Aparna Balamurali owes her interesting career in cinema to an unconventional approach of picking films. The actress, who rose to fame for starring in Dileesh Pothan's classic Malayalam comedy Maheshinte Prathikaaram (2016), says she always had the advantage of reinventing herself with every film. "Because of the decisions I've made, my career didn't become less exciting after my first few films. If I had gone through a conventional way of picking films after having worked with Fahadh Faasil in Maheshinte Prathikaaram, by picking films with superstars, all the excitement would've fizzled in the first few years."
Aparna will next be seen in Dhanush's Tamil directorial Raayan, which is up for release on July 26. The actress points out the advantages of working with a prominent director, who is also an actor. "The good thing about working with an actor like him is the clarity he gives, something that is so important to an actor. I do have my limitations. I cannot give a great performance off-handedly like how we've seen Lalettan, Mammukka or Fahadh do on screen. But the bad thing about working with such an amazing actor is, when someone like Dhanush sir acts out a scene, you feel like 'how do I match that?'" she laughs. "Especially when he talks in the North Chennai slang, which is his area."
There are many similarities between the directing styles of Sudha Kongara and Dhanush, she recalls. "I still remember, during Soorarai Pottru (2020), I kept changing costumes until we got it right. And Suriya sir was like 'doesn't this girl get tired at all?'. Sudha ma'am and I were in such good sync and I would keep going back to change some small detail until it was right. Dhanush sir has such a similar pace of work." It also helped that she was from an industry like Malayalam cinema, which is used to working fast.
"Thankfully I had such a good rapport with Dhanush sir. I was very hesitant if he'd be okay with me wanting to try more takes for scenes. But he was absolutely patient. Until and unless both of us were satisfied with a scene, we'd keep filming. It was amazing."
It was for Soorarai Pottru that the actress won her first National Film Award. Did that make things easier for her on the work front? It's not really that simple, she says. "There were complications after I got the award. The problem is in the way people think 'Oh you get a National Award and you have to then only do an award-winning type of film'. But sometimes we forget that doing simple things like romance and comedy are so difficult. Generally there's a saying that once you get an award, it gets difficult for people to approach you. But I've always been the same. I still want to do films, and I'd love to do a simple romance someday."