Exclusive! Dulquer Salmaan: I wasn’t trying to emulate Gemini Ganesan in anyway in Mahanati

This year, Dulquer Salmaan will have his second straight Telugu release with the Hanu Raghavapudi directorial, which also features Mrunal Thakur and Rashmika Mandanna. It’s rare that a Malayalam actor headlines a big budget Telugu movie but Dulquer’s fanbase in Telugu – especially after his stellar debut in Mahanati has made this possible.

In an exclusive interview with OTTplay, the actor talked about his apprehensions when he was first approached for the role of Gemini Ganesan in the acclaimed film that had Keerthy Suresh essaying the role of yesteryear actress Savitri.

The actor’s initial reaction, even though he liked the idea and the team, was to say no because Telugu as a language was “alien” to him and he didn’t want the additional pressure of not knowing the language while performing. However, after the team kept approaching him, the actor relented because he didn’t want to “miss out on something wonderful”.

However, he did make it clear that he wanted total support from the team while playing the role. “I told them I was depending entirely on them for the role. They gave me the lines and I said I wanted as many ADs sitting with me and teaching me. I wanted to know word by word what I was saying,” Dulquer tells us.

Another cause of worry for him was that he “looked nothing like Gemini Ganesan”. “I also understood that at the end of the day, when you are doing a biopic, you don’t necessarily have to look like the person. If you are doing their life story, the audiences are anyway imagining that person. I am just a vessel. I felt free in that,” he says.

Ask him about how he approached the role, Dulquer explains, “I wasn’t anyway trying to imitate or emulate him except for the film-within-the-film portions. Offscreen, I interpreted my version of a ‘60s movie star,” he says. “But I also spent time with his daughter and son, and they gave me pointers on the little things that he would do – like how he loved cooking and we used that in the movie. They also said that he never sits in a chair in the regular way, he would flip it around. So, anytime he sits in the film, I used that. Also, the clothes gave me a lot of body language.”

Read the entire interview: Exclusive! Dulquer Salmaan: The next stage of my career is to lose myself and delve deep into my characters