Bollywood muscle debuts in K’Town

Pilot-athlete-television actor Thakur Anoop Singh is making his entry into Kollywood with the Suriya-starrer S-III, which is hitting screens next week. Excited as he is, he says filmmaker Puri Jagannadh referred his name to Gnanavel Raja of Studio Green.

"I was working on Puri’s film Rogue, which was supposed to release this March. I got this offer while I was shooting in Mumbai for another film and I didn’t want to miss it. More than anything, Singam is a huge brand,” he says. By the time the crew had approached Thakur, they had completed shooting the rest.

“Except my portions, everything else was ready. I took exactly a month to complete my scenes,” he adds. Interestingly, he never watched the earlier versions (Singam 1 & 2) because he wanted to do the movie in his own way. “I don’t know Tamil, but I have dubbed for myself. I don’t like to use prompters. I learnt the language for S-III,” he adds.

Thakur plays the role of Vittal Prasad, one of the richest men in the world. “It’s as powerful as Suriya’s role. The crew had hired a private aircraft to a place near Talkona and we shot my scenes there. I enjoyed every bit of it,” he says.

He will be seen as a Tamil-speaking NRI, whose English will sound Australian. He practiced his dialogues five hours a day before the shoot. “I received my dialogues prior to the shoot everyday. I wrote my dialogues in English, after knowing the meaning, memorised them and worked on my pronunciation. It was one heck of an experience,” he grins.

How good is his Tamil now? Thakur surprises us with a lengthy dialogue from S-III without pause! “On Diwali, I was at the dubbing studios for nearly 13 hours. It has been two months since then, but I remember my dialogues,” he adds.

On his scenes with Suriya, Thakur says he is one of the few down-to-earth actors. “When I was introduced to him, he knew everything about me. Though I don’t belong to Chennai, everyone on the sets, including director Hari treated me well,” he smiles.

Thakur is making his debut this year with five films in five different languages. “I am eager to make a mark in Tamil, Kannada and Telugu industries, too,” he quips.

For some of the high octane action sequences, Thakur did not eat properly for a week. “I had to cut down on water to look sharper in front of the camera. I used to work out on the sets intensely, and then start shooting. But everything was worth the effort,” he says.

Thakur’s life revolves around shooting, dieting and body-building. He had won gold at the seventh World Bodybuilding and Physique Championships in Bangkok last year. Though he always wanted to become an actor, he trained to become a pilot, and took to the small screen.

“I made it in TV after 129 rejections. I played Drithrashtra in the Mahabharata series in 2011. Until then, I was not a believer. But being a part of the epic changed my outlook towards life,” he recalls.  

Though he never follows Tamil films, his favourite actors are “Ajith and Vijay”. He has also been trained in acting by veteran actors like Naseeruddin Shah and Rajat Kapoor. “I am game for any interesting role. At the same time, I don’t want to restrict myself to playing only villainous characters,” he shares. 

While signing a role, all that matters to him are his performance and the scope to entertain the audience. “I’d love to take up lead roles! Though I play the antagonist in S-III, there’s a lot of heroism in my role. Even Shah Rukh Khan started his career as a villain,” he says.

Up next, he has an untitled project bankrolled by Eros International in Hindi, in which he plays the lead. “Besides this, I am playing the antagonist in Gopichand Malineni’s untitled film starring opposite Sai Dharam Tej. Rakul Preet Singh is the heroine,” he adds. Thakur learnt horse-riding and a schedule of the film was wrapped up in Istanbul recently.

Give him a tough option to choose between Bollywood and Kollywood, he says, “I can’t choose one. Both are equally important. But when the Tamil audience need me, I’d be here for them anytime,” he winks.

(The piece was originally written for The New Indian Express)