Filmmakers Pushkar-Gayatri are on cloud nine after the spectacular response to their Bollywood directorial debut, Vikram Vedha, starring Hrithik Roshan and Saif Ali Khan, who portrayed the roles essayed by Vijay Sethupathi and R. Madhavan in the Tamil version released in 2017. With the success of the Vikram Vedha Hindi remake, the Pushkar-Gayatri duo is now ready with their next, Vadhandhi: The Fable of Velonie, an upcoming Tamil web series which they have produced under their Wallwatcher Films and has been directed by Kolaigaran fame Andrew Louis, with S. J. Suryah in the lead role.
Pushkar and Gayatri along with S. J. Suryah and Andrew Louis recently sat down to talk about Vadhandhi with National Award-winning film critic Baradwaj Rangan, the Editor-in-Chief of Galatta Plus. During the interview, Pushkar & Gayatri were asked about whether films can be made into a web series and vice versa, including the possibilities of adapting their Vikram Vedha into the series format. Addressing the query, Gayatri said, "Actually, that one lends itself to be a series. From a structural point of view, there are questions back and forth and it then proceeds to the story. Like a Bandersnatch where the audience can have the choice to choose, there were conversations around it." Pushkar then added, "It's something we'll have to crack in writing the script, but it would have been an incredible format to use where Vedha will tell a story and then the audience will have to make a choice, which you can choose on screen. If you choose this option, the story will proceed in one direction and if you choose the other option, the plot will head in another path. So, we'll have to shoot multiple storylines for it."
Pushkar continued, "Not all feature films can be adapted into the series format. I think one of the things in gathering information is, 'Do your other characters have legs?' When we're working on a feature film, we are still looking at it primarily through a protagonist, who has a problem. The problem might be an antagonist or it could be climate change. It could be an earthquake - an opposing force as such. When you look at the series format, we do this at multiple levels. There is the journey of the protagonist, but you want completely fleshed-out characters for at least the circle around that person or parallel stories. So, the research that we end up doing for writing a series is to see how these characters can get fleshed out. So, if you look at it from that standpoint, the structure of the series will not be compressible into a film format because you're then losing out on primary stories and the other plot lines. It will become like taking a plot line of only one character and then it loses the flavor."
Watch Pushkar–Gayathri in conversation with Baradwaj Rangan below:
