Acting in serials created the notion that Arul had “made it”, at least back in his hometown. “They were just happy to see me on screen, even though I was upset that I wasn’t being considered for a bigger role. After a point, I felt this too was a trap like any day job, so I quit and then tried to act in movies again.”
His contemporaries became independent directors and actors even though Arul’s struggle was not close to ending. He kept getting small roles in films but none that would make a bigger impact. This is around the time when he was offered the role to star in an animated film based on the great king Raja Raja Chozhan. “They gave me a monthly salary and wanted me to work exclusively on this film. It would be my big launch and it was being planned as an animated film that was to be shot using the latest digital camera technology then.”
But the company kept sinking money into the project without it reaching the finish line. Arul doubled up as a salesman for the company, trying to get animation contracts from other films, just so they could finally complete the magnum opus. “I gave this film two years and despite their best efforts, nothing was happening. From what I had learnt working there, I wanted to mount a tiny animated film that I could produce and star in. I even got a meeting with Sun Pictures when life began to change…”
He got a call from the office of director Shankar who was making the biggest Tamil film at the time Rajinikanth. With what was then rumoured to be a sci-fi film based on a robot, Arul was chosen after he acted out a scene from Anniyan during the auditions. Unlike Shankar’s previous film with the Superstar, this new film included complex shots that required multiple doubles for Rajinikanth. Shankar too had spotted Arul’s uncanny resemblance and convinced him to join the new project full time. From his dream to become A superstar, his life had now detoured to make him THE superstar.