Actor Shaam broke into Tamil cinema as a chocolate boy in 2001 with an experimental rom-com 12B, and about two decades later he admits that being a softie is not sustainable in Kollywood. He is currently playing the role of a cool gangster named Harbour Ravi in the Goli Soda Rising Series, a prequel to director-cinematographer Vijay Milton’s blockbuster film Goli Soda (2014). Now, the beefed-up Shaam is not the lover boy he once was. “I realized that being a softie or a romantic hero in Tamil cinema would not work for a very long time right by the time I realized it it was too late because I already was into that mould of that charming lover boy," he says as we sat down for a chat about the series, which is currently streaming on Disney+Hotstar.
Shaam admits to being a fan of Goli Soda’s first part. Still, when he was approached for the series, he was skeptical about the opportunity in a series, which is essentially about a bunch of youngsters trying their way up in Chennai’s Koyambedu market. “Then when I met Vijay Milton. He narrated a completely different track about a person named Harbour Ravi, who comes from a small town and takes complete control of the harbour. He’s raw and heartless, but he has a soft shade with his wife," he shares.
The highlight of playing the role was that Vijay Milton asked Shaam to come up with his dialogues for the role. “I was like what are you saying? He said, ‘Sir, basically when you provide dialogues, the actors get stuck to it. They fixate on something and I’m not able to change it. I want to try something novel.’ He would tell me the main content of the scene and insist upon adding specific words to it and let me frame the lines accordingly. The first few days were difficult but if you have control over the language, you know exactly how much to talk and where to talk and when to stop," he explains.
After going through a rough patch for a long while, Shaam made a comeback by playing an important role in Vijay’s 2023 Pongal release Varisu, which put him back on the radar. At the audio launch of the film, Vijay shared Shaam was the life of the shoot and the reason behind his good mood during the shoot. Since then Shaam gets asked about his friendship with the Tamil star, who is all set to contest in the 2026 Tamil Nadu state election. When asked about his friend’s political aspirations, Shaam opines that Vijay will be the next CM of the state, and he has his reason for it.
“I started my film career with him in a movie called Kushi. The minute I saw him, I said, ‘Everyone is saying that you’re the next superstar.’ He just looked at me and said, “Enna Kalaikiriyaa (Are you messing with me?) I don’t think many people can talk to him in that tone. I just casually said it then he understood that I’m not just another regular guy. We got introduced and then my 12B happened. I didn’t meet him after that until Varisu," he recalls.
“And when Varisu happened, on the first day on sets, I again went up to him. This time I said, ‘Everyone is now saying that you’re going to be the next CM.’ He again went, ‘Enna Kalaikiriyaa Shaam?’ But then I told him, ’You denied that you would become the next superstar–he is now much beyond that–so, likewise this will also happen’."
Shaam adds, “I think that the decision which he has taken is real. He is not someone who will just say something now and back out later. He’s a man with a clear mind and he’s keen. He loves his fans. He told me that they’ve given him so much and he wants to give it back to them. I’m sure he’s going to have a great breakthrough."
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