Sugumar Shanmugam presents a contradiction in phrases of artistes in Tamil cinema.
For one, he prefers to determine himself as an appearing coach and a casting director greater than an actor; although it was an appearing task — as Veera in Priya Krishnaswamy’s National Award-winning movie Baaram — that put the highlight on him.
Also, only a few actors, if any, in Tamil cinema focus on Konstantin Stanislavski and Michael Chekhov in their interviews, particularly with the easy ease Sugumar does. When we meet, he is holding a month-to-month Tamil movie journal in his arms.
The version, an ode to the Vetri Maaran movie Asuran, has an essay that Sugumar penned, whereby he discusses why the filmmaker struck gold with the movie’s casting. “Chekhov says the point where the psyche and physique conjoin is when one begins to understand the character. I saw that in Dhanush in Asuran. I relate to these aspects due to my academic background,” says Sugumar.
Casting proper
Hailing from a household of therukoothu performers, Sugumar holds a Master’s diploma in Drama and Theatre Arts from Pondicherry Central University. Subsequently, he aced a diploma course in intensive appearing from the National School of Drama (Bengaluru).
Since 2015, he has been pursuing a doctorate in Theatre Arts with the Department of Performing Arts in Pondicherry Central University; his analysis subject is Characterisation, actor’s physiology and bio-psychology. He additionally runs the Pondicherry Theatre Arts Academy in Kalapet, his hometown, the place he trains 18 college students.
As a casting director, he names individuals like Kim Ki-duk and Woody Allen as inspirational.
“If you do the fitting casting, I imagine that you’ve accomplished 30% of the film earlier than it is shot. I learnt this from painters. The ideological feelings they seize with individuals’s faces or animals… that course of is casting. The painter does his casting after figuring out if it will assist promote his artwork. So casting is vital not solely in the movie enterprise,” he says, including, “The best casting director that I know of is Charlie Chaplin. I don’t think there has ever been someone better or that there ever will be. He understood the importance of characters.”
It was after working as a casting director in a Kannada film, Beerangipuram, which Sugumar says was “shelved after its first schedule”, that a possibility to meet Baaram’s director Priya Krishnaswamy materialised.
“She had reached out to my Head of the department (R Raju who played the central character Karuppasamy in Baaram). She told him that casting was important for her film and he (Raju) pointed her to me,” says Sugumar.
When the duo met, he advised Priya that there have been two approaches to casting that he is providing her.
“One, I could get experienced professionals, but I should give them a workshop and brief them of the character, backstories, economic backgrounds, period, geography and other details. The second option was to find real people who live as these characters, and give them a workshop on how to face the camera. Priya liked the second option more though I told her that we may not get an exact likeness to how she visualised the character in her script,” he provides.
Characters like Nagamma (the maid whom Karuppasamy’s son hires), Buchi (the shepherd) and the ladies with whom Veera discusses Thalaikoothal have been all chosen by way of such a course of.
Psychological course of
Sugumar’s educational footing helps set up a sure aesthetic that his line of labor helps to add in the filmmaking course of. But he has a gargantuan activity at hand: convincing an trade of a course of that helps ship higher output.
“In Hollywood, even for commercial films, they engage casting directors. I don’t know what understanding filmmakers here have about a casting director but it certainly doesn’t mean that directors cannot do casting. It is a simple psychological process. There may be a thought process that casting directors may get involved too academically, and would end up confusing the actors. That is not true. A doctor does not diagnose a patient by telling him the chemical, physiological definitions of the person’s problem. Likewise, I train them in a way they will understand the theories I have learnt,” he says.
However, getting the Tamil movie trade to take to a novel thought is an enormous activity.
“Which is why we must appreciate directors like Ram, Mysskin, Vetri Maaran, Lokesh Kanagaraj and Karthik Subbaraj to name a few, who draw quality work out of their artistes despite the restrictions,” he provides.
Quiz him on what constitutes good appearing and he retorts: “Acting is being a character. I don’t know how you categorise talent though. What you consider as good acting itself is a conflict. Say, a mainstream actor whom you think doesn’t belong. You may think he is not the best actor out there but he may have been true to the character he plays, and the audience must have felt it. That is all that matters. There is no hard and fast rules to acting. It is not classical dance… for you to practice mudras in just the right way to convey the meaning lest you get it wrong,” he says.
His exploits in Baaram has introduced him appreciation from filmmakers, most of whom have been curious to work out who he was, and what he brings to the desk as an appearing coach and a casting director.
“I’ve been booked for two films now as a casting director. I was already doing another film when Baaram released, where I play the second lead and am also the casting director. I’m doing a Kannada film but in the capacity of an acting coach. It is a satisfying feeling. I’m getting the recognition for the years spent on academic work,” he concludes.
