From Ghazi to Baahubali: Rana Dagubbati on Getting the Look Right

“I shed 14 kilos of muscle for The Ghazi Attack and then built up it all up for Baahubali2’” says Rana Daggubati. (Photo: The Quint)

Rana Daggubati looks just right for his part, as the larger than life evil king Bhallala Deva, in Baahubali 2: The Conclusion. But he looked starkly different in The Ghazi Attack and Leader. In an exclusive interview with The Quint, the actor talks about how he managed to pull off the drastic physical transformation and what was the toughest part of the challenge.

Q: A lot of things must come together for you to look the part on screen. How do you go from a wiry youngster in Leader to Bhallala Deva in Baahubali2?

Rana Daggubati: First, it takes a good script. I’m only as good as the script in a movie. Second, it all depends on how fleshed out my character is. In Leader, I play this young politician, in Baahubali2, I play an evil king and in Ghazi, I’m a soldier. Someone who saw me in Leader, won’t be able to recognise me in Baahubali. The credit for this goes to a bunch of people, right from the director, to the costume and make-up team. Everybody gets due credit for this.

Rana Daggubatti as the lanky politician in his Telugu debut Leader. 

Q: You’ve dedicated a lot of time and effort to your physique over the years. You’re not the lanky guy you were in Leader anymore...

Rana Daggubati: I will look like that very soon, for my next film.

Q: Isn’t your body sort of limiting, in that you have to choose the next film keeping in mind the physique you have right now? Isn’t it like the superhero genre, where they have to sort of keep at it?

Rana Daggubati: It’s not very complicated to maintain the body I have now. That’s fairly straightforward.

Where it gets complicated is when I choose to do Ghazi, between Baahubali 1 and 2. I had to shed all of the muscle and mass I had. So I was into heavy cardio, and doing runs. I shed 14 kilos of muscle. which is quite a lot. That is why I look a lot leaner in The Ghazi Attack, than in Baahubali.

Once I was done shooting for Ghazi, I had to beef up again, to look the part. For this I had to begin a new regime, a new diet. I give credit to Kunal for this. He understands the character, and designs workouts based on the character, so that I look my part.

Rana Daggubati in a scene from The Ghazi Attack. (Photo courtesy: Dharma Productions)

Q: But your physique is different, between Baahubali 1 and Baahubali 2. Did you just get bigger, or is there more to it?

Rana Daggubati: Yes and yes! Initially, I had developed the muscle, but the symmetry was missing. My arms weren’t in proportion to my torso. All of that was perfected for Baahubali2. The process grew more scientific.

Rana Daggubati gets in shape for Baahubali2. (Photo courtesy: YouTube)

Q: Do you see yourself as someone who bridges the gap between Telugu cinema and Bollywood?

Rana Daggubati: No, I don’t draw parallels. I grew up in Hyderabad, but with a steady diet of Tamil films. I’ve debuted in Telugu. I’ve debuted in Hindi and then there’s The Ghazi Attack, which is sort of a national film. I just follow the natural course of the stories that are to be told.