More Chances Please - II

The situation of our actors is not as bad as it is for our actresses. Even the ones who make us wince with their debut seem to get more opportunities to try their luck (though it is true that many of these actors continue to act because of their filmi connections, there are others who have shown up in more than a few movies inspite of unimpressive debuts and no apparent filmi links). And we've had actors who stuck around for a long time with few hits to their name before striking it rich and making it to the top(Vikram would be the most obvious example though Surya would kinda fit that definition too).

But inspite of such differences, there are a few actors who I feel haven't gotten all that they deserved. Here are 4 of them...

Shaam
Though I can't pick out any particular area where Shaam excels when compared to other actors, he makes this list mainly because I feel sorry for him. He looks better than many of the actors who show up on screen today and from what we've seen in movies like 12B, Iyarkkai and Lesaa Lesaa, he has decent acting skills, is a pretty good dancer and isn't uncomfortable doing action sequences either. Inspite of this, he hasn't had a single bonafide hit so far in his career. He started off strongly (in probably the luckiest debut for any actor, he got to act with Simran and Jo in his first film as hero) but a series of box-office flops later, he is in probably a worse position than he was then. As we've seen before, it takes just one film to turn an actor's fortunes around. Hope he gets a film like that before its too late...

Prasanna
Prasanna is not a versatile actor. But the desire to see him have a more successful career stems from the desire to see more clean, simple, down-to-earth films in general because he fits into such films perfectly. Prasanna has a wonderful knack for subtle comedy and has been impressive in all his films so far. Actually, he is one of the actors who has been revealing a new facet of his acting in almost every new film since his debut in Five Star. Considering the current trend in Tamil movies, it is understandable that he is not seen in more movies since it doesn't look like action movies would be up his alley though. Then again, it took a Lingusamy to bring out the action hero in Maddy and for all we know, Prasanna might just be waiting for his own Run.

Arunkumar
I usually have a little prejudice against star sons since they have it easy compared to other actors who find their own way into Kodambakkam and work hard to make it. But Arunkumar is someone who has made me feel bad for him. Right from his first film Priyam, he has proved that he has the goods to be a hero. Tall, having a good physique, and pretty good at both dancing and fighting, he made a good debut and his movies since then haven't done anything to change that opinion (yes, he looks a lot like Vijayakumar but I don't wanna hold that against him:-). Like most actors he has had movies that, on paper, looked like they could change his fortunes around but they came and went without affecting his career much. He has a couple of movies in his kitty and lets hope atleast one of them gives his career a much-needed boost.

Nandha
I predicted that Nandha would make it big when I saw him in Mounam Pesiyadhe. He looked smart and held his own against Surya, getting noticed in the playboy role. But his career never took off. He has appeared as the hero in a few films since then but inspite of being impressive in them, the films never did good enough for him to be taken seriously as a hero. With good emoting skills, he is definitely hero material. He will suit action roles too(though, after watching Agaram, I think he needs a lot of work to be good at them), a necessity if a hero is to make it big in Tamil cinema.