CHENNAI: In April 2011, a dejected 10 lakh fans were stripped of their collective identity as registered fans of their ‘Ultimate Star’ Ajith Kumar. The star, who had become clearly uncomfortable with the stardom (read sycophancy) he enjoyed with fans, took this startling decision to disband his 60,000-plus fan clubs a few days before his boys were poised to celebrate his 40th birthday.
Cut to three months later. On Thursday, the day that Ajith had his 50th film released, these fans seemed to have shot back with a sweet revenge. There was no fan club number to identify themselves with, no special allowances to create a ruckus that only ‘fan club fans’ can usually afford and no tickets coming their way through the clubs for FDFS shows. Yet, these Ajith devotees came in drones to film halls to drown their hero’s posters with milk and, believe it or not, beer.
“We are not registered fans anymore, but we are fans nevertheless,” reasoned Purasai Saravanan, president of the erstwhile Central Chennai fan club. Celebrations have only increased for this film, it being a milestone movie for their thala, he added.
With stars, garlands, paal abishekams, beer honours and slogans to soothe their hero’s ego, Mankatha opened on with every madness and fan mayhem that are part of the release routine for Ajith films. Fan frenzy acquired a green makeover with Mankatha, with fans planting saplings on theatre complexes to mark the occasion. Fans of Egmore are also involved in distribution of sarees and dhothis to senior citizens, Saravanan explained.
Cashing in on the long Ramzan-Vinayaga Chaturthi weekend, Mankatha released on a Wednesday, and features antagonist Ajith, incidentally as Vinayak Mahadev, and actors Arjun, Andrea, Trisha and Anjali. It was released in more than 350 theatres across the State. For fans, these numbers matter little, but they acknowledge that the scramble for tickets has been mad.
“Bookings opened for the first day on Sunday. Serpentine queues were formed in many theatres by early Sunday morning. I tried booking online for the film in Sathyam Cinemas for Wednesday. But within 10 minutes, all shows got sold out,” said Sekar, a fan.
Fans across the State echoed Sekar’s concern that finding tickets was a task in itself, considering that fan club shows were not held and no fan club tickets organised.
