In a different garb this time
MALATHI RANGARAJAN
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Actor Napoleon is going in for a totally changed look in Saran's `Vattaaram.'
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MANAGING DIVERSE AREAS WITH EASE: Napoleon
Multi-faceted is an epithet that suits Napoleon to a T — he's a talented actor, active politician and successful businessman, besides a few other things. The man can give you a few tips on time management. "As an MLA, mornings were always hectic till a couple of years ago. But now that I'm an ex, I feel comparatively free at the start of day though I still have people coming over to meet me. Then, of course, I leave for shooting and on the way back home I check out business processes at my office. On the days I don't don make-up, I head towards office straightway."
Napoleon chalks out his routine for you. And though he makes it all sound so simple, it should be anything but that. Because running a software firm, which has about 350 employees (Jeevan Technologies on Radhakrishnan Salai, Chennai), is in itself a full-time job. "Yeah! But I have capable people working for me," he says.
The caravan positioned on the racing track at the Madras Race Club is where you settle down to converse with Napoleon during lunch break of the shooting of Saran's `Vattaaram.' "I was pleasantly surprised when Saran offered me the role of a suave, taciturn, fashionably attired don. Till date, nobody has conceived a role beyond the bucolic scenario for me. My costume has invariably been a dhoti folded up in villager style, a shirt and a sickle. Saran has dared to see me as a city-bred. I like his calm and composed way of working. It's a youthful, friendly unit," smiles Napoleon.
It's nearly 14 years since this Bharatiraaja find entered cinema with `Pudhu Nellu Pudhu Naathu.' "I was a youngster who wanted to be in cinema, so I gladly accepted the role of the 60-year old he gave me," laughs Napoleon. It was 26 films later that he got the chance to play hero in `Seevalaberi Paandi.' However, till date his favourite director is his guru, Bharatiraaja. "Few can extract work from artistes, like he does," he says.
Was he always called Napoleon? "No, my name is Kumaresan. It was Bharatiraaja who changed it."
Sense of humour
"As was his wont he asked me to bring a list of names beginning with the letter `R.' He didn't like any, and two days before the release he told me I will be called Napoleon. I was taken aback. Not for anything else but ... those inclined to the bottle will know what I mean. I didn't dare tell the director so. What if he got cut up and edited out a few of my scenes, I thought. However the name has only made me popular," he laughs. Tall and well built, the actor looks far removed from the squat French emperor!
Napoleon is a known face in Telugu, Malayalam and Kannada too. `The Government' in Kannada that had him play a police officer, was a super hit. "Emotions are the same everywhere. Language is no barrier," he avers. Napoleon has acted and interacted with the best names in cinema — Rajinikanth, Kamalhaasan, Mammootty, Mohanlal. `Devasuram,' its sequel that came a decade later, and `Ravanaprabhu,' are some of his memorable Malayalam efforts.
Napoleon has completed 90 films. "I don't accept negative roles. It won't be right to do them when I'm in politics," he explains.
So when Kamal offered him a villain's role in `Marudanayagam' Napoleon reluctantly declined it. "Much later, Kamal called up again, this time for `Virumaandi.' `This is not a negative role,' he began. I was touched that he remembered, and accepted the role at once. `You've told me it's a positive role. That's enough for me,' I told him." Napoleon is also working with Kamal in `Dasavatharam' and will be playing a police officer in Vijay's `Pokkiri' under Prabhu Deva's direction.
What does his wife have to say about his reel rendezvous? "Dancing is not my forte. So she makes fun of those jigs I sometimes do on screen," he laughs.
Getting back to his business pursuits, Napoleon is one actor who owns a ship. "Yeah! I have a vessel that plies between the Andamans and Thailand," he says simply!
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