I knew beforehand that the songs on Krishna and Sridevi, particularly the Kuchipudi-style dance for the title song, would enthrall the audience a lot! ...A song that was supposed to be shot on Krishna and Sridevi was replaced with a song on Krishna and Jayamalini instead, as Sridevi hurt her leg during the shoot and was thus made to sit in a club during the song.

My dilemma and trouble did not end there! On the day of release, I went to Vijayawada as per my producer's suggestion. The general practice was that the distributors come pick up the director from the railway station and take them to their hotel, book a room on his name and treat him hospitably. However, no one came to receive me, and I took a rickshaw to the hotel, learnt that there was no room on my name in their hotel, took a room myself, and went to the distributors' office the next day, when the first day morning show of the film was to start in less than two hours. To my utter shock, the distributors, after waiting for a long time, told me that they want to trim the climax of the film, and that the film would at the most be an average fare anyway! I kept my cool and requested them to wait until at least the first show to be completed, because it's less than an hour anyway! He reluctantly agreed and told me to go to the theater. As I expected, the film was received with great response from the audience, with everyone dancing and whistling for the songs, and even throwing money at the screen, and the film's hit range was understood by the interval itself! I was not known to anyone there, but an old friend of mine saw me and shouted my name when I walked out of the theater after the film was over. The audience rushed to me, were thrilled that I was the director of the film, and felicitated me there right there as much as they could! ...My directorial debut was thus a great experience to me in many ways! With a career that started with troubles, I made five more movies, but a supposedly lavish budget of forty lakh rupees for my last film with Chandramohan (Suvarna Sundari) was a "costly mistake" that made me quit direction!

Release Theatres and Centers :

Article by Kiranpraba
Complied by Nachaki
Centers List by Vijayabhaskar