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Prithviraj, the new-age superstar

The Southern actor is back in Bollywood with Naam Shabana

What does it take for a superstar, adored by critics and masses alike in the South, to step down from the pedestal and travel up North to star in a woman-centric Bollywood film?
For Prithviraj Sukumaran, a veteran of over 90 films, it is "the next good script."
By his own admission, though, the Malayalam film industry is currently going through its best phase, content wise. "I don't remember the last time I listened to a bad Malayalam script," he admits during a candid chat at the Khaleej Times office last Thursday.
The actor who made his Bollywood debut in 2012 opposite Rani Mukerji in Aiyyaa was next seen in 2013's Aurangzeb. So what's taken him a good four years to make it back to the big screen with Naam Shabana, starring Manoj Bajpayee and Taapsee Pannu?
"For me there are only two kinds of movies. Good and bad," Prithviraj says matter-of-factly. "The endeavor is to be part of good cinema. You may or may not be successful in it.
"If you have been following my career, I'm clearly not someone who prioritizes in terms of language. Okay, I have done four Malayalam films, let me do one Tamil and one..
"No. For me it is just a good script that I listen to. And this film came to me through Neeraj.
"The movie presented a very unique idea - you put a female protagonist at the centre of the plot and then design a film around her. But you don't write anything that caters to the so-called vulnerabilities of the gender - that was new."
The actor who eschews rehearsals took special care for the action sequences when his character confronts Taapsee's Shabana.
"When I landed up for an action sequence, it was very important for me to realise that I shouldn't think of it in terms of facing off against a girl. This is a character written for a girl in a film that does not rely on gender vulnerabilities, so I kept that in mind."
"I've lost count of the number of action sequences I've done in my career, but this was a new thing for me."
"Hats off to Taapsee. I saw first hand the kind of work she's put in. Women in Indian cinema are not conditioned to do action and for somebody like her to walk in and be comfortable doing that is great. I really hope this starts a lot of new things in the industry."
"This film will work if Shabana was a man, but the writer chose to say this story through a girl... And that is something I'd love to see in Malayalam films also. Like I say, I'd have done this even if it had come to me in Malayalam."
What's in a surname?
The actor whose recent outing in the Malayalam film, Ezra, has proven to be a game changer in many ways, reveals a bigger vision.
"The whole idea of Bollywood incorporating actors from other regions speaks of a very optimistic larger picture for the future," he says. " I believe that sometimes in the future, our country should amalgamate to formulate a pan Indian film industry.
"I think that's how we can take Indian cinema to the world stage. We've had something like Baahubali from Andhra Pradesh. Think of a stage that is three times that size, that originates from Bollywood which has actors/technicians from all over the country. This is the way to start - when India's biggest film industry starts inviting and incorporating talent from all over the region into its own."
At a time when the industry is reeling under the nepotism tag, it is heartening or ironic (your pick) to have a movie like Naam Shabana helmed by "outsiders" whether it is the director Shivam Nair, writer-producer Neeraj Pandey, or actors Manoj Bajpayee and Taapsee Pannu. And then there is Prithviraj; the proverbial "star son" who has proved his worth is more than his surname.
"Regardless of your surname - which is going to give you one, maybe, two films - I don't think you are going to survive (without talent) especially in an industry that is as competitive as films," explains Prithviraj.
In search of better co-actors
Not many actors can boast of churning out consecutive hits like Prithviraj has done of late. From his debut film Nandanam in 2002 to his latest one, he's proven to be bankable star worth every penny invested by the producers as well as the audience. Even Manoj Bajpayee refers to him during our interview as the "superstar of Malayalam cinema". Unlike lesser actors he, however, has no qualms admitting he wants to work with those as good or better than him. "I really don't think there can be a great performance in a bad scene," he explains. "And great performances in bad films are usually not remembered, so you better be hoping that if you have a great character in a film, it better be in a great film with great scenes in it.
"Now for a film to be great it has to be that the actors you are working with have to be good or better than you," states Prithviraj, a self-confessed Manoj Bajpayee fan who unfortunately doesn't have any face-to-face scenes with the latter in the movie.
He's also full of praise for Akshay Kumar, who is part producer and plays a cameo in Naam Shabana as well. "It's so heartening to see one of mainstream Bollywood's biggest superstars taking this arch in his career. I completely respect him for that."
As for his own success, he has a very refreshing take on it. "The idea is to stay equally disconnected from your success and your failures. Over the years I've realised that when you have a film that has gone to become a huge success, it is so tempting to stay in that. Because every evening there is a celebration. You are called to Dubai for a success party, then you fly to the US for a success meet. Then someone from London calls to say there is a celebration here. But the idea is to say, no, thank you, 'I'm shooting my next film'. And when you have a huge failure - in a movie that you were so convinced about and put so much of yourself into, again, it is very easy to sit there and think, ?Oh My God, what is this?, I have invested so much in this film and this has happened. Now, what do I do?' The idea is to analyze it, learn what you can from it and then move on."
ambica@khaleejtimes.com