Exclusive! Priya Anand: After Karataka Damanaka, I want Yogaraj Bhat to make a romantic film and give me a rain-effect song

When Priya Anand last promoted a Kannada film, she was doing it amid immense grief, having lost one of her great friends and co-stars, Power Star Puneeth Rajkumar. Priya was the actor’s romantic interest in his last commercial film ever, James. Two years later, the actress is back in Kannada cinema, romancing Shivarajkumar in Karataka Damanaka. It’s an opportunity she has been looking forward to, as she has known Shivanna (as the actor is popularly known), since meeting him during the audio launch of Raajakumara and only heard the nicest things about him.

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“Karataka Damanaka is my first film with Shivanna, although I had signed up for another project with him to be produced by Sathya Jyothi Films earlier. That did not take off. Eventually, when Karataka Damanaka came to me, and I was told that Yogaraj Bhat was directing, I was intrigued because I was familiar with Mungaru Male and its amazing music album. I was really excited and hoping that it would be a typical romantic drama in the rain, where I could be the heroine and then I heard the story and realized that it was going to be a hardcore commercial film with loads of comedy. Since the other film with Shivanna was getting delayed and I’d been looking forward to working with him, I came onboard,” says Priya, adding that the fact that Prabhudeva was also a part of the film was an added bonanza. “We’d known each other for a while, but just never got around to working together,” she says.

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Priya admits that she was nervous about Karataka Damanaka because it was unlike any other film she’s done across languages. “From the character and the look in the film, it was all new to me. I was expecting Yogaraj to be an old-school strict taskmaster, only to realize that he is the most fun person to be around on set. Since I had never met Yogaraj and only knew about his work, I just assumed he would be a very serious person. Also, he has quite the towering personality, so, when I met him on set on day 1, we didn’t even have time to do a look test and a major scene was happening with multiple artistes and I was really intimidated by him. It took me a while, but it then struck me that I was working with the funniest man I have ever collaborated with,” the actress tells us.

Such is her comfort level with the filmmaker now that Priya has been urging him to make a Mungaru Male-like love story in which she gets a ‘rain-effect song’. “I don’t know, but as a heroine, a rain-effect song is just one of those most filmi moments you could get. I remember watching Geethanjali as a child; we’d reached late and as we entered the hall, there was a song, Jallanta Kavvinta, featuring Girija Shettar in the rain. From there to all Sridevi songs I have been hooked,” she says.

As for Karataka Damanaka, since it is a story based in north Karnataka, Priya says that there was no way she could even try and dub for herself, so there is not much that she has seen of the film and will, like audiences, watch it only on March 8. “But from the perspective of my character Kusumi, well, she runs a local kirana store in a village that these two conmen, played by Shivanna and Prabhu sir, come to. Kusumi is very strong and bold and then falls in love with this man who shows up and a romance unfolds,” says Priya.