Amala Paul Reveals Why She Turned Down Mani Ratnam’s ‘Ponniyin Selvan’: I Was Not In The Mental State To Do It

Actress Amala Paul left everyone in shock when she took a break for two year from films in 2019 at the peak of her career. She ended up returning to work in 2021 and now in a recent interview, she has revealed how she felt ‘exhausted’ and had no energy left to work in films. 

Further revealing how she turned down an offer to work in Mani Ratnam’s historical drama, ‘Ponniyin Selvan’, Amala, while speaking to ETimes, mentioned how she had auditioned for the film, but had to let it go because she was not in the mental state to do the film. 

Actor Amala Paul recently said that she turned down an offer to work in Mani Ratnam’s historical drama, Ponniyin Selvan. Amala added that she has no regrets about letting such an opportunity go as she was not in the best frame of mind to accept such an offer.

“There has been a very valid reason for why this has happened. So, Mani Ratnam sir auditioned me for 'Ponniyin Selvan' and I was so excited for that. I am a huge fan of Mani sir and I was so excited for it. And that didn't happen at that time. I was so disappointed and sad. Then in 2021, he called me for the same project. And like I said, I was not in the mental state to do it, so I had to turn it down. If you ask me if I regret doing that, I won't, because certain things are just perfect. It's perfectly designed and I think it's just about how we look at it,” Amala said in the interview.

For the unversed, ‘Ponniyin Selvan Part 1’, which is based on Kalki’s masterpiece, features an ensemble cast, including Aishwarya Rai Bachchan, Vikram, Karthi, Jayam Ravi, Trisha, Sarath Kumar and Aishwarya Lekshmi among others. The much-awaited film will release on September 30.

As for Amala, when she returned to work in 2021, she starred in two anthology films -- ‘Kutty Story’ in Tamil and ‘Pitta Kathalu’ in Telugu. She also made her OTT debut with web series, ‘Kudi Yedamaithe’, and her Hindi debut in the Voot series ‘Ranjish Hi Sahi’. 

After starring in Tamil thriller ‘Cadaver’, which was released on Disney+ Hotstar, the actress has Malayalam films – ‘Teacher’, ‘Christopher’, and ‘Aadujeevitham’ – in the pipeline.