It is one thing to play an evil-incarnate person, but it is quite tricky to play someone who is subjected to witnessing all kinds of horrible things and slowly gets poisoned, not knowing what lies on the other side. Actor Soundararaja, who was recently seen in Karthik Subbaraj's Dorothy, begins by saying that though he does not condone the actions of his character, that one is not the most God-forsaken person in that household either. "If you notice in the flashback scene where young Subbu first introduces young Karthi to us, the elder brother character enquires the kid's caste, and my character chastises him for putting the child on the spot."
Elaborating on his earlier point, Soundararaja also responds to some criticisms on how and why Dorothy (Keerthy Suresh), who was otherwise emotionally intelligent and well-informed, gets married to a misogynist brute like the one he played. "Maari is not the worst person in the household. Again, that is not to say he is an innocuous soul. His problems are that he cannot resist his father and elder brother's toxic nature enough, and he keeps drinking and gets into trouble. But he is well-dressed and scoffs at his brother occasionally when he bad-mouths women, even Dorothy. Though I still don't know why Dorothy married Maari, she may have found something redemptive in him," he says, as he opens up that he was confident about Karthik Subbaraj and did not ask him about anything more than he needed to know. "I have known Karthik since 2008. He is a dear friend and family member. Though I had a lot of questions about the film, he made sure I knew enough to perform well. With every scene, I asked him to give me more to perform."
Soundararaja further adds that he believes that the live-sound filming also enhanced his performance and the film itself on the whole. "Dubbing at the end of the day is pretension. Shooting with the live sound with the ambience is the easiest and the most effective manner to communicate a character and his/her emotions to the audience. It was more so for me as I am a Maduraikaaran myself and I know the inflections," he says, as he feels that dubbing is doing the same thing all over again, and for him that may not always replicate the good performance he pulled off on screen. "It is hard, at least for me, to enter the dubbing suite and once again immerse myself in the film's world, the character and the emotion. Yeah, on the downside, the atmospheric noises could harm a film. Dorothy, thankfully, is well-made on that front too."
Praising Karthik Subbaraj as a "once in an era" filmmaker, Soundararaja says that with Dorothy, the director has taken a big, bold, and necessary step for this generation. "As I said, I blindly trusted his vision and he did not fail to deliver. I did not know how the film ended before watching it with the audience. But the climax acted as the mascot for acceptance and love for transpersons," he says, as the actor-politician shares how the film presses on the importance of the philosophy he believes in. "If you ask me, the world belongs to everyone equally. The humans, flora, and fauna. It is not right for a section of humans to be isolated and not get treated in the right way, with respect and dignity inalienable to every human."
Before concluding, Soundararaja laid out his plans and said he wants to balance films and politics. "I am just planning to take one step at a time with no hurry whatsoever. My immediate next film is Non Violence from Ananda Krishnan, who made Vijay Antony's Kodiyil Oruvan (2021). I am also a part of another project under production. My primary focus is on politics, and I look to work on one or two films a year and not more than that. That will hopefully make me choose good stories alone," he signs off.