Be it the chocolate boy character of 12B or robust young police officer of Thillalangadi , Shaam handles all kinds of roles with equal felicity. He does not bother about the ‘image’ factor. For him, what matters the most is how efficiently he interprets the role. Shaam is on cloud nine after the rave reviews he has got for his performance in the recently released 6 Meluguvarthigal .
“I am a performer first,” says Madurai-born Shaam. “Only performance will elevate you as an actor. I try to do maximum justice to the roles given to me. Though success or failure does have a bearing on me I am not too much concerned about that. I am more than satisfied if I have performed the role well,” he says.
He hogged limelight after a bang entry in 12B pairing two top heroines of that time in Jyothika and Simran. He came in with a lot of promise and still has not belied the expectations of his directors.
“When a director narrates a story, as a listener you never know how the film is going to shape up visually. You just bestow your faith in the director and do what you could. It is a tight rope walking both for the director and the actor,” he says.
Turning point
Year 2009 has been a big turning point in his career, he believes. After a brief lull in Kollywood, he shifted his attention to Tollywood where Surendar Reddy provided him a meaty role in Kick which ran to packed houses and became the chartbuster movie of that year competing with Arundhati and Magadheera . “Graphics played a huge role in the success of both the movies but Kick without any graphical element became a box office grosser,” he beams.
Shaam has evolved as an actor and 6 Meluguvarthigal is a standing testimony to his acting skills. The story is about the emotional struggle of a father who ventures out in search of his lost child. “Audience could feel the total transformation the protagonist undergoes traversing six states in search of his son,” he says.
“We read in dailies about children found missing even today. Where are they going? I see a lot of children begging on the streets. Who are they? Though trafficking of children has been internationally recognized as a major human rights violation, still it is happening everywhere. This movie is to highlight this issue. We have worked for more than two years for this movie,” says Shaam.
Cricket lover
An ardent cricket lover, he regularly follows Indian cricket and is also part of the Celebrity Cricket League (CCL). “Initially, it was full of fun playing cricket with colleagues from neighbouring states. But of late, cricketers in professional circuit are hired killing the essence of CCL. It is an excellent platform for the actors to meet and share, for they neither get the time nor an opportunity like this. Injuries on field can be serious. Actors are risking their professional commitments. The organisers should step in to instil confidence so that once again CCL is played in true spirit,” he feels.
He has also done a Kannada movie Tananam Tananam . Shaam and Naan E fame Sudheep are now planning to do a trilingual.
“The success of 6 Meluguvarthigal has entrusted me with a lot of responsibility and I will do best to live up to the expectations,” says Shaam, who is busy with his next Telugu project Race Gurram .
