While the makers of Vijay’s Varisu have clarified that it is a proper Tamil film and not a bilingual, even though it is directed by popular Tollywood director Vamshi Paidipally and backed by producer Dil Raju, this seems to have now created a new kind of problem for its dubbed version, Vaarasudu. The Telugu Film Producers Council (TFPC), one of the producers-led associations in Tollywood, has released a press note urging exhibitors there to give preference to straight Telugu films during festivals like Sankaranti (Pongal) and Dassera.
With Varisu/Vaarasudu being planned as a Pongal/Sankaranti release, this has raised a question mark over the release of the Telugu version. With Chiranjeevi’s Waltair Veerayya, Nandamuri Balakrishna’s Veera Simha Reddy and Akhil Akkineni’s Agent expected to hit screens during this festive season, the battle for screens has already begun in Tollywood, and the buzz in trade circles is that the TFPC had come out with the press note to keep Dil Raju, a top producer-distributor, in check.
Interestingly, the note points out that Dil Raju had called for such a resolution when he was the vice president of the Telugu Film Chamber in 2019. That year, his film F2: Fun & Frustration was released alongside Telugu films NTR Kathanayakudu and Vinaya Vidheya Rama, and Rajinikanth’s dubbed Tamil film Petta for Sankaranti.
Insiders reveal that TFPC has taken this route due to its conflict with Raju, who is one of the founding members of a rival producers body —Active Telugu Film Producers Guild — which had, earlier this year, had called for halting the shooting of Telugu films in August, to discuss the “changing revenue situations and increasing costs” post the pandemic. With Varisu being shot in Hyderabad at that time, Dil Raju had justified it stating that it is not a Telugu film, but a proper Tamil film.
Meanwhile, G Dhananjayan, vice president of the Tamil Film Active Producers Association, informs us that the film bodies in Tamil Nadu have not passed any rule similar to that of Telugu producers. He adds that this move by the TFPC might not impact
Vijay’s film much. “At the end of the day, it is the content that sells, and no one can prevent a film from succeeding by imposing such rules,” he states.
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