DH Radio | The Lead: Veteran actor Avinash on his 'rare role' in Kannada cinema

In this episode of The Lead from DH Radio, a veteran of the southern film industry Avinash talks about his latest film Arishadvargas, the evolution of the Kannada film industry, the pandemic, and more.

Ahmed Shariff: Hi, this is Ahmed Shariff and welcome to the Lead by DH Radio. In today's episode, we are joined by a veteran of the southern film industry Avinash, who talks to us about his latest film Arishadvargas and more. Listen in. Hi sir and welcome to DH Radio.

Avinash: Thank you.

Ahmed: What is your role in the movie?

Avinash: I play the role of a film producer, who has relationship issues with his wife. It's a strong character, who has most of the Arishadvargas— the six sins. It's one of those rare roles that I have done in the Kannada film industry.

Ahmed: What made you choose the film?

Avinash: The script and the role. When the filmmaker narrated the script and my role, which is a bold and a gutsy one, I thought it's a challenge. I'm just an actor who is fine with any role as long as it motivates me. And this role did that. I thought this is something that I can do differently to what I normally do in a commercial cinema. And this is a type of role that one rarely gets. For an actor, that's the only challenge and satisfaction.

Ahmed: How has the Kannada cinema evolved?

Avinash: I have done both parallel as well as mainstream cinema, mostly the latter. We shouldn't compare the two. Mainstream cinema is what makes the film industry going because that's where the money is generated. At the time when I started my career, it would take 30-40 lakhs to produce a movie and today the amount has come to be 50 crores— This is a huge jump because of the growth of stardom and the industry.

But, at the same time for example in Tamil Nadu youngsters have come up with different stories and made small budget films that are doing extremely well. These kinds of films with a small budget, good story and intelligent directors are where you get characters that you don't get to play in commercial cinema. Both art and commercial cinema should run parallelly, both are healthy for the industry.

To know more about the conversation, listen to the podcast...