I still can’t believe he’s a superstar - Neil Nitin Mukesh on Ilayathalapathy Vijay !

15/07/2014

Bollywood star Neil Nitin Mukesh who plays one of the antagonist role in Ilayathalapathy's Kaththi in a recent interview to IANS opened up on the film, his character, A.R.Murugadoss and the experience of working with Vijay.

Neil Nitin Mukesh who rose to fame with Johnny Gaddar said "For ‘Kaththi’, I’ve gone back to the days of ‘Johnny Gaddar’, which is an inspiration for my look in the film, I shed about 10 and a half kg for ‘Kaththi’ and reduced about four and half inches on the waist. I wanted the puffiness of the face to go down, so that I could look leaner and sharper."

Talking about his character in Kaththi, Neil said “It’s not a typical villain role you see in the south (southern film industry). I play an extremely polished character, a north Indian who speaks Tamil, well read and foreign-returned. As a villain, I don’t fight the hero with physical power, but with intelligence,This is a very challenging role and I wanted to push myself to the edge for it. To try and speak the language, learn the expressions and understand what I was saying, I had to learn Tamil. In a way, it was interesting because it felt like going back to school to unlearn and relearn,” 

Neil was all praise for Director A.R.Murugadoss and called him a fine technician, “Every actor wishes to be handled by a good director. Tamil being a new industry and language for me, I wanted to work with the finest in the business and Murugadoss happens to be that. I knew that he would handle me very well and therefore I didn’t have to think twice before signing."

Talking about Ilayathalapathy, Neil said "Vijay was one of the finest people in the industry” and went on add that “I still can’t believe he’s a superstar because he never behaves like one. He is always humble and very friendly. He’s supportive and very encouraging. I feel really lucky to have Vijay and Murugadoss as a team to work with in my Tamil debut.”