‘I grew up listening to Harris songs thinking they were composed by AR Rahman’

Director Rajath Ravishankar on how he went about writing the Karthi and Rakul Preet Singh-starrer, which hits screens on February 14

Rajath Ravishankar’s fascination for travel and adventure has helped him on a couple of occasions. It got him a job as an assistant director in Tamil films (“I know five languages thanks to all my travels”). And then, it gave him a storyline that landed him his debut project Dev.

“Every director writes himself in the story... it’s easier that way,” says Rajath, during a chat at composer Harris Jayaraj’s studio, “I do a lot of adventure trips and travel... so I think the storyline was born somewhere then. But of course, it is a fictitious character.”

Dev, which stars Karthi and Rakul Preet Singh, traces the life journey of the protagonist. “I have always admired Karthi. He’s versatile and is very comfortable in any role he is cast in. I wanted someone who’s natural; I was fortunate to meet and pitch the idea to him through the producer,” recalls Rajath.

 

 

Music plays a big role in Rajath’s storyline and he says he was fortunate to get through to Harris Jayaraj, whose music he grew up with. “I’ve loved his music since

Minnale. I grew up in Bengaluru, where only a few Tamil films released. Back then in the city, only music cassettes of films that were big hits in Tamil Nadu were sold. Over a period of time, all the cassettes I had were Harris Jayaraj albums. I was young then and thought that the music was actually by AR Rahman, since he was the most popular name then. Only when I was older did I realise that it was by a composer called Harris Jayaraj,” reminisces Rajath.

Dev, in a way, marks the return of Harris’ brand of music. “The script demanded music to showcase Dev’s ups and downs. Harris’ tunes fit in perfectly.”

Rajath’s journey in filmdom has been eventful ever since the time he left Bengaluru for Kolkata to study cinema. He then moved to Mumbai, where he interned with Anurag Kashyap, which gave him a taste of how things unfolded on the sets. Once he came back to Chennai, this experience came in handy. “It also helped that I can speak five languages,” smiles Rajath, “In Chennai, filmmakers are always looking for assistants who are multi-lingual.” It created opportunities for him to work with directors like Kannan and Saravanan, which helped him during the making of Dev. “I see Dev as a great start. With this, comes great responsibility. I don’t want to get carried away. I’m the sort of person who plans for today and tries executing that as effectively as possible,” says Rajath, who likes to watch romantic, motivational and sports films.