In a conversation in roundtable, Adivi Sesh who rose to fame with the biopic of Major Sandeep Unnikrishnan titled Major, addressed the prevalence of nepotism in the Telegu industry. He added that there is barely any culture of auditions for Telugu film industry, it is because the major roles are being conferred to the family members of the celebrities.
Sesh mentioned in a roundtable conference hosted by Bollywood Hungama, “Last six films I have released, four of them were written by me, in collaboration with the director. And the reason was because of that because I was tired of… When you come from outside of the business, people don’t offer you (important parts). Upar se vahan par ek-ek family mein dus-dus hero hote hain. (There, each film family has ten heroes). So, for a good script to come by you, you are like choice number 53. And there are only 20 good scripts so it became only easier to…”
He further adds, “One thing is we don’t have an auditioning culture. Agar karein bhi toh lead roles ke liye ya important roles ke liye nahi hota. Fourth friend ke role ke liye tum audition kar sakte ho but you can’t audition for a lead role, usually it’s booked (The auditions don’t happen for lead roles. It is usually done for the fourth friend but you can’t audition for a lead role, usually it’s booked).”
Sesh elucidated that this is the very reason why he started to write and take cognizance of the process. “You end up writing your own thing in part because I wanted to control this process. Not that I know any better but I know at least if I fall, I’ll know why I am falling,” he concludes.
