One of my most pleasant cab rides in the city has been with Sudarshan V. I remember it vividly because they are far and few in between especially when you live 14 to 15 km away from office. His punctuality and politeness wasn’t contrived to earn a five-star rating but something Sudarshan has learnt from his other career in the Kannada film industry. When Sudarshan is not driving a cab, he is working as a production manager for Kannada films and serials.
“I have learnt discipline and honesty from my film work and I apply it to my driving,” says Sudarshan. He has just finished work on a corporate film for a client abroad. “There were 200 people on set. For three months, I was up at 3.30 am. For a shoot starting at 6 am, you have to be ready with everything by 5.45. It was stressful,” he recalls.
Born to an engineer father, Sudarshan wanted to be an actor and did a one-month course in acting after dropping out of ITI. Taking everyone’s suggestions, Sudarshan started with theatre and frequented Ravindra Kalakshetra. After waiting for two to three months, landed a non-speaking part as the king’s attendant. “After doing such roles for a few months, some of us joined hands and started the theatre troupe, Rupantara. We staged a play called Rotti in which I played a cop. It was based on the well-known case of advocate MA Rasheed’s murder in the ‘80s in Bengaluru. A producer had come to watch the play and asked me to do a serial. I reached the set and realised the production manager had fallen ill. The producer asked if I could help out. That is how I started doing production work. In any case, I had realised that there is no money in acting. In my second serial as production manager, Sambandha Male , I earned ₹ 750 per day.”
While being involved in production work, Sudarshan learnt other trades such as sound recording, editing and camera work. He also worked as camera attendant. Then, he started to concentrate on production work in films in different languages. A few notable among them are Tamil film Kandukondain Kandukondain , English movie Monkey Who Knew Too Much and a Hindi film. Till date, Sudarshan has worked on around 40 to 50 serials.
Besides film and TV, he also works on advertisements, corporate films, documentaries and live shows. He has also sustained his engagement with Rupantara. Though he doesn’t act in the plays, Sudarshan is involved in organising them.
Sudarshan says with his driving job, it is easy to manage everything. “With these cabs, it is easier to decide when you want to drive. If I am free and there is no hectic shooting involved, I drive but when there is a major film/serial work going on, I take off for months. Nobody is there to question me. I can drive at my own will. It also enables me to utilise my time. You need to work hard if you want to earn money,” expresses Sudarshan who also gets lot of support from his wife, who teaches Hindi in high school. Just like Sudarshan didn’t follow in his father’s footsteps, his son is pursuing a career in animation.
