Roja
An eventful century

The dusky actress Roja scores a century with her 100th film, Durga which was released recently to a good response all over the state. After making her debut in Telugu with Peelipushtakam, she hogged the limelight with the Tamil film Chembarathi and within no time became a much sought-after glam girl. She was paired opposite all the top stars down south including Rajnikant, Chiranjeevi, Nagarjuna and Balakrishna. Incidentally, ace director RK Selvamani who introduced her in Chembarathi is the director of her 100th film too. After a gap she has also revived her home banner with the bilingua. And her next project will roll early next year. A brief chat with the actress...

Durga may be a devotional film, but it will have the distinctive touch of whizkid RK Selvamani.
I’m glad my 100th film happens to be a devotional

How does it feel to cross the century mark?
In fact, I was too surprised when my brother who kept count of my films suddenly disclosed it to me while we were shooting for Durga. Initially I didn’t believe it since it happened so fast and quickly. It has been a decade since I made my debut in Chembarathi and it will continue to be one of my favourite films since it helped me to gain a re-entry in Tamil films.

Of late many devotional films have been released and how different will be Durga from them?
I do agree that it is a devotional film but it will have the distinctive touch of whizkid RK Selvamani. Technically it would be far more superior than films of this genre and I am happy that my 100th film is a devotional one. I play two characters with distinctive behavioural patterns and it has shaped up very well.
Your career graph can be split into four different shades -romantic, glam, emotional and action films - of these the one you enjoyed doing the most?
nPersonally I liked playing funfilled characters among the above mentioned categories. It doesn’t mean that I dislike other since the rest are also very close to my heart. Even in real life I strongly react to wrong things happening around me. Hence, I immensely enjoyed the angry woman phase that came in my career. I should thank the audience for accepting me in all kinds of roles as I didn’t receive any negative feedback at ant time.

After a long gap you revived your home production with Durga. Do you intend to produce films regularly?
As Durga was my 100th film, we decided to produce it ourselves and took all precaution to make it a winner. We roped in promising newcomer Venu, ace director Selvamani and spent lavishly on graphics without compromising on the quality. We intend to produce films regularly and I am thinking of doing an author-backed role in my next production which is being finalised. Though it is premature to talk about it, the film will commence early next year.

Except for Tirumala you haven’t signed many films in Telugu whereas you have good number of Tamil films?
You should put this query to Telugu filmmakers and not me since I have proved myself many a time. The ball is in their court now. I have completed shooting for Tirumala which is a remake of a Tamil film. At the right time in my career, Tamil films came to my rescue and now I have regained my position again. I appear in three different male get-ups in Looty and even Sathyaraj couldn’t recognise me in one of those guises which looks similar to my brother Kumar. Besides I have Mitta Mirasu with Prabu and another film Shakalaka Baby with director Ram Narayana. I rejected few Kannada offers since I didn’t want to loose my position in Tamil. I prefer not going by the number of films as I want to continue doing only meaningful films.

BVS Prakash