For actress Aditi Rao Hydari, working with Mani Ratnam on their upcoming film Cheliyaa, co-starring Karthi, has been a dream come true. Apparently, his films took her to a “land of dreams”, and when she became a part of that world, it was worth a lot. “I cherished every single moment throughout the filming of Cheliyaa. This film will remain with me forever. Looking back, I still can’t believe that I have been part of a Mani Ratnam film. I grew up on a dose of his films, and this seems surreal,” says the actress reflecting on the same.
While the film was originally made in Tamil and will have a dubbed release in Telugu, the actress with roots in Hyderabad, shares that a release in multiple languages is quite a thing. “I think actors who get to act in films of different languages are lucky. And also, it is a fact that with the kind of cinema we are making, the boundaries are slowly being erased. Cinema transcends borders and barriers, especially when it’s the film of a director like Mani Ratnam,” she shares.
Playing a doctor in the film — interestingly a dream she cherished as a kid — seems to have been easy for Aditi considering Mani Ratnam pushed her to give her best. “He extracts the best from you and pushes you to go beyond your capability. At the same time, he gives the space and freedom which lets us discover a new side to ourselves,” she says on a parting note.
