Kalyan Ram’s Amigos is arriving in theaters this Friday. The film has an interesting concept of doppelgangers and is directed by debutant Rajendra Reddy. T Produced by Mythri Movie Makers, Sandalwood beauty Ashika Ranganath plays the love interest of Kalyan Ram. Kollywood music director Ghibran is scoring the tunes. Ahead of the release, we had a brief interaction with Kalyan Ram, and here is the transcript.
After a success, would there be any pressure in choosing the story?
I okayed Bimbisara, Amigos, and Devil in 2020. Before starting Bimbisara, I finalized Amigos, and during the shoot of Bimbisara, I gave the green signal to Devil. Mythri approached me with Amigos script, and I liked it very much. It isn’t my intention to do a triple role, but the concept was very interesting.
What made you believe in the director Rajendra Reddy?
The story itself was very compelling, which made me believe in him. The way he narrated the film is superb. Generally would be grey shades for the protagonist in our movies, but in Amigos hero himself is the villain. There is only one heroine.
Initially, the audience didn’t understand what Amigos meant. Was there a discussion about it with your team?
Firstly, we felt having a character’s name as the film’s title isn’t correct since all three have equal importance. Then our team thought of Doppelgangers. I myself didn’t know what it meant and asked my director the meaning of it. We wanted to have a title that gives the meaning of friendship. That’s how we came up with Amigos.
Is Amigos an experimental or a commercial film?
This is not an experimental movie. 118 is the only experimental movie that I did. Every other film of mine is very commercial, and I make sure my films are narrated in an interesting and new way. So I won’t say Bimbisara is an unknown subject, but we added some interesting elements to it.
How would you update yourself?
Now world cinema is at the tip of our fingers. We are able to see a lot of quality content through various OTT platforms. The only thing I make sure of is not to repeat the characters I have played. It becomes monotonous if I repeat the characters. So, I make a conscious effort about it.
Didn’t you think about other language releases?
We didn’t think about it, to be honest. Promoting and marketing a film isn’t my cup of tea. I only think about what best I can do for my role, and I am not into marketing. So you need to take this forward to Mythri Movie Makers.
Can you say a few words about your future projects?
We will start the shooting of Bimbisara 2 probably by this year-end. Apart from this, we are done with 70% of Devil shooting, and the entire production part will get completed mostly by May.