Vikram battled hunger, rashes for ‘I’

Vikram is an interviewer’s delight.

The unassuming actor’s witty repartees leave you chuckling — it’s like catching up with your friendly next-door neighbour.

The National Award winner believes in stepping out of his comfort zone for a role, and has pushed the envelope further for Shankar’s I.

This is his 50th film in his 25 years of work in the industry, having won the State Award for best actor in the romantic tragedy Sethu, and Filmfare awards for the blind Kasi in Kasi, and Anniyan, and a National Award for playing a gravedigger in Pithamagan.

Kenny, as he is fondly known, is always game for an exciting role.

“Shankar offered me this role while I was working on Rajapattai,” he says.

“I was nice and healthy, even had a little paunch,” the Tamil actor added with a smile. That was in 2011.

In I he sports four different looks.

There is Lingesan, the bodybuilder who is aspiring to win the Mr Tamil Nadu crown. The second is a model, the third is a beast and the fourth character is a hunch-backed ogre.

He dropped from 86kg to 56kg by following a tough regimen of exercise and diet for one year.

“I was keen on touching 55kg, but the team of doctors who were monitoring me cautioned me when the body parameter levels dipped.”

“I had to first gain weight and then reduce.”

As Lingesan, he had to look the part and blend in with other bodybuilders, including the real Mr Tamil Nadu and Mr India, who were part of the cast.

“I could not stick out. Some of them suggested going the steroid route, take the oosi (needle) it’s safe, but I was clear [about] doing it the healthy way.”

They taught him to pose and flex his muscles.

“Flexing muscles is an exhausting effort and can be painful when the muscles get caught,” Vikram says.

“I learnt simple tips from them like surviving on black coffee and sucking [on] an orange segment to ward off thirst.”

For the emaciated look (for the hunch-back role) he survived on half an apple, an egg white for lunch or banana stem juice for a meal. “But this kind of weight reduction is not advisable,” cautioned the star.

Family members disapproved of his emaciated look, and he also grew irritated.

“I would snap at my friends when they suggested I try a spoon of biryani, my favourite.”

Battling food cravings in the middle of the night, when sleep betrayed him and hunger pangs got louder, this father of two would sneak into the kitchen and pull out a chappati and tuck into some leftover curry. Yielding to temptation, he gorged on a packet of chips, and popped in a handful of nuts.

“Peeking into the fridge I nibbled a chocolate bar and downed a cup of ice cream. It was crazy. Those nights after this kind of bingeing I put on 3.5kg.”

The following morning would see him cycling on an empty stomach.

“Only then I managed to lose 1.5kg.”

Yet driving him ahead during this mean phase was the excitement of seeing a different Vikram onscreen.

“New challenges egg me on. I am keen on portraying a person remotely far away from the real me and from my earlier roles too.”

Wearing prosthetics was a different cup of tea altogether.

It took four hours to get into the beast makeup while the hunchback took even longer. He developed rashes when he wore the makeup for more than seven days.

“The paints used are alcohol based and I would be inhaling them all the time. In fact there was one crew member who would keep a blower near my nose to ward off its fumes. Yet, I seem to have developed alcohol sensitivity.”

Dubbing in a bass voice for his character affected his larynx.

Talking about the action sequences shot atop a roof in China, Vikram appreciated their speed and nimbleness of their bodies.

“It was quite an eye opener, watching them.”

Vikram shares a great understanding with director Shankar, having worked with him in Anniyan, the story of Ramanujam, a lawyer with a personality disorder.

“Shankar’s detailing, his meticulous approach to a film and his keen sense of perfection is amazing. With a big budget you can get helicopters and a thousand elephants for shooting, but the challenge lies in using the funds for creating something out-of-the-box. Shankar always looks to conceive something innovative.”

Vikram is confident that I will go down in history as a landmark film.

“Anniyan was not just a Tamil film, it became celebrated as a south Indian film. Going by the responses to the trailers online, I will be celebrated as a national film. It has a good content.”

I hits screens in time for the Tamil festival of Pongal on January 14.