JOIN USThe lives of dreaded dons have always been turned into interesting stories on the big screen. Even actors consider playing a don as an opportunity to showcase their acting prowess. The same holds true for actor Sumanth Shailendra, who is thrilled about his latest film ‘Bettanagere Seena’ in which he plays the title role. ‘Bettanagere Seena’ is based on the life of rowdy sheeter Bettanagere Seena, who presided over the dreaded Nelamangala mafia, till he was gunned down by the police in an encounter in 2012.
“I play the role of Bettanagere Seena in the film. The makers of the film have interacted with his family and collected information from real locations — all in an effort to pack a lot of reality in the story,” says Sumanth, who confides that he is becoming choosy about his projects. “To live each moment like Seena and act like him was certainly a challenge,” he adds.
Sumanth confesses that he spent a lot of time understanding and researching Seena’s character. He says he had to completely change his look and body language to get into the skin of the character. “I was given three months to understand the character. I looked up online and checked a few videos on YouTube but none of them really helped me understand the person that Seena really was,” he states.
The actor recollects that he visited Nelamangala and Bettanagere where Seena lived and interacted with his family and friends to know more about Seena and how he got the tag of being “dreaded and dangerous”. He also states that he had to go through the local papers for news on Seena and collect old photographs in black and white to change his look to resemble Seena.
Sumanth recalls that the shooting of the film was not always a smooth run. “We had real rowdies come on the sets and question us on the scenes and even though they didn’t understand why the scenes were shot the way they were, they still wanted to know the details,” says Sumanth.
All of his earlier projects have had him play a soft role and this is exactly why Sumanth enjoyed playing Seena. “It was a lot of hard work and we had to shoot in the locations where Seena lived, visited and even broke into a fight with local gangsters. Even the smallest of emotions have been captured and brought out well on screen,” he adds.
Sumanth has a couple of more projects lined up for release. “I have been occupied with the promotions of ‘Bettanagere Seena’ and will return to my shooting schedules soon,” he says.