Superstar Rajinikanth knows how to entertain the audience both on and off the screen. Recently, during the trailer and audio launch of Coolie, ‘Thalaiva’ shared several anecdotes from his time shooting the highly anticipated film, his conversation about hair loss with Nagarjuna, and his first meeting with director Lokesh Kanagaraj.
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Apart from Rajinikanth, Coolie stars Nagarjuna Akkineni and Shruti Haasan in key roles. During the event, Rajinikanth lauded his contemporary Nagarjuna’s hairline and compared it to his own look. He also asked him the secret behind his lush hair. He said, “I saw Nagarjuna during the shoot and he still looks the same. His hair is still intact. I’ve lost all my hair. When I asked him his secret, he said exercise. Director Venkat Prabhu wrote a dialogue for Ajith Kumar, which goes, ‘Innum evlo naal dan nallavanave irukardhu (how long should I play a good guy).’ That’s how his character in Coolie is.”
Rajinikanth also recalled calling filmmaker Lokesh Kanagaraj after watching his acclaimed film Kaithi. The superstar shared that he knew Lokesh was going to become a much sought-after filmmaker and, before any other actors pitched in to work with him, he expressed his wish to collaborate with him. He said, “Before other actors line up for him, I wanted to meet him. I called him after Kaithi and asked if he had any stories for me.”
Rajinikanth, however, remembered how Lokesh made it evident that he was a Kamal Haasan fan. He recalled, “He said yes and also added that he was a Kamal Haasan fan.” The Jailer actor jokingly took a dig at his own brand of films and said, “Did I ask you? Did I ask you whose fan you are? Then why? It’s his way of telling me that he has an intelligent story, which doesn’t have punch dialogues.”
Rajinikanth went on to joke about himself and shared how he asked choreographer Sandy to go easy on him with the dance steps. He said, “He promised me that we’d kill it in the first song. I told him, ‘I am a 1950s model and have run lakhs of kilometers. My parts were used and changed. So, don’t pressure me and handle me with care.’”
Before becoming one of the top actors in the country, Rajinikanth had worked several odd jobs. At one point, he also worked as a coolie. During the event, he spoke about that time and recalled how he actually cried for the first time in his life while working as a coolie. He said, “I got yelled at many times when I was a coolie. One day, a man gave me Rs 2 asking me to load his luggage in a tempo. His voice sounded familiar to me. I realised he was my college friend. I had mocked him a lot. He told me, ‘What a show you put on.’ That was the first-ever time in my life that I broke down and cried.”
