Exclusive! Director Abhilash Reddy: Loser Season 2 tells why success is more difficult to handle than failure

It's for filmmakers like Abhilash Reddy that the digital medium is ideally made for, as a launching ground. OTTs serve as a perfect avenue for a storyteller to reach out to a wider audience, prove his/her mettle and make it work like a visiting card for their ambition to make a feature film. While the medium provides them with the liberty to stay true to their vision, it presents its own set of challenges - be it budgets, breakneck schedules and timely delivery of content. 

The youngster, despite several limitations, did wonders with his web show Loser for ZEE5 that released amidst the first wave of the pandemic. The complex sports drama spanned across different timelines, charting the journey of three characters in different forms of sport - cricket, air-rifle shooting and badminton. With low-key yet familiar names like Priyadarshi, Kalpika Ganesh and Shashank, he let the content do the talking and the show had massive viewership despite minimal promotions or marketing. He chats with OTTplay.com while returning for the second season of the drama, to stream on ZEE5 from January 21.

It's quite a special feeling for a filmmaker to have two seasons of his show produced by the management (ACFM) from a film school that he was a part of. Take us through your days in ACFM and how it shaped your sensibilities as a filmmaker...

That the film school was within the premises of the (Annapurna) studio proved to be a huge advantage for someone looking for a practical insight into filmmaking. As students, we always had access to shoots and see how things work on the field. I don't believe in the theoretical side to direction much because you don't know it unless you practically experience it. 

A book may tell you how to approach an actor to discuss a scene/extract a performance, but every person reacts to a situation differently and their mood, vibe varies from set to set. Watching shoots, observing people work on sets gave me a firm understanding of ground realities and the confidence that I could do a good job of it too. 

With writing, I agree that the academic approach may be very important, unlike direction where on-field understanding is a must. The film school helped me form my core team easily and if not for it, I would've had to go through my share of struggles to bring like-minded people together. After finishing school, I did a web series named Ekkadiki Ee Parugu for ZEE5 and noticing my work, Annapurna Studios collaborated with me for Loser. 

How did you land your first project, the web show Ekkadiki Ee Parugu, also for ZEE5?

Web series as a concept hadn't taken off back then. After finishing film school, the main aim was to make feature films but the path wasn't easy at all. I realised I had to prove myself before the industry considers me worthy of a big offer. With a bunch of classmates, we came together as a team and shot Ekkadiki Ee Parugu at a shoestring budget. ZEE5 was mighty impressed and asked us to do a second season and it opened our doors to make Loser later.

How was it collaborating with Annapurna Studios as a director (from a production perspective) and not an in-house student?

It was always smooth going with Annapurna. None of them interfered with our vision at any point. Supriya (Yarlagadda) mam's inputs were so integral to the story and the writing. With the production too, I was never questioned about my choices and only because of that freedom, I was able to develop something on the lines of Loser. They didn't tell us the technicians that we had to rope in and gave me the luxury of working with the team I was most comfortable with.

Even during the pre-release event, you'd mentioned that Supriya Yarlagadda's inputs were crucial in shaping the show's female characters. What were her insights, in specific?

Being a male myself, it's not always possible to know how would a woman react to a particular situation. We were a team of three male writers and despite our best efforts to understand something from a woman's shoes, the male gaze would involuntarily creep in. In such scenes, Supriya garu would suggest if this character could respond to a situation differently but she never imposed her ideas upon us. She only used to say, 'ila cheste bagundedi.' These discussions helped me create fully realised female characters and brought more depth, authenticity to their stories.

Loser, even during the first season, would've been a difficult show to execute. Different timelines, three sportspersons, a non-linear narrative and yet the show was so coherent...

You're right, it's difficult for a writer to execute such a complex script and we didn't have the budget of a big feature film. As film school students, our primary advantage with the first season was the technical grasp we had. We knew what camera to use to attain certain quality and the tricks of the trade to achieve a result. The entire team was full of my film school batch mates and my understanding of editing helped me ideate, compose shots better.

Many people were curious as to how we pulled it off. Another key aspect here is that the actors, be it Shashank, Kalpika or Priyadarshi, hadn't done such characters before. We went against the grain in terms of casting and it got people interested. This motivated the actors more to give their best. A bulk of them (actors) had already worked with me before and they'd trusted me when I was a nobody. This was my payback of sorts to them. The mutual understanding made the work experience smoother and hassle-free.

The show didn't come with heavyweights and it was only word-of-mouth that helped it grow among crowds. The viewership metrics and the decision of ZEE5 to renew it for a second season are a true victory of audiences and their love for your content...

Meme-pages were trending us big time and showered so much love upon our efforts. A lot of industry people, including Sai Dharam Tej, Mohan Krishna Indraganti and Maruthi tweeted about the show and the word of mouth spread rapidly among common audiences. Moreover, theatres were shut and audiences were quite hungry for quality content, which proved to be an add-on.

What made you choose these three sports - air rifle shooting, badminton and cricket?

I had a friend who was a professional shooter and I was aware of his struggles to acquire guns. Only then did I know that such a sport even existed. I thought it'd be interesting to tell a story about a sport that not many know about and how people from humble backgrounds have made their mark in it. I also haven't come across stories about female badminton players before. If you notice, the sportspersons belong to three different religions - Hindu, Christianity and Islam. I underplayed the religious angle in it but wanted to showcase the diversity of the country and its unity in the subtext. I planned my screenplay later accordingly.

Is the show's main intent to give a platform to a loser, whose voice is ignored despite being in a majority?

I wanted to tell the story for a loser. You need to lose many battles in order to win some. The title was born out of this idea. In the first season, there were two losers and one winner. Ruby and Wilson failed in their lives but Suri achieved what he wanted to. Ruby, Wilson know the value of winning more because of their failures.

Is the trajectory of John in the second season similar to the journey of his father Wilson?

Yes, he too behaves like Wilson at some point. While Wilson has already tasted failure in life, he tries to impart a few life lessons to his son though he's not ready to listen. Wilson is now in the same position that his brother was, in the first season. Wilson's brother used to tell him about the practical realities of a cricketer's life but Wilson was never in a position to listen. Now, he is experiencing the same thing from his son. The father-son relationship has come out beautifully in the show and Harshith Reddy did a fantastic job. 

Suri Yadav's is a story of a shooter who gets corrupted by the fame and the power it brings, in the second season. Were there any personal experiences that pushed you to write such a character?

Though I haven't experienced that, I observed a few people who change with fame. I am in an industry where success is everything. People change their hues conveniently when they are successful and when they aren't. Especially in fields like sports and films, you can become famous very quickly but can lose your ground even faster when you don't handle it well. Being a public figure in both these arenas can change a lot of things. The main intent of the second season is to tell how success is more difficult to handle than failure.

You've mentioned that Loser is a show that'll travel across three seasons. Did you structure the story in your head in terms of seasons right when you wrote it?

During the writing stages, I realised these were characters with a lot of scope - they fail, succeed, fall again and finally win. It takes a lot of time for these events to unfold, at least ten years of their lifespan. It gave me clarity to plan my seasons better. Web shows help you study characters in-depth, which indirectly translate into memorable sequences and makes it easier for the viewers to connect with them. It gives them the space to see the character through their thick and thin. Only when you showcase their struggles well, the audiences will relate to the success better. Web was the only medium where I could've made Loser.