Sapthami Gowda on ‘Kantara’ shortlisted for the Oscar 2023: We didn’t expect the film will travel beyond Karnataka – Times of India

Sapthami Gowda, who made her debut in ‘Popcorn Monkey Tiger’, was the surprise find of ‘Kantara’ playing the role of Leela, the forest officer who gets caught between being loyal to her duty and being helpless when justice is being denied for her community’s people. Life is not the same for Sapthami Gowda after the phenomenal success of ‘Kantara’ bringing overnight fame, name, and attention across other industries for Sapthami Gowda. Now Sapthami’s name besides Rishab Shetty, Kishore Kumar and Achyuth Kumar has been shortlisted for the Oscars under the Best Actor category. This piece of news surely must have come as a big surprise for the actress. Hence ETimes called Sapthami Gowda to know her reaction to this happy news.

“I am feeling extremely so happy and have no words to react. I am in the same feeling when ‘Kantara’ became a huge hit across the world as when we were doing the film, we didn’t expect this kind of result and ‘Kantara’ will travel beyond Karnataka. So I am so feeling happy knowing this Oscar news and at the same time feeling very numb knowing my name being in the Best Actor seeing my name besides Rishab sir, Kishore sir and Achyuth Kumar sir,” an elated Sapthami said.

Getting world recognition at the beginning of the career is sometimes added pressure for actors to choose their roles carefully further and when asked Sapthami Gowda about this sudden world recognition, he shares “Definitely it’s a huge pressure and motivation to do well good and live up to the expectations on my upcoming films so I would choose the latter and give 10 times hard work here onwards to every role I choose playing.”

‘Kantara’s success in Telugu and Hindi has definitely given Sapthami Gowda a much bigger reach, and if Sapthami has any wish to work with other big directors in other industries, Sapthami Gowda replies, “Yes definitely I do have wishes to work with other industry directors but I am looking forward more to work with our Kannada directors first any day as I am coming across good ideas and scripts.”

2022 was one of the unforgettable years of Kannada cinema where many films did extremely well at the box office and also critically acclaimed making the Indian cinema industry turn towards Kannada cinema seeing the varied films that rocked beyond Karnataka barriers when asked Sapthami Gowda how she sees 2023 in her career, “I don’t want to expect anything big but just keep going forward with clean slate” was the prompt reply from Sapthami.

When asked how she is going to handle this unexpected worldwide recognition and fame, “I am clueless as this Oscar news is yet to sync in where I am very happy and don’t know how to react to this news.”

The actress is still garnering applause and acclaim for her remarkable performance in ‘Kantara’ and upcoming projects include ‘Kaali’ opposite Abhishek Ambareesh and speculations are Sapthami Gowda is also part of Dhananjaya and Ramya’s much-anticipated film ‘Uttarakaanda’ which is yet to be made official.