Vikram has been an actor for over 30 years now. His upcoming project Mahaan is the 60th film in his career. And he has seen the idea of acting evolve over the years. “When Sivaji Ganesan sir and Dilip Kumar sir were acting, they were more dramatic. And with Kamal Haasan sir, acting became more subtle and real. And now it’s total subtlety. While making 10 Endrathukulla, director Vijay Milton kept telling me, ‘Sir, don’t act’. I wondered what was he saying. Then I found out that most of them on the set were not professional actors. And I had to evolve into that,” Vikram said. Vikram noted that his son Dhruv comes with a different understanding of acting and working with him in Mahaan kind of became a learning curve in his career. “Initially, I thought I should teach him acting. But, I soon found out he was doing something else entirely. He does it without even knowing it. The subtlety that he exhibits is so different. As they say, run with the horses and hunt with the hounds, I just try to keep up with my previous generation and current generation,” he said. He recalled how worried he was for Dhruv while he was doing his debut movie Adithya Varma. “My first film was a miss. So for him, I wanted his first film to work. I was always with him during the shooting of Adithya Varma. And every time I tried to tell him something or give him notes, he used to brush me off saying, ‘Appa, I know what to do’. I then took a step back, saw him just do his thing.” Vikram also revealed that when director Karthik Subbaraj came to him with the script of Mahaan, he was reluctant about the idea of sharing screen space with Dhruv so early in the latter’s career. “I had decided that I shouldn’t do a movie with Dhruv at least for the next 10 years,” he said. However, Karthik’s script was too good for Vikram to pass. “I heard the script and I loved it. In fact, I loved Dhruv’s character more than mine,” he said. He even recalled telling Dhruv that he thought of playing both father and son. “But, I couldn’t have done what he did. He has done something entirely different,” the actor shared. “When Karthik narrated it to me, Dhruv’s character was at the top of the heap. And I told him, ‘No, no, let’s tweak the story here and there’. And Karthik came up with something beautiful and interesting,” he added. Mahaan also stars Simran, Bobby Simha and Sananth. The film will premiere on Amazon Prime Video on February 10.
