'Waltair Veerayya is a dream come true for fans'

With the film set to arrive on Sankranthi, the team of Waltair Veerayya interacted with the press in an event organised on the sets of the film’s chartbuster, Boss Party. Like all promotional events of films starring major stars tend to gravitate towards, this one too was all about one man, the film’s star, Chiranjeevi. 

One of the film’s producers Y Ravi Shankar, “You will have to agree with me that Chiranjeevi garu looks way more handsome in Waltair Veerayya than in Gang Leader. Generally, when his film comes out, everybody’s generally curious about the songs, but trust me, beyond the songs, the film has extraordinary content. Filmmaking is a collaborative effort and everyone on the team have given their best.”

Actor Rajendra Prasad, who is playing a supporting role in the film, corroborated Ravi Shankar’s words on teamwork. “I, for instance, tried my best to give a better performance than Hitler (1997, also starring Chiranjeevi). Likewise, every department did their best in this film,” he said, adding that the film’s success is sealed.

The film’s music composer Devi Sri Prasad, who is sort of a specialist in the mass genre, kept his speech short. “I can say without any doubt that Waltair Veerayya is a dream come true for all the fans of Chiranjeevi. The way Bobby garu shaped this film—balancing the images of Mega Star and Mass Maharaj and writing the film with numerous elements to take care of—deserves appreciation,” he said. “While scoring the background score, I felt that both Chiranjeevi garu and Ravi Teja garu ensured that none of their emotions appeared fake and balanced their performances beautifully.”

The film’s director Bobby shared that being an ardent admirer of Chiranjeevi helped him present the actor the way he wanted to witness him on the big screen. “I came to Hyderabad to assist writer Chinni Krishna for the sole reason that he delivered a blockbuster with annayya called Indra (2002). At Chinni Krishna’s office, there would be a framed picture of the writer with Chiranjeevi garu and I would clean it every day to keep it spotless. Such is my admiration towards him,” he said in a heartfelt speech. “While I had the dream of becoming a filmmaker, the person who made it a reality is Ravi Teja. And his entry into the project itself is an interesting story. After narrating the initial draft, sir asked me to work on the emotional angle and the villain’s character. That’s when the lockdown was announced. And then, I got the idea of incorporating Ravi Teja’s character. I was initially anxious about how annayya would react to such major change but he was quite excited with the idea and immediately asked me to go ahead.”

Ravi Teja kept his speech short. “I would like to save my speech for the pre-release event.” However, when asked if he would have done the film if not for Chiranjeevi’s association with it, the Dhamaka-actor added, “I trusted Bobby, that’s it. And went ahead with him.”

When the moment finally arrived for Chiranjeevi to speak, he said, “If not for the collective effort of this team, neither Waltair Veerayya nor I would be here. Everyone on this team didn’t work just for the money, but did their job sharing and receiving love. Bobby did a wonderful job with the script and when the producers came on board, I assured them that the film would be a blockbuster. They told me that my assurance gave them the confidence to mount the film on such a massive scale. A senior actor once told me that a hardcore fan can do a better job than filmmakers and writers in presenting a star on screen. I strongly believe that Bobby would present me on-screen better than anyone, including myself, can possibly imagine. He tried to recreate the excitement he experienced while seeing me on screen,” Chiranjeevi said. When asked if Waltair Veerayya would be just another mass entertainer, the actor confidently asserted, “Raskondi (write this down)... it is a routine entertainer on the surface but inside, it has much more to offer.”