Idlebrain.com has caught up with Nagababu on 20th of August morning at his residence. Naga Babu, a humble and honest human being, made no bones about accepting that his latest film Kouravudu is a failure. Its a pleasure to be with Mr. Naga Babu and chat with him on different aspects. Here is the transcript of the Interview made by Jeevi

About megabrothers
I used to adore my brother since childhood. I used to be close to him. I always wanted to be with him when I was kid. So, I used to roam around with him. However, brother used to avoid me, as I was kid. There is an age gap of 4 and half years between us. He used to move around with at least seven friends. He is called with different names at different stages. At high school level, he is called as KSSV Prasad. During his college days, he was called as Prasad. At home, he was called as ‘Sankara Babu’. After coming to Industry, he changed his name to Chiranjeevi. There is lot of age gap between Pawan Kalyan and me. He was the blue-eyed baby in the house. We used to tease him a lot. He was a hardcore fan of Amitab Bachhan. We used to criticize Amitab and get pleasure by looking at the reddened face of Pawan Kalyan.

Game of changing name
My brother has changed the name after coming to industry as Chiranjeevi. He felt that his name ‘Sankar’ would not be appealing to the people. He got a dream that a kid has called him as Chiranjeevi. Then he told the same incident to our mother and she advised him to change the name to Chiranjeevi. He is also a great devotee of Lord Hanuman. At that time, Chiranjeevi considered modern names like Rakesh, Rupesh etc.

Kalyan entered the industry with the name Kalyan Babu. Nevertheless, after the release of a film, an astrologist suggested him to change his name to Pawan Kalyan. Incidentally, both the names Chiranjeevi and Pawan Kalyan are synonyms of Lord Hanuman.

I entered the Industry as Nagendra Rao, which is my actual name. Later on it was changed to Nagendra Babu and then to Naga Babu. I did not have a strong ambition of becoming a cinema hero. Otherwise, I would have got a dream like Chiranjeevi or some astrologist would have asked me to change my name (he was smiling).

In our home, we did not have any nicknames. Chiranjeevi is called as Sankar Babu, Pawan Kalyan as Kalyan Babu and me as Naga Babu.

Favorite actors
I used to be great fan of Superstar Krishna. I used to admire him when I was a kid. At that time Krishna used to do stunt films with good number of fights and songs with variety steps. Later on, I liked Savitri and SV Ranga Rao. I like Pridhvi Raj Kapoor, Raj Kapoor, Dilip Kumar and Amitab Bachhan in Hindi field. In Tamil field, I like Sivaji Ganesan and Rajni Kant. In Malayalam, I like Mohan Lal. I love Raj Kumar of Kannada field. I watched a particular film of Dr. Raj Kumar for seven times, though the film is made in kannada.

Favorite Films
The film I liked the most was ‘Enter the Dragon’. I watched it for 30 times. I do not watch my brother films for more than two times. Only exception is ‘Manavoori Pandavudu’ by Chiranjeevi. I saw that film for 14 times. I have not seen the film ‘Badri’ yet.

About Fans
I do not have any fans. If I say that I have a fan following it shows my hypocrisy. All the Chiranjeevi fans like me because I am the brother of Chiranjeevi and I handled the fans wing of Chiranjeevi. All the fans of Chiranjeevi meet me and try to get access to Chiranjeevi. Some people may like my action and my films. But none of this can get me a good fan.

Weight
I am over weight now. I was a little slim in ‘Handsup’ film. Again, I put on weight for Kauravudu. I am in the process of reducing my weight now. It will take some time. I do ‘Naturopathy’ to reduce the weight. I should also do dieting to go along with.

Landing up in films
I used to think that I should act in a film in small appearance with my brother for the heck of it. However, I never expressed it to anyone. Then KS Rama Rao asked me if I could do a small role for ‘Simham’ character in ‘Rakshasudu’. I accepted it and my entrance into films happened like that. Later on I acted in films like ‘Marana Mridangam’ and ‘Kondaveeti Donga’ with my brother. By now I acted in around 32 films out of which most of the films are failures. There were a couple of successful films and a couple of average films. My career graph as an actor was bad.

As a producer
I produced five films so far. They are Rudraveena, Trinethrudu, Mugguru Monagallu, Bavagaru Bagunnara and Kaouravudu. The success graph of these films increased from film to film (except for Kaouravudu). My first film Rudraveena got three national awards. Best singer award for Balu, best music director award for Ilaya Raja and best film for national integration. It also has four Nandi awards and a few private awards.

Next film as a producer
I am planning a film with Chiranjeevi as the hero. Story discussions are going on. As soon as the story is finalized, we will decide on the director.

Choosing a suitable director
We have a set of directors to choose from, according to the subject. If it is a family drama, we prefer Muthyala Subbaiah. I prefer Raghavendra Rao for pucca commercial film. We go for Karunakaran or Poori Jagannath for new trendy youth stories. If it is heavy subject, we go for Suresh Krishna. EVV Satyanarayana would be the choice, if we prefer a comedy film.

As a story writer
The basic point for ‘Bavagaru Bagunnara’ is taken from ‘Walk in the clouds’. The original film is a serious film. We made it a comedy film by introducing Rambha character. Jayant gave the backdrop for ‘Mrigaraju’. My contribution for Mrigaraju is narrating for 20 minutes. This film’s basic point was taken from ‘Ghost and the darkness’. It was further developed by Satyanand, Yandamuri Veerendra Nath, Gunasekhar and Chiranjeevi.

Future films as an actor
I am doing a small supporting character role in Mrigaraju. It is having 4 days of shooting. I have finished a days shooting in South Africa. I will also be acting in another film with Chiranjeevi soon.

Internet
I do browse the net often. I like SETI(Search for Extra Terrestrial Intelligence) site a lot. I am interested in taking participation in SETI project. I will be taking the partnership in SETI project soon. I also frequent yahoo.com a lot. I do search for information on different countries. You can browse the SETI activities at http://www.seti.org

Mr. Naga Babu is blessed with two children. They are Varun and Niharika.