DIRECTOR SUDHA KONGARA INTERVIEW

I had a story about an athlete ten years ago or even earlier. It excited me. In fact, when I joined Mani sir, in all my naivete, I remember telling him that he can direct this story if he wants because he was wondering what he should be doing next.

I’ve always loved sport films and Lagaan in Indian cinema being my all time favorite. Then I saw a small article some six years ago about little girls being encouraged to take up boxing in North Chennai. That was pretty unusual. A conservative area sending their girls out to be little pugilists!! I started reading up about boxing and then specifically female boxing. And it was a Pandora’s box and a can of worms put together. A dramatic, fascinating world! I couldn’t stop. I met several boxers across the country in Chennai, Andhra, Kerala, Haryana, Delhi and even spoke to Mary Kom well before the country knew of her. I met coaches, officials, Olympians and what they spoke about became my scenes. 

Maddy is probably the most positive being I know. I did not know him too well before the film. Though he has never behaved like a star with me even when he was a superstar and I was the last AD on the sets. He’s a naturally friendly, gregarious guy. What the world perhaps doesn’t know is that he’s also the most vulnerable guy. 

I had fantastic actors in this film

Stalwarts Nasser sir and Radha Ravi sir- they acted in my film like it was their first after nearly 500 films and forty years in this industry respectively. It was humbling. They came for readings and rehearsals with the rest of the cast with no fuss whatsoever.

Kali Venkat is a gem. He plays the girls’ father and he’s a Tamilian married to a Sowcarpet ‘Settu” and their relationship is pretty volatile. Which is why the girls don’t look typically Dravidian and also their Tamil is not typically local Nochikuppam unlike Kali’s. Their mother and the girls often switch to Haryanvi. Baljinder a National Award winning actress played their mother. And she lived the part. They would teach each other Tamil and Hindi and help each other in their respective languages. It was lovely to watch them. We all stayed in Mumbai in an apartment together for a week to do readings and well past midnight I would see the two mugging the alien language lines. I was fortunate.

And then the super talented Zakir, who is Ramgopal Varma’sfavourite and now mine, another actor I want to cast in all my films. He makes it look so easy, but the work he puts in, makes you relax on sets. The way he learnt Tamil and dubbed for himself was humbling. 

See, that’s the thing with Sashi and all the producers on my film. Every decision was mine. Solely. And they backed me. Be it standing firm in casting Ritika, or wanting only this editor, or this DoP or this music director. I asked and they facilitated.

I loved Santosh’s background score  in Soodhu Kavvum. I asked Sashi for him and he made it happen. He and CV Kumar.

And Santosh is the flawless part of the film. Be it his songs or the score. They are just so right for the film and lift the film’s emotions tremendously. My reference scores when I was editing were Zimmer and Newman. And Santosh’s score is no less. He’s a great collaborator. His music is the soul of the film.