'It took me weeks to forget Ayyanar'-Aadhi

IN an image driven industry, it takes sheer courage for a debutant hero to play Aadhi’s role in Mirugam. A rough, arrogant, violent, sexually overactive, rustic character who ends up an AIDS victim, turning hollow eyed, balding and emaciated is not everyone’s idea of a dream debut.

His debut can perhaps be compared to that of Karthi, who also courageously took on a rustic, self-transforming role in Paruthiveeran, both actors preferring performance over appearance and image. Aadhi too in actuality, is quite the opposite of his screen character. So who is Aadhi? How tough was Mirugam? What are his future plans in Kollywood?

No cakewalk

“I‘m a complete Chennaiite,” says the Don Bosco and Venkateshwara Engineering College graduate. A BE in Computer Engineering satisfied his dad Raviraja Pini Setty (actor and director of 60 Telugu films) who always kept him away from the uncertain cinematic world. “Till I joined movies I had never been to a film shooting!” grins Aadhi.

So why did he join films? “Actors from the film frat were doing it around me and when I acted in a play Galileo Galilei directed by Mu Ramasamy, I thought of giving films a shot,” he shrugs. The first break came with Teja’s Telugu film Oka V Chitram which didn’t do too well. He was disappointed and decided to discontinue and get a job.

But director Saamy spotted him at the YMCA at Pandian master’s Silambam class and offered him Mirugam. “Frankly I was hesitant and thought it's not for a newcomer. But my friends encouraged me. I also knew that the Tamil audience would encourage something new, so I accepted,” recalls Aadhi.

The going gets tough

Preparation for the role was tough. “From 85 kg I increased to 95 kg and then reduced to 65 kg for the second half where I become sick and old,” recalls Aadhi. He exercised vigorously for the muscled look and grew a beard and long hair to complete his character. He stayed in Kurandi village for one-and-a-half months to get the dialect, arrogant swagger and mannerisms of Ayyanar by watching the local folks.

“I became completely tanned, with skin peeling off. I wore only a veshti. We had no TV, computer or mobiles. I used to watch the men getting drunk so I could imitate them in the film. I recorded live conversations to practise the speech. When the unit came to visit the location, Thota Tharani’s car whizzed past me as I looked just like a local,” chuckles Aadhi who had indeed passed the litmus test.

The sick man’s make up took three hours to put on and two hours to remove. So after a long late night shoot, he would get two hours sleep and then had to be back in the make up room early morning! The heat made it worse. Shooting went on for long hours in rough terrain without even a tree for shade. But the toughest parts were the intimate scenes.

“I wasn’t comfortable and had to go for several retakes,” he recollects. Getting out of the role was equally tough. “It took me weeks to forget Ayyanar. I would talk rudely to my parents and react arrogantly, always speaking the Madurai dialect.

Getting rid of the beard and long hair after five months, was the first step towards becoming my old self. Being with my friends helped greatly. When I first came back and saw TVs, computers and mobiles, they looked completely alien!” recalls Aadhi.

Future plans

Aadhi is currently doing S Pictures Eerum, directed by Arivu Azhagan. The exact opposite of Ayyanar, he plays a city-bred, subtle, level headed youth. Samy’s next, Sarithiram is a fully commercial action film with Raj Kiran and Ganja Karuppu.

About the future he says, “I am grateful to Samy. I wasn’t confident, but he had faith in me and moulded me. I have three very varied movies and my future depends on the audience’s response to me.

I personally would love to work with directors like Gautham, Ameer, Sasikumar, Venkat Prabhu, Bala and Selvaraghavan.” Aadhi’s motto in life are dad's words, ‘Success and failure should never take you high nor low.’ With a balanced outlook to life and the courage of conviction in his eyes, looks like this new kid on the block is set to go places.

Dream debut

Aadhi’s famous three-and-a-half minute Jallikattu scene was cut from the film due to a protest by the Animal Welfare Board and a court case on the sport. Aadhi was deeply disappointed. “It was my opening scene which establishes the character. Samy told me we could use a dupe but I wanted to do the Jallikattu scene myself.

Maybe I had grown accustomed to roaming with bulls and cows by then! I actually played the sport amongst a live Jallikattu we had organised, complete with protective measures in place.

Only the final scene where I turn the bulls head was filmed in close up with the bull safely segregated,” recalls Aadhi. Later the case was resolved but it was too late to include the scenes in the film.

The hard work did pay and Aadhi received a good response. The film ran for 75 days and distributors recoverd their investments. “You didn’t perform like a newcomer,” was the common refrain.

He won the MGR Sivaji Award and the Old is Gold award for best newcomer while being a nominee for the Vijay TV award for best debutant (which finally went to Karthi).

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