“After the release of Awe , we never got together as a team to celebrate the film. I feel this is the right time for us to celebrate,” says director Prasanth Varma, reacting to the film winning two National Film Awards — for best make-up and visual effects.
Speaking to MetroPlus , Prasanth looks back at the genre-bending film, which was released in February 2018, with pride. “The film did well and made money, but since we didn’t organise a ‘success meet’ which has become a norm in the industry, a lot of people assumed that our film didn’t do well,” he laughs.
Prasanth recalls his discussions with the make-up and costume departments to chalk out the looks of every character in the film, “We prepared a detailed look book.”
Director Prasanth Varma
The chief make-up artiste Ranjith worked along with Shanti, Aditi and Sanjana from the costume team and executed the looks. “We all worked together, discussing the looks with the director. I cannot take credit on my own. I am really happy that our work has been recognised,” says Ranjith, whose real name is U Giridhar. He changed his name when he began working in films.
Ranjith has been a make-up artist in Telugu cinema for 16 years and in the last nine years, has worked primarily with actor Nani. “Without the help of the co-producers Nani Prashanti Tipirneni and director Prasanth, this recognition would not have been possible. I will always be thankful to them,” he says. Ranjith had earlier bagged the Andhra Pradesh State Nandi Award in 2016 for his work in the film Arthanari .
Make-up artiste Ranjith
Going back to Awe , he says Regina Cassandra’s look was the toughest. It involved designing several tattoos and her hair had to be styled in multiple braids. “It would take our team close to 12 hours to do her tattoos and hairstyle,” says Ranjith.
Prasanth adds that on the first day of shooting with Regina, they underestimated the time required for make-up. “We thought it will be done in a couple of hours, we had miscalculated. We ended up waiting till the evening,” he reminisces.
From the look book of Awe, detailing Regina’s look
As Regina’s portions continued to be shot, she went without taking a shower for four to five days. “There were tattoos on her back, so she couldn’t even sleep comfortably. The make-up team would touch up those tattoos before a shot,” adds Prasanth. He explains that all the tattoos sported by Regina’s character were there for a reason. “She had tattoos of Morse code (a connect to the segment featuring Srinivas Avasarala), a tree (the quirky character with voice-over by Ravi Teja), fish (voice by Nani), and so on. A lot of thought went into designing the look for each character,” he says. For Nithya Menen who plays a lesbian, they opted to have long hair like any other woman and break the pop culture stereotype of short hair for lesbians.
From the Awe look book, styling Kajal Aggarwal’s character
The film’s visual effects were done by Hyderabad-based Srushti VFX and Prasant lauds them for doing their best. “Even when we were happy with the outcome, they would keep pushing, trying to get better results for a few frames. Venkat Kumar from the team was a huge help, especially during the days I was in Chennai overseeing the film’s sound recording,” sums up Prasanth.
