Ranjith wouldn’t approve a shot until he hears the punches: Arya

The trailer of Sarpatta Parambarai set the tone for the film’s release on Thursday in Amazon Prime Video. The hero of the film Arya plays Kabilan, a boxer, who belongs to the Sarpatta Parambarai clan. “When I heard Ranjith has this script on hand, I met him through Kalaiyarasan and told him that I am trained in boxing and would love to be a part of it. Ranjith said that he would keep me in mind when he starts the film’s work. That is how I landed the film,” the actor tells us. Arya opens up that he is emotionally connected to the sport and hence didn’t want to miss the opportunity. “Normally action films are high-octane and has a lot of fight sequences. The adrenaline on the sets of Sarpatta was too high. We landed real punches. Ranjith wouldn’t approve the shot till he hears me punching John Kokken or vice-versa. Satthame Varlaye (I can’t hear the punches) is what he kept saying,” laughs Arya. Having said that he also clarifies that he doesn’t do a film just for the sake of it. “I don’t accept or even approach a film if I feel that I cannot justify it. Be it Boss Engira Baskaran, Naan Kadavul, Magamuni, and Sarpatta, I signed them because the characters excited me and I felt I could do it.” 

Once Ranjith got back in touch with Arya, the pre-production work for Sarpatta Parambarai began. “I asked him when are we shooting. Ranjith calmed me down saying we have six months of prepping to be done for the film. We had a 45-day workshop where Ranjith enacted each and every scene. As the story is set in the 70s, we had to work on the dialects and the body language of boxers from that period. National boxing champion Thiru and my boxing coach Santhosh conditioned us. We also spoke to real fighters from Sarpatta Parambarai and Idiyappa Parambarai who are still around and took their inputs. The workshop was an eye-opener of sorts,” Arya explains. 

If not for film shoots, one can either see Arya at the gym or cycling on ECR. According to him, being a fitness enthusiast came in handy to prepare for the role. “Having been trained in boxing and staying fit did a world of good for me. I need to tone my body to play Kabilan, so I knew what sort of regime it would take to be there,” he adds. Arya credits Ranjit for bringing Kabilan to life. “Every character in the film has its own intricacies and not a touch-and-go prop. For me to play Kabilan, I merged with the ambience at a point in time. The sets, the props, the costume brought the 1970s alive. It made the process much easier even for a junior artiste to understand what we wanted to present to the audience,” the actor opens up. 

Be it Naan Kadavul, Magamuni, Avan Ivan, or Sarpatta Parambarai, Arya’s transformation into the character for several months for each of these films has had a positive effect on his business in the southern movie industry. “I am certainly happy when the efforts reap rewards. I have given what it takes for a movie to have a good output. Sometimes it has worked and sometimes it hasn’t. However, I have not let my failures bog me down. Successes and failures are secondary to me. I am not someone who keeps dwelling in it,” he concludes.