Mumbai: South superstar Nagarjuna will be playing an antagonist for the first time in the highly-anticipated Rajinikanth starrer action-thriller ‘Coolie.’
At a recent event organised by Spotify for the Hindi album launch of the film in Mumbai, Nagarjuna opened up about his role and shared that his character in ‘Coolie’ is so bad that he would never discuss it with his grandchildren.
He also shared how filmmaker Lokesh Kanagaraj convinced him to play a baddie and how Rajinikanth guided him during the shoot.
“I was playing a goodie all the time; it was getting a little boring, so I thought, let’s play a baddie. It was liberating, but I made Lokesh work for it — I took seven to eight meetings before he convinced me. I definitely don’t want to tell my grandchildren about this role. It’s bad, too bad,” the actor explained.
Sharing his experience of working with Rajinikanth, he added, “Yes, working with Rajini Sir was fantastic — something I can truly take back home. The charisma, the aura, what he created on set — it’s just outstanding. He even helped me with my Tamil dialogues, guiding me on how to deliver them. That was very kind of him. Though I have played the most negative role, the experience itself was the most positive.”
“#Coolie: I got bored playing goodie all the time, so done Villain😀. I was dying & waiting to work with Anirudh & Lokesh🤞. Anirudh gave me ‘Iam the Danger’ song. Lokesh used to play random music, especially for baddie & it worked woders🎶🔥”
– #Nagarjunapic.twitter.com/98rDdPCTmx— AmuthaBharathi (@CinemaWithAB) August 12, 2025
Produced by Sun Pictures (Kalanithi Maran) and co-written by Lokesh and Chandhru Anbazhagan, ‘Coolie’ will release in theatres on August 14.
The film will be clashing with Ayan Mukerji’s Hrithik Roshan and Jr NTR starrer ‘War 2.’
Besides Rajinikanth and Nagarjuna, the film also stars Soubin Shahir, Upendra, Shruti Haasan, and Sathyaraj in key roles, and Aamir Khan in a cameo.
