Once a celeb child makes his baby steps into tinsel town, there’s a likely hailstorm of overblown judgements and cliché-bound comparisons. The Khan, Kapoor kids to our Tolly, Kolly and Molly babies are no exception to this welcome parade. Here, as Pranav Ratheesh makes his debut acting, in a lead role in the about-to-be-released Theeram, the prominent reason why he’s being written about is this legacy. Pranav, the youngest and latest of the Ratheesh siblings to follow in the footsteps of his actor dad, elder sister Paravathy and brother Padmaraj.
The 22-year-old boy we have been talking to is too new to arc lights and far less media savvy. Yet, Pranav cautiously wipes off that aforesaid aura to judiciously demarcate personal and professional lives. It is a possible interpretation that his surname straightaway paved his way to big screen, but it did not. During his college days happened a short film Nizhal. Saheed Arafath, the director of Theeram, had watched it before extending an invitation to Pranav. “I made that short film along with a little bit of acting in the dark-sided family drama. It was in Tamil. The Theeram director first saw that film and then only he realised me as the son of actor Ratheesh. Afterwards the discussion of the subject took place. I just got blown away by the way he narrated the plot. On the set, I learned a lot from him. He trusted his crew all through the shoot,” he recaps.
Pranav’s character Ali is a factory worker in the morning and an autorickshaw driver by night. He gets smitten by Suhara (Maria John). There’s a boy, there’s a girl, they fall in love and the romance blooms in the serene locales of Alappuzha. Any real-life reference? “Romance is a funny experience all are likely to have in college and I too had one. There’s nothing more to it like the ones you see in a movie,” he smiles. It was a hectic schedule that awaited him. “Theeram was completed in three time slots. First, there was a four-day schedule. It was followed by a day and night shoot for 33 continuous days. Lastly, we spent three days in Kuttanad,” he says.
The Visual Communication grad takes life and cinema as it comes. Pranav was just a third-grader when he lost his dad; too young to realise the magnitude of his father's oeuvre. “Frankly speaking, dad was gone by the time I understood who he was. I have a liking for the powerful and manly character he had portrayed. My favourite is Mohan Thomas in Commissioner. When he was there, we used to tour. He’d take us out,” Pranav recaps. Pranav remembers his childhood days as usual like any kid, less affected by the celebrity factor. “As a child, I loved watching cartoons and enjoyed playtime with my friends. There was a camcorder I had in my school days. I had this fascination to capture something in it, and make it into a moving film in Windows Movie Maker (software). Then I showed it to my mom. She used to speak high of it and encourage me though they were no big works of art,” he rewinds.
Seeing the boy’s interest in cinema, the mother herself had advised him to choose a course which may let him further explore and reinforce his skills. Pranav backpacked to Bengaluru to graduate in Visual Communication at St Joseph’s College. Coming back, he completed a diploma programme in film editing from Revathy Kalamandir Film Academy in Thiruvananthapuram. The Ratheesh kids get together at their newly-shifted apartment at Maruthamkuzhy in Thiruvananthapuram. Another sister Padma who got married off is settled in the Middle East. In the movie Vakku, Pranav and elder sister Parvathy could be seen together. “It was rumoured that we are acting as a pair. It’s just that we both are acting in a project,” he clears. Theeram is planned as a May release. The grown up Pranav is a voracious reader and a travel enthusiast. “Travels happen with friends. The longest of the trips was to Goa.” How would he like to establish himself in cinema, as an actor or editor? “I am going with the flow. Nothing has been planned,” he winds up.
