A Method To Madness: Charting The On-Screen Physical Transformation Of Malayalam Cinema Actors

PRITHVIRAJ SUKUMARAN who portrays the role of Najeeb in Blessy’s Aadujeevitham reportedly had to undergo an unhealthy body transformation. To play the initial portions featuring a pot-bellied Najeeb he weighed 98 kilos and had to come down to 64 kilos to realistically pull off Najeeb’s physical and emotional disintegration. Prithviraj himself has gone on the record to state that he often blanked out during the shoot. When Vikram was offered Shankar’s Ai he started preparing two years ahead, lost 15 kilos, and also shaved his head. While such drastic physical transformations are rare in Indian cinema, we pick a few actors in Malayalam cinema who managed to go against the grain and look unrecognisable on screen, and of course, aced in internalising the characters as well.

Sometime in the late 80s, Revathi who had only played urban, confused, and spoilt young women in Malayalam cinema, slipped into an amber-haired, dusky gypsy, spotting paan-stained teeth in Kamal’s Kakothykaviley Appooppan Thaadigal (1988). Not only was she unrecognisable, but the actor aced the mannerisms (unrefined gait, Tamil twang), equably selling her act on screen. In addition to that, she also lent an irrepressible comic layer to the act, which is perhaps why Kakothy is one of her most memorable on-screen outings.

Though Mammootty’s insistence to physically delineate his celluloid characters is a known fact, he perhaps surprised himself in Mrigaya (1989). In the same year that he played the epic warrior Chandu in Oru Vadakkan Veeragadha and the CBI Officer in Jagratha, the actor decided to step up his game as Varunni, the vagabond hunter. It is the external bulwarks that take you by surprise—the dark-tinted face, stained fanged teeth, murky clothes, and frayed hair. And the actor typically adds his own nuances to the character, to establish his moral derangement. Mada in Ponthan Mada can be counted as a makeover stripped off vanity—the torn banyan, soiled mundu, face marked with grime, and the slumped bearing. Mada belonged to the fringes of society, and it wasn’t difficult to buy it.

Mohanlal as a balding professor in his 60s who is in a wheelchair in Pranayam, is a rare instance when the outward look added to his performance. Of course, it goes without saying that the actor was at his sublime, charming best.

Bindu Panicker did something inventive, unconventional and incredibly brave in Soothradharan (2001). The actor who was till then living in the dreary obscurity of being someone’s sister, mother or jealous aunt made a stunning volte-face on screen, as this paan-chewing, beer-guzzling, loud, garishly dressed madame of a shady brothel. She gets the character’s traits to the T, including that frighteningly loud guttural laugh and feral anger. Devumma was such a daunting sight that it instantly wiped away the image of domesticity that the actor had represented on celluloid till then.

It takes a while to register that the 50-something towering matriarch Kaalipuli sitting defiantly at a police station was this sultry actor who shook a leg with Ajay Devgn and Aamir Khan in Ishq. In gold-bordered mundu and sari, grey-tinted hair, betel-stained teeth and a perpetual smirk, the regality and ferocity in which Shwetha Menon carries the formidability of Kaalipuli in Ozhimuri (2013) is a sight to behold. For someone known for her item numbers and B-grade Bollywood thrillers, this performance was almost cathartic. Even more than her first such bravado as Cheeru in Renjith’s Paleri Manickyam (2009).

One has to admit that when it comes to the “physical transformation” game no one aced it better than Jayasurya. In 2014 for the medical drama, Apothecary, he lost a whopping 10 kgs to “look” the part of a cancer patient. And it wasn’t for nothing. The actor went bald, his eyes were hollow, and he walked with a drooping head. While that meant he won half the battle, it was also true that he effortlessly internalised the despair and pain of Subin. In Vellam (2021), similarly, it was astonishing to witness the accuracy with which he incorporated the behavioural and physical signs of an alcoholic. Jayasurya’s earnestness was evident in how he played a quadriplegic in Beautiful. The details were spot-on—resigned to his fate, masking the turmoils of someone trapped for eternity in a lifeless body, not to forget the bearing, smile, and caustic sense of humour he brings to his lines.

It isn’t easy for an actor in his 30s to sell himself as a teenager, college student as well as adult and that’s what Nivin Pauly achieved in Alphonse Puthren’s Premam. Not only did he look the part in the schoolboy portions, including his interactions with friends, but Nivin also imbued a naivety in George. And that artlessness is consistently maintained in George’s arc, during the various phases in his life.

Much before Vijayaraghavan smoothly superbly lived up to the part of 100-year-old Ittooppu who demands a divorce from his wife in Pookkalam, the actor had slipped into the character of an ageing Cheradi Skariah (Ekalavyan) at a much younger age. He is presumably in his 70s, chews pan, needs the aid of a wooden stick and has a crudeness in his bearing. From the body language and dialogue delivery to the voice inflexions, the actor easily sells his “ageing act”. As for Ittooppu, though makeup did aid the act, it goes without saying that Vijayaraghavan gets the method right. The slouch, the hand moments, the voice timbre that trembles and then intones, or the multitude of emotions that flit across his heavily wrinkled face, it is what one would define as a thoroughly researched internalised method act.

Fahadh Faasil, like Mohanlal, is an instinctive actor, so external transformation is rarely required to sell his characters. It all comes down to natural talent but in Joji, he sets himself up for a bit of makeover madness. Fahadh goes several sizes down to play the complex, diabolic Joji in this Dileesh Pothan film. In hindsight, that physical alteration helps us to absorb Joji’s deceiving exterior. We never forestall his actions or his capacity for doing evil. And eventually, when he does what he does, we are convinced as well.

A similar scenario can be said for Kunchacko Boban’s exterior transformation as small-time thief Rajeevan in Nna Thaan Case Kodu. Sure, one can cast aspersions on the director’s choice to stereotype such characters by putting brown makeup but here, one is inclined to believe that Kunchacko steps up his act aided by that makeup. The false teeth, brown tint, and the mostly grubby look vastly help in the whole act.