Family Matters

He first tasted stardom with his Telugu debut,Leader. This paved his path to Bollywood. In fact,he wrapped up the shooting of Rohan Sippy’s Dum Maro Dum alongside Abhishek Bachchan and Pratik. “Is there any fixed path in the film industry? I don’t know if there is. I have only done what I wanted to all along,” says the 26-year-old.

On his brief visit to Mumbai,we met Daggubati at his favourite hangout,Bandra’s Café Basilico. Dressed in a casual shirt with denims,the actor has been nurturing an unruly beard for a look test for his next film with director Selva Raghavan. Yet,his rugged looks don’t escape the attention of the girls seated at a table close by.

Having experimented with photography at 17,Daggubati was already editing film promos in Class 12. He followed it up by turning cinematographer and then starting a visual effects company,Spirits Media,in the South. “I started with a team of two artistes and we soon grew to over 150. I consider it as one of my contributions to the film industry since there weren’t many people doing special effects back then,” he recounts. He later tied up with Prime Focus to become a visual effects major in the South. But Daggubatti’s heart lay in filmmaking. He soon turned producer. His first project,A Belly Full Of Dreams,a children’s film,won him a national award in 2006.

He admits that his film family background has had a huge effect on him. “It’s like being in a film school right from Class I and I realise very few get such exposure,” he smiles. Leader was hence the next natural progression. It was Daggubati’s intense yet poised performance as a politician that charmed the audience. Sippy realised the actor’s potential when he saw the rushes. “Rohan called me after Leader’s promos came out and it was a great opportunity to explore the kind of roles that Hindi cinema offers—like that of playing a Goan musician,which is not something I would otherwise get to do down South,” he avers.

Though Duggabati is currently known for his urban chic looks,he is set to break the mould with Dum Maro Dum. “I had to grow my hair and learn how to play the guitar,” he admits. Guitar was probably the easier part; it was getting rid of the South-Indian accent that took more effort. “Rohan sent me the script much before the shooting schedule and I took diction training to rehearse the dialogues.”