While many actors from big film families are still struggling, Sai Srinivas, the son of producer Bellamkonda Suresh is fast turning into a big star with every successive film.
Just days away from the release of his film Saakshyam this Friday, the young actor is quite composed. “When director Sri Vaas narrated the story to me, I found it to be a new concept and knew it would be a success. It’s a commercial film, but made very uniquely, so I’m very excited about it,” says Srinivas.
Describing his role, the actor explains, “I play an adventurous video game designer. The characterisation is new and the action scenes were especially challenging. I trained for nearly a month in Dubai and even action choreographer Peter Hein felt that it was like a debut film for him. So one can imagine how natural and yet difficult the action episodes were!”
The film apparently has a backdrop of the five elements. “It’s not a supernatural film, but the subject has never been seen in Telugu cinema before. It was also a very complicated film to make but all of us took it up as a challenge and did it,” says Srinivas, adding that it took nearly 160 working days to complete the film.
The actor says that he blindly follows his directors and travels with them wherever required. “I am a director’s pet and I blindly follow them. My job is to bring to life the way in which my director has visualised my character,” he says.
Showering praise on co-star and lead actress Pooja Hegde, Srinivas says, “She is a dedicated actress and did her own action scenes without a body double. Infact, she has become my good friend.”
Meanwhile, the actor is also doing two other projects simultaneously. “It was not a conscious decision to do the films simultaneously. While Saakshyam was underway, debutant director Srinivas and Teja garu came to me with good subjects. Both the characters are different, and that’s why I signed up for them,” he explains.
With high expectations from his upcoming film and the fact that his films are in big demand with Hindi satellite channels, an emotional Srinivas reveals, “Many have openly professed their jealousy towards me. But I feel good when my films do well at the box-office. Not to forget that I have worked very hard to get here. I was born into this industry and I always feel, think and talk about cinema. I prepared myself with passion before taking up acting as my career and have spent many sleepless nights.”
He adds, “I want to make good cinema and discover myself in every film. I want to take up challenging roles and do films for audiences of all age groups. Then alone will I truly feel successful. I also want to make my father and entire family proud, as they are my biggest source of support.” Varun Tej and Akhil Akkineni are very close friends of Sai Srinivas “We discuss films and what kind of subjects to do,” he concludes.
