In debutant director Mithilesh Edavalath’s Roopanthara, which is currently in theatres, one of the stories that has struck audiences across board is the one featuring an elderly couple from north Karnataka on a trip to “see the city” in Bengaluru. The ajja and ajji, who remain nameless in the film, were played by Somashekhar Bolegaon and Hanumakka, respectively.

The segment featuring the duo has a simple set-up and a rather devastating pay-off. The childless and financially backward couple decide to take off on one merry trip to the city, which starts well, but then goes south, when she collapses and has to be hospitalized. Turns out that the stomach pain she’s been nursing for a while and treating with a home-made concoction of herbs, was an aggressive form of cancer that has numbered her days. How they deal with this bit of news is what the tale entails.

Somashekar and Hanumakka’s stellar performances and the banter between them is what makes this story one of the best in Roopanthara. And one thing that Mithilesh and his team knew from the word go was that executing it to perfection would hinge almost entirely on the casting. The debutant filmmaker did not want to fall back on a popular artiste, and instead went hunting to find the right artiste in north Karnataka.

In a recent video that the team released about the Journey of Roopanthara, one chapter is dedicated to ‘Finding Somanna’ – Somashekhar Bolegaon. The team had camped in Bijapura for days together and were all set to pack up and return when they were told about someone who’d suit the character, but lived further away. When this person then turned up, the entire team was stunned – he was dressed the way they’d envisioned the character, had the right physique and age, and sported the bearded look they’d wanted.

At that point, they knew they’d found their actor and stopped looking at whether he could perform or not. Somashekhar had some basic theatre experience, but what worked for team Roopanthara was that he fit the description of the character. In fact, Mithilesh wonders how Somanna, as they fondly called him, remained an untapped talent, “because he is such a great actor”.

After watching Roopanthara, audiences have asked producer Suhan Prasad where and how they managed to find Somashekhar and were all appreciative of his work, which the filmmaker describes as a performance of a lifetime. Unfortunately, the actor passed away before the film could hit theatres, making Roopanthara his last film.

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