Sathyaraj and Cheran rally behind Sankagiri Rajkumar's ONE

Filmmakers who do everything alone usually have to promote their films alone too. Sankagiri Rajkumar turned up to speak about ONE in Chennai and found a dais full of people ready to vouch for him instead: Sathyaraj, Cheran, Lenin Bharathi and ARK Rajaraja, each with a story about how they were pulled into the orbit of the man who wrote, directed, shot, scored and acted every role in his own film.

Rajkumar’s own story was about doors opening. When the film was finished, he went to Kalaipuli S. Thanu for advice on getting a release, and Thanu picked up the phone to PVR on the spot. “No one in the world has attempted something like this, and you have done it here in Tamil Nadu. Our support is yours,” the chain told him, by his account.

ARK Rajaraja went further than a phone call. When Rajkumar came to him for post-production, the director handed over the keys to his studio and told him to work there for as many months as he needed. He also confessed to the doubt everyone starts with. “When a man says he will do every job and play every character, a question mark forms in you,” he said. Then he watched the finished film with Lenin Bharathi and Subramaniya Siva. “For about ten minutes, none of us could speak.”

Lenin Bharathi’s point was about what the polish usually costs. Technically accomplished films ride on thousands of technicians, big studios and bigger money, he argued, and Rajkumar reached a comparable finish with none of that behind him. He wants the film screened for students at the Tamil Nadu film institute, with Rajkumar teaching them how he did it, and asked the state government to make it happen. He also slipped in a casting note: Rajkumar is a fine, precise actor and a therukoothu performer, and Tamil cinema should be using him more.

Cheran has been carrying this torch the longest. Rohini rang him years ago and told him to watch Vengayam; he did, invited over fifty directors to screenings, and re-released the film under the banner Cheran Presents Vengayam, this time to success. His case for Rajkumar is economic as much as artistic: the man makes complete films for around Rs 70 lakh, proof that cinema is not gated behind studio money. He watched ONE two years ago and says Rajkumar has spent the time since polishing it further, with another film, Nedumpa, already made. “In ten or fifteen years, Tamil cinema will celebrate him,” Cheran said. “For the love he has for cinema, cinema will one day have no choice.”

Sathyaraj arrived by the most unexpected route: Periyar. Dravidar Kazhagam leader Kovai Ramakrishnan called him, described Rajkumar as a devoted follower, and asked him to help. Rajkumar’s request was specific: appear as yourself, and as Periyar for one song. So ONE briefly returns Sathyaraj to the part he played in the 2007 biopic. He was also disarmingly honest about stage praise, recalling Manivannan’s advice that flattery should never come in small cubes: put a whole block of ice, so either the head breaks or the ice does. But Vengayam, he said, genuinely stunned him, and the one-man premise still defeats him. “How is it possible? I have not understood it to this day.” He ended by asking the media, in his words begging them, to help the film reach people, because a win for Rajkumar means a generation of young filmmakers who believe new things are possible.

After the speeches, ONE was screened for the press. It opens in theatres worldwide on August 21.