Mumbai, Oct 11 (IANS): Bengali actress Tannistha Chatterjee has been roped in to play a major part in a British production based on Leo Tolstoy's classic "Anna Karenina", with Keira Knightley playing the title role and Jude Law starring as her husband.

The project is being directed by the super-successful Joe Wright, whose literary adaptations of Jane Austen's "Pride and Prejudice" in 2005, followed by the much-acclaimed box-office hits "Atonement", "The Soloist" and "Hanna" have put him right up there among the most successful British directors.

Tannishtha too has been lately making ripples across Western cinema. Her portrayal of the Bangladeshi wife in London in the British film "Brick Lane", directed by Sarah Gavron, fetched her accolades across the globe. Last year, she shot a major film with actress Lucy Liu, who was making her directorial debut.

Joe Wright's project is Tannishtha biggest global break to date. Apparently, she has been cast as a gypsy woman named Masa.

A source who spotted Tannishtha sharing some great moments of camaraderie with Jude Law and Keira Knigtley said: "Tannishtha's character of the gypsy has nothing to with her being an Indian. Masa could be a woman of any nationality. That Joe Wright thought of casting Tannishtha is such a major role in one of the biggest cinematic projects on the floors at the moment, is amazing."

"Tannishtha is having a ball shooting. Though this is the director Joe Wright's third film with Keira, not for a minute does Tannishtha feel out of place. In fact Tannishtha, Keira and Jude Law are quite a threesome in London at the moment," the source added.

Incidentally, Wright is the husband of sitarist Anushka Shankar, Pandit Ravi Shankar's daughter.

Tannishtha remained unavailable for comment.