K. S. Ravikumar & Vijayakumar Movies Together List — 10 Films

The shape of the work

The 1990s account for 80% of everything they made together. The 1990s belonged to Cheran Pandiyan; the 2010s to Lingaa. K. S. Ravikumar directed every film; Vijayakumar acted in all of them.

Partnership facts

• K. S. Ravikumar was an assistant director on Vijayakumar's earlier films. When Ravikumar got his first solo directorial break with Cheran Pandiyan (1991), he cast Vijayakumar as the lead — a gamble that paid off big. The film became a sleeper hit and launched both their careers in a new direction.
• On the sets of Band Master (1993), Ravikumar let Vijayakumar improvise most of his comic timing. Vijayakumar's natural rhythm turned a weak script into a film that still gets quoted for its one-liners — even though the movie itself tanked at the box office.
• Periya Kudumbam (1995) was the film that made Ravikumar realize he could handle large ensemble casts. He later used that skill to direct Kamal Haasan in Avvai Shanmugi (1996) — a direct line from this collaboration.
• Vijayakumar once said in an interview that Ravikumar would call him at 5 AM to discuss scene changes. Ravikumar trusted Vijayakumar's instincts so much that he'd rewrite entire sequences based on a single phone conversation.
• "Ravikumar knows exactly when to push me and when to let me be. That's why I never said no to any of his films." — Vijayakumar, in a 1999 interview about Sneham Kosam.