Regina Cassandra has had a great start to the year, with her film Vidaamuyarchi, opposite south superstar Ajith Kumar, hitting theatres this week. We sit down with the actor to discuss her character—an adventurous, thrill-seeking woman who keeps everyone on their toes. Cassandra says filming with Ajith was her biggest motivation for taking on the project.

“This is the first Tamil superstar I’m working with. The journey has been enriching. I trusted director Magizh Thirumeni to write me a character I could do justice to. He was confident I’d be able to pull off the layered role. He cleared all the doubts I had about the script. Usually, in big-budget superstar films, they don’t give you much importance, scenes get cut, and things could go wrong, but my director made me feel that no one else could have played the role but me,” explains Cassandra.

She claims Ajith set a precedent on set with his behaviour. Besides working hard, he treated everyone around him with respect. “He is an inclusive person. Usually, in mainstream, massy movies, they shabbily write female parts. You realize the quality of the writing by seeing how well they write the characters, irrespective of the language. That’s why I trust my directors. However, some directors have let me down. Then I feel detached from whatever I signed up for.”

When asked why she hasn’t been seen much in Hindi cinema, she laughs, saying people feel that way about her in every industry. “I have three films lined up. Two are complete and ready for release, and the third is almost finished,” says Cassandra. Her next film is Jaat, directed by Gopichand Malineni and starring Sunny Deol and Randeep Hooda.

Tamil actor Ajith Kumar, who is known for films such as Valimai and Citizen, finished third at the 24H Dubai racing event on Sunday. Last week, the actor had a crash during practice sessions, leaving fans worried. His recent win became a celebratory moment for fans and peers alike.

R Madhavan, who was present at the races, took to Instagram to share his excitement. The 3 Idiots actor posted a picture of Ajith waving the Indian flag and wrote, “What a man.. as he says ‘DREAMS DO COME TRUE’... an incredible real HERO (sic).” Madhavan also shared a behind the-scenes glimpse of the moment Ajith celebrated his win with fellow racers, calling it a “proud moment for India.”

Kamal Haasan and Rajinikanth also posted on X to congratulate Ajith. Meanwhile, Naga Chaitanya, who is a big racing fan, wrote on Insta, “Ajith sir!! What a journey what a win (sic)!”

Tamil actor and avid motorsport enthusiast Ajith Kumar, 53, narrowly escaped injury after a dramatic crash during a practice session for the upcoming 24H Dubai endurance race. The incident occurred on Tuesday afternoon as the actor was gearing up for the gruelling six-hour test at the Dubai Autodrome.

The crash, which saw his Porsche 992 GT3 spun multiple times before hitting barriers at 180 km/h, was captured on video and shared on the official Instagram page of Ajith Kumar Racing. His team confirmed the accident, explaining that it happened around 12.45pm during the final leg of his practice session. His manager, Suresh Chandra, provided further details, revealing that the crash was caused by a turn with limited visibility, which led to a loss of control and a spin-off.

“The car was broken, but nothing happened to him. The ambulance rushed to the spot, and he walked away from the car. He was taken to the nearest grid, and a full examination was done... All results came immediately, nothing to worry about. He was lucky because there was nobody behind him. If there was a car behind, things would have been ugly.”

The crash has posed challenges for Ajith’s team as they prepare for the main event on January 11-12. Chandra added: “We had two cars for the race; now one is out of commission. The team is at a disadvantage, but Ajith is committed to supporting his teammates. He will remain in the pit for now and race only if necessary.”

The actor launched his racing team, Ajith Kumar Racing, in September 2024 and has since been a driving force on the motorsport circuit. He will compete alongside teammates Mathieu Detry, Fabian Duffieux, and Cameron McLeod in the endurance event.

Neeshita Nyayapati

Vivek Oberoi made his onscreen debut in 2002 with Ram Gopal Varma’s Hindi film, Company. Since then, he has worked on many projects, including ones in all four South Indian film industries, and with some of the biggest names. This includes essaying the role of the antagonist to Ajith in Vivegam (2017). In a chat with us, he shares about his desire to work with Rajinikanth and Kamal Haasan, being anti-exploitation, and more.

Every actor in my generation has a dream to work with Rajini sir and Kamal sir. My journey will not be complete till I do a film with them. Also, I love working in Tamil cinema because the talent here is brilliant. It was fantastic working in Vivegam. The film’s team felt like a family, and Ajith anna is amazing to work with. What a gentleman he is! He gave me so much love and treated me like a younger brother.

Chennai has a beautiful and big heart. My mom is from here, and I used to come visit my grandmother. I have spent a lot of hot summers in the city, and I remember all of us cousins used to get together, eat lots of crispy dosa, and then drive to Coonoor to enjoy the cool weather. I have beautiful memories here. When the tsunami happened, many people supported me when I was trying to do Project Hope in Devanampattinam, Cuddalore. I still meet with many volunteers and students from then.

I’ve done a film in every single South Indian language and it was my dream to do that. That gave me a kick. The people in the South Indian film industries are extremely committed. The same can be said about the fans, as they love so deeply. If you look at the fan following of Rahman sir and Anirudh, it’s huge and not normal.

I loved playing Vikrant Dhawan in Inside Edge. Its makers are like family to me. I started my OTT journey with them in 2016, when people didn’t know what OTT was. It was so new in India at the time. If they reach out to me for season 4, I’ll do it in a heartbeat. But that’s a creative decision that they have to take.

Any kind of exploitation, whether it is sexual, financial, or emotional, is absolutely wrong. I’m anti-exploitation. You have to be fair and honest in life and have integrity. When you have stardom, the least you can do is facilitate harmony and live without exploiting people who are poorer or weaker than you. Exploitation is cancer to society and any industry. Every one of us should work together to remove exploitation.

Huma Qureshi was in the city recently and spoke to us about her association with Tamil cinema, her approach to scripts and the kind of films she wants to do. Huma states that she’s always open to doing films in Tamil. “If there is something good and exciting, I’ll jump at the chance to take up the offer. Even if it’s a small film, without big stars like Rajinikanth or Ajith, I would love to take it up,” she says.

I love Tamil cinema, and I want to work here more often, but it all depends on the right opportunities and the availability of dates. It was a great honour to work with Rajini sir (Kaala) and Ajith (Valimai). I was lucky to be in the right place at the right time and these wonderful films fell into my lap. I’d love to do a spin-off of my female cop character in Valimai. I should probably tell my producer, Boney Kapoor, about this idea.

My approach to scripts is simple: choose the best that is offered to you. I was an outsider, and it wasn’t an easy journey, but I love my work. So, I wake up every day with a lot of fire in my belly, go in front of the camera, and deliver my best. I like to do films that educate people and have a message for the viewer, not necessarily political films, but those that make people see things in a better way.

Even though it is a little hot, I enjoy my Chennai visits a lot. That said, these days, it is hot almost everywhere. I love shopping and spending time in the city. Especially, as another festival season is approaching, it’s a good time to buy things for you and your family. I do like to pick things myself.

Huma Qureshi recently clocked a decade in Bollywood. She had stepped into the industry with Gangs of Wasseypur – Part 1, which had released in June 2012. Today, even as she’s busy completing movies and shows at breakneck speed, she believes she has learned to strike the perfect work-life balance. In a conversation with BT, she talks about working non-stop and how the narrative for women and women-led stories has changed in the industry in the decade that she has been a part of this field. Excerpts:

Opportunities and hopes come at the most unlikely times and from the most unheard of places. The two years, 2020 and 2021, were the pandemic years in public memory. Theatrical releases had virtually stopped and content on the OTT platforms was dictating the entertainment space. In that phase, I was clear that I won’t let this bog me down. I wanted to go out there and put out something great for people to see. When Bellbottom came to me, I eagerly took it up because it was the first film that went on floors post the global slowdown. The part was great, and it was an experience worth the risk we took. Subhash Kapoor’s narration for his web show (Maharani) had blown me away. I was certain that I wanted to do it. We shot it between two lockdowns amid so much uncertainty. What if this was my last piece of work? That thought ignited an entirely different passion in me. It liberated me in so many ways. And that is the thought with which I have surged into 2022. I’m trying out newer things, playing characters that are completely different from who I am.

I just do things that I naturally gravitate towards. At the outset, I didn’t have the luxury of choosing projects, neither was I launched on a grand scale nor have directors chasing me. I went through an entirely different journey where I auditioned to get work, I got replaced on numerous occasions and went through a grind, something that I wear like a badge of honour. I am proud of everything I endured to get this far. All that I have today has been earned with a lot of hard work and patience. It didn’t come to me. If you find my repertoire full of unconventional projects, it’s also because those were the choices I made from all that came my way. It was about choosing a role where I could not really see myself easily. I have never tried playing myself. The greatest compliment for me was to be told that I played an uneducated Bihari housewife like I belonged there, although I am a South Delhi girl. That is the fun of being an actor. I didn’t come here to play a doll. I came here to be an actor. I will do what it takes to play a part effectively. In the last year alone, I have worked with different directors and in content across various genres. Do I love songs and dances? Yes, I do, but I don’t want to do just that. I have a lot more to offer that goes beyond it. I don’t know what the new conventional norms are, but with our choices, if we have been able to redefine how a woman should be seen in a movie, we’re getting somewhere and exploring so many of her other facets.

Yes, and it hasn’t come in easily. I can talk for myself. After I worked with Deepa Mehta on the show Leila, my perspective changed in a big way. It was such a turning point. Khoon chakh liya maine! The joy of leading a project is scary and empowering in the same breath. And she gave me that. Deepa made me believe that I can carry an entire show and be in every frame without boring the audience. She made me believe that I had it in me. When an opportunity presents itself, you rise to the occasion. The show opened doors for me to work with Hollywood bigwigs like Zack Snyder. It got me several good projects. Maharani was one of them. I am now leading a lot of stories which have a female perspective. This is Huma Qureshi 2.0. I want to call it that without sounding vain about it. I am not the same person I was back in the day. I am trying to do things differently. As an actor, the more fearless you get, the more this industry and the audience rewards you. I like reading and watching content. A few years ago, people had an issue with the phrase, web-series. I had seen that not only was it brimming with international talent, but it was also gearing up to take India by storm. The writing and the production standards were superlative. These are opportunities that have to be grabbed when they come to you. Doing my first show has hence, been a big turning point. Sometimes, merely doing things you like can have a domino effect on your life. It benefitted me in a big way.

I think the change here is phenomenal. People have realised that there is a lot to learn from them. Industries like Tamil and Telugu are not talking down to their audience. In fact, they are pushing their boundaries. The stories are contextual, they pride themselves in the cultural references, they are deeply personal, nuanced and have a massive scale. The southern industries have done this repeatedly. The way things are going, multilingual projects are the in thing. For every actor and talent involved, the audience base increases. I feel thrilled that I did my second Tamil film, Valimai. I have learned so much by sharing screen space with Thala Ajith and Rajinikanth sir. Not just as an actor, but also as an audience member, I am excited about these big pan-India films. Why should we have so many boundaries within our country anyway? We need to shake things up a bit in these seminal times.

After several delays due to Coronavirus, Boney Kapoor’s Valimai, starring Ajith Kumar, will be releasing nationwide on February 24, and the producer says that backing a big-budget action drama like this one during the pandemic comes with its own risks.

“There were big setbacks, both in terms of finance and time. But I had the determination to help the director get what he wanted. In fact, I also had four other projects — the Tamil remakes of Badhaai Ho and Article 15, and the Hindi films, Maidaan and Mili — on floors during this time. These are challenges which every producer must be ready to face,” he states.

Quiz him if he ever mulled taking the OTT route and he says, “OTT is now part of our revenue stream and helps us reach wider audiences. But certain films, like this one, are made for the big screen and I believe in making films for the big screen.” Boney's association with Ajith began when the actor played a cameo in Sridevi’s English Vinglish.

“My wife was very keen that we do films in south Indian languages, too, as she had begun her journey with Tamil and Telugu films. My first south film as a full-fledged producer, Nerkonda Paarvai, was with Ajith. We were both very satisfied with the response, and began working on Valimai. We felt comfortable working with each other and we are now going to do our third film together.”

Now, along with the Tamil version, the producer is releasing the film in Telugu, Hindi and Kannada as well. “The film has family drama, fantastic action and also something for the audiences to take home. So, it has the potential to work everywhere. You can call this the beginning of a pan-India release for Ajith’s films,” he signs off.

Charu Nivedita didn't enjoy Chennai's big August hit Vivegam, and had no compunctions about saying so. An acclaimed experimental writer, Charu has written about all kinds of cinema, including popular Tamil hits - he uses the word “trash“ with some relish - for ten or fifteen years. More recently, he recorded brief, pithy video reviews of some new releases for the YouTube channel Madras Central.

“Writers don't exist for society,“ Charu says, but if they didn't know his name before, they certainly did over the weekend of Vivegam's release. The film's male lead, Ajith Kumar, is one of Chennai cinema's bona fide superstars. He's critic-proof, but his large following of young men who adore him is not.

He knows it, too. Before Vivegam came out, Ajith issued an unprecedented public statement, through his lawyers, in which he apologized unconditionally for those “misusing his name,“ and condemned the unauthorized use of his name and image on social media. He had prepared for the eventuality that not everyone would stay quiet about the flaws in his film out of love for his handsome face.

It's unclear if this made any difference to the trolls who came out swinging after Charu's YouTube review appeared. Men called to tell him they knew his home address. They wrote saying they knew he had female relatives. “I got death threats,“ Charu says wryly. “But the women of my family received threats straight out of the writings of the Marquis de Sade.“ More or less the same filth besieged another popular YouTube critic, “Blue Shirt“ Maran, who also candidly disliked Vivegam. A parody video recorded in response to Maran's review featured actors threatening “Blue Shirt“ with a machete to his throat, then beating him brutally.

Threats of rape and murder are run of the mill for anyone who offends another's idol on the internet: it's how we punish blasphemers these days. It can be a criminal offence, and offenders may be charged on a variety of counts, including intimidation and obscenity. But while it was not always the case, this kind of abuse is now as much a force in film fandom as they are in politics.

As many have learned in the years since trolling became a feature of Indian public life, the predatorial edge that trolls have over regular people such as you and I and Charu Nivedita is their tirelessness. They are legion. They work in shifts. They can attack for hours and days and weeks. They stalk you. They take - and fake - screenshots. They'll respond to everything you say in public. They are the persistence hunters of digital life, intent on wearing their prey down to destroy them.

The normalization of political cyber bullying has spilled over into Hindi cinema fandom online, where supporters of Hindu right-wing causes have been popularising an imagined conflict between “Muslim“ Bollywood and its “Hindu stars“ for some years now. Like most meaningful developments in Indian cinema, however, the south is the real crucible of change.

Never was this clearer than in early August, when Dhanya Rajendran, journalist and editor-in-chief of The News Minute, fired off a casual, snarky tweet late on a Friday evening about how much she hated Jab Harry Met Sejal. “I watched Vijay's Sura till interval and walked out,“ she wrote. “#WhenHarryMetSejal has made me break that record. Could not sit till interval.“ It wasn't SRK-ians or Anushka-maniacs who found her. Within an hour the tweet had 700 replies, all angry comments from self-proclaimed worshippers of the Tamil star Vijay, considered Ajith's great rival. They were followed by thousands more and included filthy abuse, rape and murder threats. “Here, I understood that people were organising the response to the tweet, so I deleted it,“ Dhanya says. The onslaught only intensified. Over the weekend, the hashtag #PublicityBeepDhanya - the 'beep' standing in for a word that can get you banned for abuse even from notoriously lax Twitter - trended menacingly for hours.

It didn't stop there. “By Monday or Tuesday the next week, when they felt the tide was turning against them, Vijay's women fan clubs“ - online accounts run or appearing to be run by women -“joined in,“ she recalls. Users found stray comments she made about Vijay films in 2011 and 2013 and raked them up, trying to prove that Vijay was a victim of a long-running, sinister agenda.

Over the next few days, it seemed to Dhanya as though every group was trying to isolate her. Someone posted fake screenshots of tweets she had never made about Rajinikanth. Another person, clearly hoping to extend the melée, circulated a collage of isolated tweets from 2012, in which Dhanya had poked fun at M Karunanidhi, leader of the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam. “At one point, TV show hosts were saying there was fair game because I had tweeted about the DMK,“ she says. M K Stalin, working president of the party, subsequently issued a statement condemning acts meant to “strangulate the freedom of expression, especially of a woman journalist in Chennai,“ and recommended that the rule of law be applied promptly in “curbing this menace.“ Eventually, Vijay himself issued a subdued statement to his followers, asking them to respect women at all costs.

Both Suprateek Chatterjee and Charu Nivedita noted that any sexual violence that came their way tended to target their female relatives By then, the juggernaut had acquired a momentum of its own. Many speculate that Vijay's prolonged silence and lukewarm response to this incident are directly linked to his political ambitions, about which he has made no formal announcements. There's no doubt that many public figures would enjoy being able to control a loyal following by appearing not to control them at all. We have no reason to claim this is true in Vijay's case. Still, the incident reveals how the real ugliness of political discourse can inflect everything, even the way we enjoy and defend our cherished popular cinema.

“Even Twitter wasn't like this a few years ago,“ says film critic Baradwaj Rangan, who says he usually escapes troll scrutiny, such as it is, because he writes lengthy features in English, which fly under the radar of fans who respond more readily to three-minute videos and punchy social media posts. “None of these people read,“ Charu Nivedita says bluntly. (“They react,“ Baradwaj adds.) “And any way, who is telling them to stop?“ Charu says. “They say Ajith is a good guy, but he hasn't had a word to say after these incidents.“

Both Vijay and Ajith are “mass heroes,“ which makes it easy to dismiss their troll armies as uncouth mobs, trapped by their class status and education, and by their Montague Capulet hatred for each other. These biases are hard to confirm in any meaningful way, though. They also don't explain what incentivizes or encourages people to join in witch-hunts that go well beyond the fundamental satisfaction of belonging to a community, and ostensibly defending a person or a movie they love.

Unreasonable accusations of bad faith have always been an occupational hazard for film reviewers. Once, fans upset with negative reviews might have sent snarky letters and gave editors an earful over their rotary phones. For years now, they have left comments below the fold and quote tweeted the critics they hate. With no real language of taste or discrimination to deploy, they complain not of impaired judgement, but of corruption. On any given Friday afternoon, a critic may be accused of being paid off by Shah Rukh when they aren't thrilled by a Salman film, or of being in the Ranbir camp when they write off Ranveer, and so on. But this routine harassment is distinct from the sort of v2 trolling that shades into st unchecked, criminal abuse.

That's what happens to critics like Anna M M Vetticad, author of The Adventures of An Intrepid to Film Critic. Vetticad is no stranger to the highly literate and and extremely misogynist sections of Malayalam language social media, always ready to attack critics for disparaging their icons. Just two weeks ago, her lukewarm review of a new Mammootty film outraged his male devotees so much that they were reduced to describing the favours they imagined she was trading with his rival Mohanlal in incoherent, unprintable desperation.



But it is Vetticad's Hindi movie reviews that have put her in the crosshairs of a section of self-declared rightwing patriots online, who hate it when she is critical of “Hindu stars“ - Hrithik Roshan, Akshay Kumar and Ajay Devgn - and “Hindu“ films like the Baahubalis. Responses to her review of Kumar's Toilet - Ek Prem Katha, were so appalling that they prompted the international Committee To Protect Journalists put out a statement condemning the violence.

Vetticad has written that the “dam burst“ for the right wing when both Aamir Khan and Shah Rukh Khan spoke up against rising cultural intolerance in 2015, after which the religious bigotry that had started to seep into movie conversation online rose in spate. Her Malayali Christian background became a special obsession for her trolls, as has her outspoken feminism. “Go watch Shah Rukh Pai Khan ****ing your mother,“ a commenter spat when her Toilet - Ek Prem Katha review came out. “In both Dhanya and Anna's case, gender had a big role to play,“ says Suprateek Chatterjee, writer and former entertainment editor at the Huffington Post. Both Chatterjee and Charu Nivedita noted that any sexual violence that came their way tended to target their female relatives - in return for an unfavourable review of Chennai Express in 2013, Chatterjee received, among other things, a manipulated image of his face on the body of a naked woman porn star, captioned, “We'll do this to your sister.“

“Until then it was funny,“ Chatterjee, who faced sustained ire (“nothing like what happened to Dhanya or Anna“) from Shah Rukh Khan's fans for that Chennai Express review, remembers. “I don't have a sister, but that was the moment that really took me aback.“ He never reported it to the police, believing it would have little effect. Nor has Charu, who says he doesn't “believe in police action.“ Vetticad, too, believes the chances of concrete action against her trolls are slim.

On the other hand, Dhanya registered an FIR with the Chennai Police the week after the trolling began. The cyber-crime team identified and arrested at least one abuser, who is currently out on bail, and who posted an apology video online, cautioning others not to end up like him.

Over the last couple of years, J Melwyn, inspector in charge of the investigation, has observed a gradual increase in crimes such as this one, he says. They are “not difficult,“ to solve in principle. “But we are slowed down by the communication gap with these social media companies“ - the third party in all these incidents, whose lack of enthusiasm for tackling this variety of criminal abuse has made life on social media untenable for many users. “With their headquarters in other parts of the world, it takes a long time to get responses from these with the information we need,“ Melwyn says. “In this case, we have requested further details from Twitter, and will proceed once we have them.“

Dhanya's Twitter mentions have been quiet for a few days, but it's too soon to say that the trolls have gone. She knows this sort of thing could affect her work, and was proven right in the weeks following the Vijay fallout. A tweet about a major news story - the suicide of the Dalit student Anitha - provoked another wave of outrage against her, this time from people claiming to be offended that she had used the word “Dalit,“ widely considered standard, self determined usage. Among those orchestrating the abuse at her this time was film director Venkat Prabhu, and several film publicists. Perhaps most bizarre, even to her, is the question of how she unwittingly became a flash-point in the Ajith-Vijay stand-off at all. Something that happened to her last year plays on her mind, though. In Madurai with her young son, covering state elections, she was stopped by a male stranger who asked her, “You are Dhanya, isn't it? The Ajith fan?“ “The last Ajith film I saw was Kandukondain Kandukondain (released in 2000),“ she says.

Facts have limited currency in public life, though - and not even the absurd romantic warmth of our movies can offer us respite from our pathologies any more.

Vivek Oberoi has always pulled off dark characters with elan. Be it as gangster Chandu in his debut outing Company, Maya bhai in Shootout At Lokhandwala, gangster-turned-politician Pratap Ravi in Rakht Charitra, or the evil Kaal in the superhero franchise Krrish 3, the versatile actor has made bad look good.

Now, he is all set to return to the grey zone with two distinct characters. Upcoming Tamil film Vivegam will see him locking horns with South superstar Ajith. He will also make his debut on the digital platform with Excel Entertainment's soon-to-be-released web series Power Play, in which he plays a pivotal role.

While he enjoys doing comedies, Vivek finds negative characters more challenging, because they are drastically different from the kind of person he is in real life.