From Dheena to Darbar, we give you some lesser-known facts and rare stills of director AR Murugadoss

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Happy Birthday AR Murugadoss: Rare working stills and interesting trivia from the filmmaker's 10 movies

Team CE

Updated:25th Sep, 2019 at 6:23 PM

Murugadoss was born in Kallakkurichi, Tamil Nadu.

The initials 'AR' refer to his father's name Arunasalam, and were added after Murugadoss signed his first film with Ajith, Dheena, in 2001

Murugadoss had his schooling at the Government Higher Secondary School and studied BA in Bishop Heber College, Tiruchirapalli

His debut film, Dheena, became a huge hit, and immediately launched him into the big league.

AR Murugadoss's follow up to Dheena, the Vijayakanth-starrer Ramana, also opened to critical and commercial acclaim

ARM then moved on to Ghajini with Suriya, which was loosely based on the Hollywood thriller, Memento.

Murugadoss's journey started from his college days his college days, where he was active in cultural events, particularly in short-story writing, mimicry and drawing.

After his jokes and stories got published in Anandha Vikatan, Murugadoss began to think of screen-writing as a career option.

During his stint at the Bharathidasan University, Murugadoss started to write comedy sketches and acted in them

After college, Murugadoss tried to join the Madras Film Institute, but was rejected.

Nevertheless, he stayed in Chennai, and became an assistant writer to P. Kalaimani, and wrote dialogues for the Tamil film, Madurai Meenakshi.

Murugadoss worked as AD to Praveenkanth in Ratchagan (1997) for half of the film, and continued as assistant script director for the Telugu film Kalusukundam Ra.

Murugadoss then worked with S. J. Surya for the film Kushi. S. J. Suryah later recommended him to Ajith for his debut film, Dheena

ARM's first blockbuster came in the form of Thuppaakki (2012). He had narrated the film's one-liner to Vijay during the shoot of Kushi. Vijay, impressed with the plot, had promised to work with him.

The Hindi version of ARM's Ghajini, starring Aamir Khan, became the first ever Bollywood film to gross over 100 crore.

Thuppaakki was apparently only the second Tamil film to enter the 100 crore club after Rajinikanth's Enthiran.

ARM next directed the Hindi remake of Thuppaakki, Holiday: A Soldier Is Never Off Duty, starring Akshay Kumar.

ARM's Kaththi, starring Vijay and produced by Lyca Productions released on Diwali 2014 and emerged as one of the top-grossing films in Kollywood for 2014, collecting an estimated 131 crore worldwide.

In 2016, ARM directed Akira starring Sonakshi Sinha, which was a remake of the Tamil film Mouna Guru. The film was moderately successful.

ARM's 3rd collaboration with Vijay, Sarkar, released in over 3000 screens around the globe. The movie collected 270 crores worldwide, where 146 crores were collected only in TN state.

Here are a few exclusive working stills from the filmmaker's movie sets...

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