Filmmaker Sukumar’s Pushpa: The Rise (2021) became a surprise success in its Hindi version. Pushpa 2: The Rule, the second movie, has broken records and has become the highest grossing Hindi film. Apart from the performance of Allu Arjun, a large amount of credit for its success in Hindi goes to Shreyas Talpade, who dubbed for the Telugu star in both the films.

In an exclusive interview with Bollywood Hungama, Shreyas said that it was his Hindi dubbing stint in The Lion King (2019) that was responsible for him bagging the first Pushpa movie. “They had seen my work in The Lion King, where I dubbed for Timon for the first time. I think they felt my voice would suit that character much better than anybody else.”

Shreyas revealed that he not only studied the character of Pushpa but also gave multiple options to the makers for the character’s Hindi dubbing. “When I first saw the film (first one), obviously before starting the dub, I figured that the character would need a particular kind of a voice,” he said. “That’s how we first tested it on one scene. Then when we felt this goes well with the body language, mannerisms and attitude of the character, we decided to go ahead with it.”

He added, “So, the preparation was essentially in understanding his swag, attitude, personality, body language and the graph of the character and then deciding what voice would suit him the best. I remember giving three different options in the test, where we felt like trying three options and whichever suits him the best, we go ahead with that.”

The success of Pushpa 1 laid huge expectations from Pushpa 2 at the box office. But Shreyas said that his bigger concern was the change of Allu Arjun’s character in the second film, which he worked out with his voice.

After the first Pushpa itself, the dialogue, “Jhukega nahin sala” had become a rage. The craze increased manifolds in the second movie. Shreyas said that they had no idea that this line would become so big.

After dubbing for both the Pushpa movies and witnessing their enormous success, Shreyas now feels attached to the franchise and the character.

Shreyas said that he hasn’t had a word yet with anyone from team Pushpa after the mammoth success of the second movie.

Produced by Mythri Movie Makers and Sukumar Writings, Pushpa 2: The Rule also stars Rashmika Mandanna and Fahadh Faasil.