Location Diaries: Sleepless in Vadapalani

The heroine of the upcoming Kaalakoothu learned the value of a good night's sleep recently, while continuously shooting for the film for an entire day. The shooting was for a song on the sets of a temple in Vadapalani. "Originally, we planned to film for longer, but as the sets were needed by another unit too, we had to shoot for 24 hours straight without any time for sleep," recounts Srushti. "After arriving at 6 am on the sets, there was no packup at 6 pm. Instead, we continued to shoot till 6 the following morning."

It didn't really help their eyes that they were shooting amid hundreds of diyas. "All I could think of was sleep," Srushti says. And considering it wasn't possible to get away from the sets, she had to innovate. "I used every prop around to grab a few minutes of sleep. As the light was being adjusted, I would lean against a pillar and sleep. If the props were being changed, I'd simply sleep, standing up. My co-star, Prasanna, did the same," she says. 

Srushti says she has shot for 18 hours in the past, but this experience was something else entirely. "It took a toll on my body," she says, referring to her eyes turning red on account of sleeplessness and the smoke of the diyas. "It looked good on camera though," she says.

She got a shock when the makers asked them to return at 11 the following day. "But I requested to come in at 1, as I knew we had to shoot till 6 am again the following morning." Despite being an ordeal for them all, the experience resulted in a lot of laughs when the cinematographer showed shots of them napping on the sets.