“When Mani Ratnam Asked Me To Do The Hasya Rasa, I Had To Say Yes,” Says  Priyadarshan

“When  Mani Ratnam Asked Me To Do The Hasya Rasa, I Had To Say Yes,” Says  Priyadarshan  While Refuting Reports  That He’ll Only Do  Comedy

There  was  a  report  from a news agency  recently that the prolific Priyadarshan would only focus on  making comedy  films  from now on.

But Priyan completely  refutes this report. “Why would I  want to make  only  one  kind of cinema? Of course  I want to make people laugh. But  I can’t keep doing comedies  over and over again. The laughs will get stale. One needs  to  keep changing gears.All through my career  I  have done that. If I’ve made Hera Pheri , Hungama  and Bhagam Bhaag,I’ve also made serious films  like Gardish, Virasat and  Kala Pani. During the year that I made Bhool Bhulaiya  I also directed  a tragedy  Kancheevaram  ,  the film that I consider closest  to my heart.

So where  did these  reports  of  comedy-only come from?

“Search me,” prolific Priyan shrugs.  “In fact my next  film after Hungama 2 is  a thriller. I have  done  a thriller only once in  my career Oppam .It’s time  for  another.”

However fans  of  Priyan’s comedies need not  be disappointed.  “I’ve done one  segment  of  Mani Ratnam’s Tamil anthology Navarasa. When Mani said I had to the hasya rasa I was  flattered. Good that I am identified with laughter.”

Navarasa is a forthcoming Tamil anthology  of  9 episodes  directed  by  Priyadarshan, Karthik Subbaraj, Vasanth, Arvind Swami, Bejoy Nambiar, Karthick Naren, Gautham Vasudev Menon, Sarjun KM and debutant Rathindran R. Prasad.

“My episode is entitled Summer  Of  92.I have  a  terrific cast headed by the wonderful Yogi Babu who is  big name in Tamil. I enjoyed  doing a shorter  film as compared with  a full feature film. It was  challenge,what to  put what not  to put.  But what I really enjoyed  was working with Mani Ratnam,” admits Priyan.