COLUMN:
LOCATION DIARY
Director
Omar Lulu talks about his experiences in the films, ‘Oru Adaar
Love’ and ‘Happy Weddings’
Photos: Omar Lulu; Priya Prakash Varrier; Omar Lulu with Roshan and Priya Prakash Varrier
By
Shevlin Sebastian
One
evening, director Omar Lulu got a call. It was from his six-year-old
son Eshan who lives in Dubai. “Papa, you must take Roshan [Abdul
Rahoof, for the yet-to-be-released film 'Oru Adaar Love'],” said
Eshan. Omar's son had seen Roshan dance regularly in a TV show and
had become a fan.
But
when Eshan called, Omar was having doubts about Roshan. “He had not
performed well in the audition,” says the Thrissur-based Omar, at a
hotel room in Kochi. “What made matters worse was that he had
slipped and fallen.”
But
Roshan kept sending videos to Omar's Whatsapp account of his dubsmash
moves. “When I saw that, I realised that he looked good and
performed well,” says Omar. “He also had a cuteness. So I decided
to give him a small role.”
Soon,
the shoot began at the Don Bosco school at Mannuthy. The first
sequence was of Roshan coming down some steps. Omar felt it would be
better if a girl also walked down with him. He saw young actor Priya
Prakash Varrier walking past.
“So,
I asked her to walk down the steps with Roshan,” says Omar. “But
when I looked through the monitor, I realised that both of them had a
very good chemistry.”
The
next sequence was for the song, ‘Manikya Malaraya Poovi’. To give
a light-hearted feel, Omar decided that Roshan would do some winks.
He had seen Roshan do it in a dubsmash video.
“The
initial plan was for Roshan to wink at Priya and she would stare
back,” says Omar. “However, when I shot Roshan winking, I asked
Priya whether she knew how to wink. She said yes. So, in a sequence
when Roshan lifts both his eyebrows, Priya gives a wink.”
When
Omar looked through the monitor he felt very excited. He immediately
called the producer Ouseppachan and asked to stop the shoot. “I
wanted to rework the script, to give more space for Roshan and
Priya,” says Omar. The producer, understandably, was upset.
Then
Omar said, “Sir, I will release ‘Manikya Malaraya Poovi’ on
YouTube and you can see the reaction. Then you will understand.”
Omar’s
gut feeling turned out to be right. The song, which was released on
February 9, went viral and racked up millions of views, making Roshan
and Priya instant stars. In fact, so great was the impact of Priya’s
wink, that she now has 5.4 million followers on Instagram, twice more
than young superstar Dulquer Salman.
During
this time, Omar was browsing through Facebook and came across a boy
called Satyajit who sang of friendship and love, without any musical
accompaniment. “I liked his voice,” says Omar.
So,
he sent a message. But there was no response. At that time, a young
actor came to meet Omar. He was from Kottayam where Satyajit lived. A
miffed Omar asked the boy, who knew Satyajit, why the singer had not
replied. The boy rushed back to Kottayam and brought Satyajit to meet
Omar.
The
director asked Satyajit whether he had any new songs. The youngster
sang a song called ‘Freak Penne’. “It had good lyrics,” says
Omar. “So I took Satyajit to [music composer] Shaan Rahman’s
house in Kochi. When Satyajit sang Shaan immediately stood up and
clapped.”
Later
when Shaan sent the music for the song by e-mail, he wrote in the
subject line: ‘Sure shot’.
‘Freak
Penne’ will be released soon.
Meanwhile,
Omar had a different experience in his film, ‘Happy Weddings’
(2016). When he wrote the script, he intended to shoot inside a
train. But when he inquired about the cost, it was very high. “We
have to deposit money at the station as well as give daily fees,”
says Omar. “Since it was my first film the budget was low.”
Omar
wondered what to do. One night, he, along with a few crew members
were having dinner at a thattukada near a highway in Thrissur.
“Suddenly,
I saw a low-floor bus going past,” says Omar. “The bus looked
nice, with all the lights inside it. I felt that maybe I could do the
shoot in a low-floor bus instead of a train.”
The
next morning, when he opened a Malayalam newspaper, there was a
feature which mentioned of how the Kerala State Road Transport
Corporation was encouraging cinema shoots inside low-floor buses.
“This was a sign from God,” says Omar. So, he had no doubt about
hiring such a bus for the film.
One
day, just before the shoot for ‘Happy Weddings’ began, Omar was
again going through Facebook. There was a video, called Rock Sasi, by
a bearded young man named Pareekutty Perumbavur. “He spoke of how a
girl tricked him,” says Omar. “I liked it, so I called him.”
They met and Omar decided to give him a role.
“Pareekutty
told me, ‘Thank God the girl ditched me because it helped me to get
a role’,” says Omar.
And
the part: It was the exact opposite of what happened to Pareekutty in
real life. “He had to steal the girl from the hero,” says a
smiling Omar.
(The
New Indian Express, Kochi, Thiruvananthapuram and Kozhikode)
#OmarLulu
#OruAdaarLove #HappyWeddings #ShaanRahman #PriyaPrakashVarrier
#Roshan
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