Malayalam star Dulquer Salmaan is known for his penchant to explore genres and roles and has now made a name for himself in Telugu cinema as well. His upcoming Diwali release, Lucky Baskhar, is a Telugu film helmed by director Venky Atluri and features Meenakshy Chaudhary, Surya Srinivas, Ramki and others. In Lucky Baskhar, Dulquer or DQ as he is fondly called, plays the role of a banker named Baskhar who wants to provide a better life for his family and sets off on an offbeat path willing to risk anything for money. On Wednesday, in a media interaction in Chennai, Dulquer spoke about the film and more. 

On Lucky Baskar and love for the grey

“What I liked most about the film, Lucky Baskhar, is that it’s a really relatable common man story. He’s the only earning family member of a big family and I could connect to the character and his family. We all have a conditioning of what is right and wrong but Baskhar’s moral compass is a little different. With people who break rules, their sense of right and wrong is very different from us,” said the King of Kotha star. “The character is fictional but the story, which takes place over a span of three years (1989 onwards) is inspired by real-life incidents and scams. The director, Venky Atluri, has done a lot of research and it’s detailed well like you can see with the use of financial terminology, banking procedures, etc.”

Baskhar is a role that has shades of grey and the star of Sita Ramam revealed that he likes picking such roles. “I like doing grey shades - as actors we all love shades of grey as it gives you an opportunity to behave outside of your own personality. I’m not saying we are angels since our parents correct us when we make mistakes but our conditioning is to understand right and wrong. As actors, these roles are fun to play. From the beginning of cinema, the audience has loved grey shades. True crime documentaries are so popular. When someone does these crimes, we are fascinated as to how they did it. As an actor, I like to explore all genres and I choose the best of what comes my way. I’ll do any story that’s authentic and original,” emphasized Dulquer.

A love for languages

For someone who has been working in several industries – Malayalam, Tamil, Telugu and Hindi – Dulquer has managed to create a niche for himself everywhere he goes. “Ideally, I want to do three to four films a year each in different languages. But a lot of the time it’s not in my hands. Last year I had health issues and was out of action for a while. I’m now trying to speed things up. My next film in Tamil is Kaantha which is about 40 per cent done. It’s a great film celebrating Tamil culture and language. Then have one more Tamil, Malayalam and Telugu. But it doesn’t always pan out as I want,” he smiled. While the Hey Sinamika actor spoke about his health issue, he didn’t reveal as to what he actually went through.

One of the interesting aspects about Lucky Baskhar is that Dulquer, who speaks Tamil fluently, has not dubbed for the movie in Tamil. “It’s not an easy film to dub. Dubbing it in Telugu itself took a lot of time. I read a lot of the comments about me not having dubbed for it in Tamil and I’m now stressing about it - I don’t like it if any member of the audience is disappointed because it’s not me speaking. Post the promotions for this film, I am going to try and dub it in Tamil also,” stated Duqluer.

After the Telugu blockbuster Sita Ramam, his films Chup: Revenge of the Artiste and King of Kotha didn’t do as well as expected. “Sita Ramam is one of the most special films in my career. But it’s important for me as an actor to keep moving ahead and finding new films. The love and joy you feel when people celebrate a film gives you so much energy. Right now, after the trailer released for Lucky Baskhar and the audience has loved it, the entire team feels energized,” stated Dulquer. Now, that the talented DQ is back after a while on screen with Lucky Baskhar, all eyes are on October 31.

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