From his first movie – Nandanam in 2002 to his debut in bollywood yesterday, over the 10 years, Prithviraj’s career graph is unmatchable to any other young contemporary actor in Malayalam industry. Prithviraj has delivered many super hits, been part of many prestigious projects, have done a lot of memorable roles but there is still a section of people who continue to hate him , a section of people who are not still ready to approve him.
Prithviraj’s haters have their own reasons to hate him , One he is not polite in his interviews. Its surprising because why should an actor’s personal life or character matter .. Should not what he does on screen have more significance? In an interview after his marriage in May 2011 , Prithviraj mentioned that Mammooty and Mohanlal should do roles suiting their age and that caused a huge stir. Here you had one actor who spoke what is in his mind without inhibitions and people did not want that.There started a huge hate campaign by publishing jokes, messages all against the actor in the social media which continued for few weeks . Prithviraj hit back with a strong performance in Indian Rupee and that day onwards, one could see a big fall on the social media slandering.
Second reason for them to not approve him is that he cannot be compared with Mammooty or Mohanlal in his performances. Mammooty and Mohanlal are two legends of Malayalam Cinema. They have continued to rule through 2-3 generations and are even among the greatest actors the country has ever produced. Why do you need to compare Prithviraj with them only .Try comparing Prithviraj with others- Can you imagine Asif Ali or Jayasurya doing Urumi ?
Can you imagine Kunjakko Boban playing Sub inspector Solomon in Vargam ? Its easy to say Prithviraj is an average actor but show me another young actor who can do variety of roles as well as him – Whether its comedy in Chocolate, action in Puthiyamugam or Urumi, characters with Negative shade in Vasthavam or Vargam or Kanaa Kandein, Romance in Mozhi , simple down-to-earth guy in Indian Rupee – Prithviraj could handle it all effortlessly.
They say his brother- Indrajith is a better actor than Prithviraj but then where are the hits to prove that. They say its because Indrajith dont have the looks but if looks was important in Malayalam movies, then how did Sreenivasan manage to play the hero and gave us those classic hits like Vadakkunokkiyanthram ! Prithviraj is the youngest actor to get the best actor state award for his performance in Vasthavam in 2006 but people tend to ignore or forget that easily.
Another reason the haters have is that Prithviraj dont have solo hits or if he had hits, they were not because of him! When Classmates was blockbuster , they said he was just one of the movie’s several central characters. Ok fair but when Chocolate was hit , they said its because of Salim Kumar – then many Mammooty and Mohanlal’s hits’ credits should go to people like Jagathy, Innocent and others !
Puthiyamugham was huge hit and the media gave him the superstar status but there were people who said it was a fluke and it looked like tamil movies. When Indian Rupee became a success, they said it was all Ranjith’s credit. Prithviraj was third Malayalam actor after Mammooty and Mohanlal who got the much prestigious chance to play an important character in a Manirathnam movie , but they said it was a small role.
Prithviraj had acted in several Malayalam movies before but it was his sohisticated bad guy in KanaKandein which amazed me and made me a fan. The subsequent movies like Mozhi and Chocolate told me here we have a young hero who could do different kind of roles and I was confident he would go a long way. Two major aspects of his character which impressed me was one -he never went on to play a side-kick or an insignificant role in a Mammooty or Mohanlal movie like other young actors like Jayasurya and Indrajith and decided to make a career on his own. And secondly, at the same time he never hesitated to play a small role to be part of a good project like he did in Thirakkadha and Thalappavu.
Yesterday Prithviraj’s debut Bollywood Movie released. Let the movie be good or bad… Let his screen time be small ( After all why is screen time so important – Anthony Hopkins just needed 16 min and very few dialogues to get the best actor oscar award in ‘Silence of the lambs’) .Its still a significant achievement which no other young Malayalam actor could even dream of…Whats important is Prithviraj got into a camp with big names and through the right contacts has already signed his second Hindi movie- Aurangzeb. It was a rare feat where a south Indian actor has got his second hindi movie even before the release of his first movie. This when other accomplished actors like Surya, Vikram who made their Bollywood debut last year in Hindi have not managed another project.
After a faulty step doing ‘Simhasanam’ , Prithviraj looks like back on the right track. His desire to be part of good projects inspite of small roles was again visible in ‘Molly Aunty rocks’. He has made the debut in Hindi and his next week release -‘Ayalum Njanum Thammil’ looks promising. From the intial look of his another upcoming flick – ‘Celluloid’ , it looks like he has put on a great performance as Malayalam’s first movie director – J C Daniel.
Prithviraj has moved on from his interview that happened 1.5 years ago. He has been careful with his recent interviews and has decided to let his work do the talking. So its surprising to see that there are people who still hate him for his old interviews. Isn’t it time we finally approve him and be glad as a Keralite when one of our own has made debut up north in an industry which is one of world’s biggest film producing ones and any actor’s dream destination?
