Spider-man 3 is all over the news while Dasavatharam seems to have gone out of bounds. But unusually, the former gave an opportunity for fans to know what Kamal is upto. After hearing the news of the grand premiere in Chennai, I was hoping that someone publishes some photographs. Finally, Galatta.com did it.

In a very old interview, Sujatha (the writer) speaks about Marudhanayagam in detail, among other things. It contains some interesting insights about the movie, including Sujatha’s contributions. Excerpts:

Q:Was it you who suggested the ‘Marudha Naayagam’ story to Kamal?
In a way ‘yes’. For the last 7 or 8 years Kamal had been searching for the right story to make a historical. He even had plans of doing a historical musical on the lines of ‘Ambikapathi’ and toyed with the idea of making a film which had only verses for dialogue. While he was examining so many ideas, I suggested why not we go into immediate past history instead of going to ancient period.
It was around that time I came across a folk ballad edited by Tamil scholar Vanamamalai and published by Madurai Kamaraj University. Impressed by the ballad, I showed it to Kamal to find out if it has the potential of a good film. Kamal was initially reluctant, but agreed to go through the ballad.
In the elaborate and excellent introduction was a footnote which said, “This Yousuf Khan was originally a Hindu Vellala called Marudha Naayagam. Kamal immediately jumped at it and felt that the story had all the potential of a good historical film. Kamal felt that the religious conversion could be owing to some social oppression and that would form a good subject for filming.

Q: The story of Marudha Naayagam is relatively unknown…
We chose the life of Marudha Naayagam for its substantial story element and episodic content. His is not a conventional story of a king. Starting his life as a supplier to the French Army, he sneaks through enemy lines with messages effortlessly. The French train him and the British, spotting his talent, elevate him to the position of a tax collector of Madurai district, only to hang him for disobedience to the British Raj just one year after his rise to the top. It is this stunning elevation from the lowest level and again touching the nadir, this graph of Marudha Naayagam’s life, that interested Kamal to make it into a film.
As for deviations, nearly 80% of the film will faithfully adapt Hills’ biography of Marudha Naayagam. Only on certain aspects, where no solid or substantial information is available, have we used our imagination.
For instance, no reason is available for Marudha Naayagam’s conversion to Islam. Here Kamal has worked back on the character and has imagined the reasons for his conversion beautifully.

Q: Don’t you foresee the danger of ‘Marudha Naayagam’ being compared to Sivaji Ganesan’s ‘Veerapandiya Kattabomman’ (a folk tale)?
Kamal can stand the comparison easily because he is not going to follow Sivaji Ganesan’s style. Knowing well about Kamal’s yen for perfection and precision, we can be sure that the level of realism in ‘Marudha Naayagam’ will be high. There is no question of any Indian actor playing a foreigner as Javer Sitaraman did in ‘Veerapandiya Kattabomman’ and spoke his lines in broken Tamil. In ‘Marudha Naayagam’ wherever the British or French officers speak, Kamal, I think, is planning to para dubbing to give it an authentic touch.
Q: Do you think ‘Marudha Naayagam,’ a film with a distinct native flavour, can have a national or an international audience?
Why not? ‘Marudha Naayagam’ may be a historical character, but he is not a larger than life character. It is a story which depicts a man with all his strengths and weaknesses. ‘The rise and fall of a man’ is the one line story of ‘Marudha Naayagam’, a plot that will interest anyone in any part of the world. When films like ‘Jurassic Park’ can run for its grandeur and technical brilliance, the same can be said of ‘Marudha Naayagam’ which will be made using state of the art techniques. Kamal is adopting the linear narrative style where through off screen narration a person tells the background of Marudha Naayagam, the historical context of the story and so on.

Q: Kamal is supposed to be following the Hollywood style in writing the screenplay of the film. Could you explain that?
I think for the first time in India, a computer has been used in screenplay writing, a method usually adopted by Hollywood film makers. Various software are available for this and Kamal is using a particular software called ‘Movie Magic’. All the information about the movie can be accessed with it..

Q: What is you actual input in ‘Marudha Naayagam’?
I created the Tamil fonts for ‘Movie Magic’. I am also overseeing the screenplay written by Kamal. In Hollywood films, you have a ’screenplay doctor’ and that is the role I’m playing.