Look who's tweeting

Speaking matter of factly, actors from the Telugu film industry joining twitter shouldn't raise eyebrows. But it does, simply because they have always been comfortable in their cocoons, venturing out only for audio releases, film functions or at the most select private bashes. Traditionally stars preferred their public relation managers giving out news feeds from time to time.

In the last one month, many leading actors signed up on twitter, including the reclusive Mahesh Babu and Nagarjuna. Says actor Sumanth, “My uncle (Nagarjuna) signed up and asked me to give it a try. I did and started liking it. It's a platform through which we can be social and yet retain our privacy. In my granddad's days, actors responded to fan mails, which doesn't happen any more. Twitter bridges that gap.”

Mahesh Babu was last seen on screen in Athidi in 2007. There's been nothing much for his fans to look forward to since then. His fans are euphoric after the actor joined twitter (twitter.com/urstrulymahesh) recently. The actor who once shied away from discussing his personal life has been posting pictures of his son Gautam and disclosing how Gautam speaks four languages. Mahesh's tweets range from personal (on how he quit smoking) to professional (updates on his new film due for release later this year).

His peers too haven't been able to contain their surprise on Mahesh's move. “OMG! What's the world coming to? My highly reclusive pal is here… welcome,” Sumanth (twitter.com/actorsumanth) posted on learning Mahesh is on twitter.

Mahesh discloses how he dislikes carrying his mobile phone to shooting spots and hence will not be tweeting while shooting. “It was an impromptu decision that made him join twitter; he felt he need to connect directly with his fans and know what kind of people are looking out to interact with him,” says wife Namrata.

The tweeple

Nagarjuna (iamnagarjuna), Siddharth (actor_siddharth), Genelia (geneliad), Allu Arjun (ursbunny), Trisha (MsTrishak), Shriya Saran (shriya_saran), Varun Sandesh (varun_sandesh), Asin (asin_thottumkal), Rana (rana_daggubati) and Ramcharan Teja (imramcharan), Lakshmi Manchu (HRHLakshmi) and Krishnudu (actorkrishnudu) are on board.

The tweets range from friendly banter between actors and responding to people's queries. Nagarjuna asks for suggestions on buying a new sports car and Rana tweets reviews on new gadgets and film news updates. “It's also a good way to keep people in the loop of what you are up to,” says Sumanth, whose tweets reflect the excitement on starting his new cricket-based film, directed by Indraganti Mohanakrishna.

Like Mallika Sherawat and Priyanka Chopra who triggered the trend in Bollywood, actresses Asin, Trisha, Genelia and Shriya among others have been twitter-friendly for a while now. Keeping with the times, male actors too feel the need to be accessible to people without middlemen and twitter seems to be the answer for now.