Chiranjeevi invited Telugu film journalists and photographers to his new house on 23rd October 2003 at 5 pm. He arranged a pressmeet at the spacious pool side on the 1st floor. He said that he wanted to invite all the journalists and show his new house and he took this opportunity to do so. He said that the main purpose of this pressmeet was to thank the entire telugu community for making Tagore a big success.

Producer: B Madhu (Leo Projects)

About Producer B Madhu:
B Madhu has produced two films in Tamil before producing Tagore. He worked as an associate producer for Oscar Films in Tamil as well. Oscar Ravi is his mentor. He is basically a Telugu guy and also an engineering graduate.

Tagore might run for 50 days in more than 250 centers:
Producer Madhu said that Tagore is currently running in 250+ direct centers as of today and there are high chances that Tagore would go for 50 days in all these centers. Three famous producers of Telugu cinema acted as distributors for Tagore. That's Allu Arvind, Aswini Dutt and NV Prasad for Nizam, Krishna and Ceded respectively. Madhu also discussed about the increasing overseas market for Telugu films. He quoted the incidents written in idlebrain.com, like Police lathicharge in Singapore and guys traveling 600 km from Paris to Germany to watch Tagore.

Director: VV Vinayak

How did you feel when you got a chance to work with Chiranjeevi?
VVV: I am a hardcore fan of Annayya Chiranjeevi. I was really thrilled when I got the offer to direct Chiranjeevi. Every director has something to tell about his achievement once he retires. For me Tagore is there to tell the entire world that I directed such a good film.

How much remuneration did you charge for this film?
VVV: If a book is written on Chiranjeevi, I wanted one line in that book to be written about me. I worked for Tagore with that purpose. I did not mind taking even One Rupee as remuneration as long as Chiranjeevi is the hero of the film.

Bharateeyudu is a film on corruption that has come in the past. Don't you think it's a risk to attempt a film on corruption again?
VVV: The subject of anti-corruption is a very powerful theme. If we tackle the subject in the right way, the anti-corruption concept would work again and again.

You seem to have managed to add Chiranjeevi's personal image to the Tagore character by putting powerful dialogues like 'meeku mukhyamantriki vunnanta network vundi'?
VVV: This dialogue was penned by Paruchuri Venkateswara Rao. When we shot this dialogue in the court scene, Chiranjeevi said that he would not do it. Then we convinced him that if that does not come well, we can cut it down when the double positive comes. Then after watching the double positive, Chiranjeevi wanted to cut that dialogue. But we convinced him again that we will wait till the 1st copy comes. After the 1st copy came, everybody was so impressed with it. Even then Chiranjeevi wanted us to delete that dialogue. But all of us insisted on keeping it in the film.

There is a dialogue - 'Meeru devudu' in 3 places of the film. But Chiranjeevi forcibly deleted it as he thought it crosses the border of Tagore and appears like a personal adulation dialogue for Chiranjeevi.

You distributed Tagore film for East Godavari area. Now tell me the records of Tagore in your area as official spokesperson?
VVV:

1. Tagore ran houseful shows for 9 days at 6 theaters in Kakinada, which is an all time record. All the telugu film records would be smashed by Tagore in 50 days itself.
2. Tagore is taken on a fixed hire for Dhavaleswaram - which is situated 3 kilometers away from Rajahmundry - for 18 days. The response is so amazing that the exhibitor extended the hire from 18 days to 50 days.
3. Tagore is the first direct release film in a center called Kadiyam. Indra - releasing after 10 weeks - collected a share of 1 lakh. Tagore collected 4.5 lakhs of share so far.
4. 90% of the records of Indra were crossed by Tagore so far.

Why Tagore has become such a big hit?
VVV: Apart from the regular cinema crowds, the people who watch one film a year also watched this film. Tagore has attracted people who do not watch films in the theaters.

Even though Tagore film was kept at low profile, it witnessed the unprecedented crowds and rush at the theater. What do you think is the reason?
VVV: The entire Andhra Pradesh wanted to see Chiranjeevi as CM. When they knew that Tagore is dealing with corruption, they wanted to see how Chiranjeevi would tackle this burning issue. Watching a Chiranjeevi film has become a social habit to audiences in Andhra Pradesh.

Don't you think that long run would get affected because of excessive prints of Tagore?
VVV: I do not think so. Lets take this scenario. If the theater rent is Rs. 4000/- all it takes is 100 chair tickets to be sold. Because, Tagore is a film that attracted masses, family crowds and intelligentsia equally well, there would be more people in chair class than nela class. Since the ticket price of charr class is almost 4 times that of nela class, it would work out in the long run.

When are you going to direct Chiranjeevi again?
VVV: There would be another film in our combination in the next year. Other details need to be worked out.

Watchout for Chiranjeevi's response on Tagore and his experiences while making the film in tomorrow's update