Tanikella Bharani & Ajay Movies Together List — 14 Films

The shape of the work

The 2000s belonged to Dhee; the 2020s to Ala Vaikunthapuramulo. Tanikella Bharani acted in every film; Ajay acted in all of them.

Partnership facts

• Their first film together, Sri Mahalakshmi (2007), was a low-budget comedy where Tanikella Bharani played a comedic priest. Ajay was the lead. The director paired them because he needed a senior actor who could match Ajay's fast-paced dialogue delivery without flinching.
• In Dookudu (2011), Tanikella Bharani played Ajay's father. Their scenes together had a specific rhythm: Bharani would deliver his lines in a slow, deliberate drawl, and Ajay would respond with rapid-fire comebacks. That contrast became the emotional backbone of their father-son dynamic.
• Ala Vaikunthapuramulo (2020) was the only film where they played actual rivals — Bharani was the villain, Ajay the hero. Their confrontation scene in the climax became a meme template on Telugu social media, with fans looping their exchange for months after release.
• On the sets of Vastadu Naa Raju (2011), Ajay would often ask Tanikella Bharani to rewrite his own dialogues on the spot. Bharani, a playwright himself, would scribble new lines on napkins between takes. Ajay later said he kept those napkins as souvenirs.
• "Bharani garu is the only co-actor who can make me forget my lines because I'm too busy laughing at his improvisations. We never rehearsed — we just fed off each other." — Ajay, in a 2022 interview about Super Machi.
• In Okka Ammayi Thappa (2016), they played uncle and nephew. Bharani deliberately underplayed every scene to let Ajay's manic energy take center stage. Ajay later admitted that Bharani's restraint forced him to modulate his own performance instead of going over-the-top.