A director needs to understand an artiste

As someone who learnt the ropes of direction from none other than the late legendary director Puttanna Kanagal, PH Vishwanath says it is pretty easy to bridge the gap between commercial cinema and those that have a message for the audience. In a chat with Bangalore Times, he speaks about his upcoming film Suli and what his choices for this film were based on.
Who do you feel must definitely watch Suli?
It's a film for every family. Especially, those who send their children to work in different cities and those parents who have daughters they want to marry off. It is about how we tend to trust too easily owing to certain circumstances. It also features a young handicapped girl who takes on the responsibility of her family in spite of her shortcomings. It is a film that all girls should watch.

How did you come to choose Srinath for the lead role?
This story required an actor who could play a loveable family man and, at the same time, was also an established one on the field. Srinath is suitable on all accounts. In real life too, Srinath is the sort of person who is very friendly with everyone, irrespective of what they do for a living. He talks to everyone ' from the senior most to the junior most person ' on the set with equal affection. He has been this sort of a person from the time I have known him ' back in the day when my guru Puttanna Kanagal was directing him and I was the assistant director. He is a good human being and that is the exact character sketch of the lead role in this film. I cannot imagine anybody else in that role.
How different was it to work with a senior actor like Srinath and a host of newcomers in the same film?
Having someone like Srinath around made my job easy, because he actually takes time out to interact with the newbies and makes them comfortable about their work. The whole team loves him. Working with newcomers is not new to me, though it is a challenge each time. For this film, we had our cast be a part of workshops before the actual shoot. A director needs to understand the psyche of an artiste to be able to extract work from each of them.
What's next for you?
After Suli, I will be working on a comedy. I haven't finalized on anything in particular as yet.