Shot Cuts: ‘No’ for I

Samantha

After she walked out of Mani Ratnam’s Kadal , actor Samantha has apparently opted out of director Shankar’s next film, I . Though the reasons for her quitting these big projects are not known, the actor is said to have returned the advance she took from the filmmakers.

It was only a few days ago that the announcement about her co-starring Vikram in I was made. The film is being produced by Aascar V Ravichandran and will have music by A. R. Rahman. Editing will be by Anthony and cinematography by P. C. Sreeram.

I will also feature Malayalam star Suresh Gopi and Ramkumar, son of actor Sivaji Ganesan and elder brother of Prabhu. Work on the film was to begin on July 15.

Sleepless for a role

Actors are known to push themselves to get into the skin of the character. Shaam went without sleep for eight days to get his looks right in his next film 6. Says Shaam, “In 2006, I went without sleep for four days and ended up with puffy eyes. In fact I went to a doctor to get it treated.”

In

6 , the actor plays Ram, who goes around six states to solve a mystery. “When V. Z. Durai, the director of

6 , said that we needed to do something different to effectively portray Ram’s stress, I decided to try skip sleep. For eight days I slept for just an hour. My eyes were swollen by the time we were ready to shoot. My looks actually unnerved the director while the cameraman was too scared to see me through the lens,” laughs Shaam.