Despite her slim frame, beauty, smile and a original voice to top it all, actress Priyamani has somehow been unable to reign over Kollywood.  The actress, who has achieved reasonable success in Telugu films, won her national award for the best actress for the Tamil film 'Paruthiveeran' in a deglamourized role.

She tried to change her image in successive films but couldn't do much to enter the public memory as an actress with substance.  Her latest Tamil film 'Ninaithalae Inikkum' did reasonably well and she is now awaiting the release of Maniratnam's 'Raavan', where she has played a significant role opposite Prithviraj.

The film stars Vikram, Abishek Bachchan, Aishwarya Rai, Vaiyapuri and others besides Priyamani and Prithviraj.  Speaking about the experience of working with Maniratnam, Priyamani said that it was a 'different' experience and said that Mani wanted realism in his films more than anything else.  Mani also manouevred to ensure that the dialogues and the dialogue-delivery by the artistes are perfect.

Saying that she would be choosy about her roles in Tamil films, Priyamani wishes Ameer that his forthcoming 'Yogi' would do well.  Priyamani's logic is that when Ameer works round-the-clock for others' films, he could only have done a fabulous job in his own film.