Tamil and Telugu stars and directors collaborate for better cinema

When top Telugu star Mahesh Babu signed on a film with ace Tamil film director A R Murugadoss in 2017, it seemed to be a dream combination that would result in a blockbuster. However, ‘Spyder’ didn’t fare well at the box office and that seemed to put a brake on those who were looking at such cross-industry collaborations. However, over the last year the number of top Tamil actors signing on films with successful directors in Tollywood – and vice-versa – has been on the rise. Kollywood star Vijay is the latest to jump onto this bandwagon having signed a film with Vamshi Paidipally titled Varisu. The movie is being produced by well-known Telugu producer Dil Raju and it looks to be a pucca commercial action entertainer. Meanwhile, Dhanush has a film with Tollywood directors Sekhar Kammula and Venky Atluri; Sivakarthikeyan with KV Anudeep; and Ram Charan with director Shankar who is making Telugu debut. Tamil director Venkat Prabhu is making his Telugu debut with Naga Chaitanya and director Lingusamy is directing Ram Pothineni. While movies have always been dubbed in various languages and released, this is an interesting trend that seems to be finding favour with actors, directors and producers in both the Tamil and Telugu film industries.

Some Projects are Special from Word Go!This is one such. It’s been a dream to work with @shankarshanmugh Thru @AlwaysRamCharan that dream is set to become a reality.Their film launched today.Wishing them,@advani_kiara #DilRaju @SVC_Official & entire team Very Best! #RC15 #SVC50 pic.twitter.com/BYVGzFuYDz

— Chiranjeevi Konidela (@KChiruTweets) September 8, 2021

Tamil stars Suriya and Karthi have always had a strong market in Andhra Pradesh and Telangana and their Tamil films dubbed in Telugu do good business. One of the Tamil producers who has worked with both these stars extensively is S R Prabhu of Dream Warrior Pictures, who has made successful films like ‘Saguni’, ‘Joker’, ‘Theeran Adhigaram Onru’, ‘Kaithi’ and ‘Aruvi’. Ask Prabhu whether this new collaboration trend we are seeing is because of the stars’ desire to expand their market or whether it’s about the best of talent coming together and he states it is because of a combination of many factors. “These collaborations are based on many things like the availability of stars and the technicians; the salary; the comfort factor between them and also market expansion,” he says. One of the many similarities between the Tamil and Telugu film industries is the love for big-budget mass action masala flicks with their top stars. For instance, if we saw ‘Pushpa’ and ‘RRR’ recently in Telugu, we saw ‘Vikram’ in Tamil. Thus, working on similar tropes is possibly a cakewalk for directors and actors in both industries. However, it’s only when it comes to social and family dramas that local sensibilities need to be kept in mind with Tamil cinema being more realistically rooted. Having said that, stars in both the Tamil and Telugu film industries are well paid - as are the technicians - and with an expanding market it also means that remuneration can increase for them substantially. The desire to create new and innovative content for the audience is also pushing stars to seek out new talent.

Ok now this feels like something else… ❤️❤️ Been watching sir for years and years and now to do everything that I’ve been wanting to do.. act with him, dance with him, take his nazar, talk to him.. everything .. yaaaaay finally!