Stephen King once wrote, “Hope is a good thing, maybe the best of things, and no good thing ever dies.” For actor Chaithra J Achar, who is a part of Hiphop Tamizha’s Meesaya Murukku 2, the idea of hope was the takeaway from Meesaya Murukku (2017). “While the first film spoke about the importance of trying to succeed, Meesaya Murukku 2 talks about the importance of access to opportunities. But hope connects both these stories,” says Chaithra.
In the film, Chaithra plays Latchumi, an outspoken woman and the wife of a gaana singer, Dass (Hiphop Tamizha Adhi). Speaking about her character, she says, “Latchumi is a person who will stand up for her husband, even if it means she has to silence him to do so. She is very vocal about what is right, and what she wants. In fact, when I was approached with this role, the makers were insistent on casting me, which empowered me to do what I wanted with my performance.”
Meesaya Murukku 2 also gave Chaithra the space to do something she hadn't done in cinema yet. “I got to dance in the film," says a beaming Chaithra, adding, "In the films that I have worked on, songs always had montages, so this was a new experience for me. In fact, my mother was more excited for Meesaya Murukku 2, because she always wondered why no one gave me an opportunity to dance. So I was happy that my mother’s dream came true.”
Having worked with multi-hyphenates like Raj B Shetty, Rakshit Shetty, Siddharth, Sasikumar, and more, Chaithra repeats the phenomenon with Hiphop Tamizha in Meesaya Murukku 2. “Adhi is an all-rounder. Seeing him credited for multiple departments is humbling,” says the actor, who shares that she harbours multiple passions like singing and photography. When asked if she would want to tell her own stories as a filmmaker, Chaithra says, “I will never say no to that opportunity. Being a very curious person has helped me understand many aspects of filmmaking from every set I have been on. But if I have to tell a story, I want to tell something from my experience. Personal stories are more rooted than something that’s drummed up, and the more personal the story, the more global it becomes.”
But the actor also has another pattern in her filmography: characters with non-urban origins. When asked if she ever considers that as typecasting, Chaithra says, “I am the one who is taking on these roles. Nobody is typecasting me. But you can see there are a lot of differences, even in something as simple as the way I've draped the saree. There is a lot that makes up a character, and there is a lot that goes into being mindful so as to not repeat mannerisms. I look at this as a way of living in different characters and making more films, and I will only take up characters like this.” While the actor will next be seen in the Telugu horror flick 418 and the Prabhas-starrer Fauzi, she also affirms her continuance in Tamil films. “Right now I am working on three exciting Tamil films with amazing directors. They will be characters you will relate to, and if it is exciting, it means you are not being typecast.”