, Apu's attraction to Calcutta might seem to some extent artificial: "I'm never sure, whether Apu's attachment to the city without the element of the girlfriend is strong enough, the pull that the city exerts is a bit abstract". However, when he watched the movie later, he did not feel the absence of Leela. Subrata Mitra, the cinematographer for The Apu Trilogy, made his first technical innovation with this film: the application of bounce lighting on large scale diffusers to match studio sets with location shooting. According to the Internet Encyclopedia of Cinematographers: The fear of monsoon rain had forced the art director, Bansi Chandragupta, to abandon the original plan to build the inner courtyard of a typical Benares house in the open and the set was built inside a studio in Calcutta. Mitra recalls arguing in vain with both Chandragupta and Ray about the