Gorgeous divas turn ugly ghosts to woo masses

With glam diva Tapsee also set to essay the role of a ghost in her upcoming Telugu release ‘Anando Brahma,’ it seems that the trend of pretty actresses turning ghosts to spin box-office magic is here to stay. Earlier, it was Anushka (‘Arundhathi’), Charmee(‘Manthra’), Nayantara (‘Mayuri’ and ‘Dora’) and Trisha (‘Nayaki’) , Anjali (‘Geetanjali’) and Hansika (‘Chandrakala’) who sent shivers down the spine of viewers with their spine-chilling act.

But pretty actress Trisha was unlucky as ‘Nayaki’ bombed, while Anjali failed to pull in crowds for `Chitrangada’. “Irrespective of flops, top actresses are bound to play spine-chilling ghosts since they hog the limelight and also prove themselves to be crowd-pullers,’ says director C Sundar who made ‘Chandrakala’ with Hansika in the lead.

“Hansika bolstered her fan -following after playing a ghost. Actually, a reigning actress turning ghost is more saleable, than a newbie doing it. Popular actresses will be attracted to this genre for a change and to break-away from their stereotyped roles,” he adds. However, director Chandra Siddarth has a different take on it. “Most of these actresses have worked with all the big T-town stars.

As these male stars don’t like to repeat the casting, top actresses have chosen spooky films as an alternative option to be in the reckoning. Apart from pocketing big sums, these actresses are also playing author-backed roles, almost at fag-end of their careers. Above all, these horror films are mostly inspired by Korean and Thai movies, where mostly pretty women play the ghosts, so directors insist on taking top heroines,” he adds.

Whereas, producer C Kalyan who tasted success with ‘Mayuri’ thanks top actresses for showing interest in this genre “Nayantara’s performance will go down as one of the best in her career and star charisma made our true-blue horror film ‘Mayuri’ a money-spinner. Actually, most of the above-mentioned actresses are highly-talented but seldom get an opportunity to showcase their acting skills in regular star-centric Telugu films.

In fact, these actresses have raised the bar on horror films as this genre was labelled B-grade even a decade ago. But these A-listers have re-defined it and brought spooky films into mainstream. Thanks to these actresses, horror films have survived,” he concludes.