Muthiah Muralitharan asks Vijay Sethupathi to ‘step away’ from his biopic

Retired Sri Lankan cricketing icon Muthiah Muralitharan asked actor Vijay Sethupathi, who was supposed to be starring in his biopic, 800, to

“step away” from the project to not encounter difficulties in his career in

future. Vijay Sethupathi shared Muralitharan’s statement with a message ‘Nandri, Vanakkam’ as if to suggest that he won’t be starring in 800. In a statement from the United Arab Emirates, former Sri Lankan legend Muralitharan, currently working as a bowling coach for Sunrisers Hyderabad team playing in the Indian Premier League said that he doesn’t want to be a reason to derail the career of a great artist like Vijay Sethupathi”. He stated that he never actually felt fatigued because of setbacks and has always won against all odds to reach his current position.

Further, he also said that he agreed for his biopic solely for the reason of providing inspiration and confidence to future generations and young cricketers. Though he knows that making such a project won’t be child’s play for the whole team, he is still hopeful for the film. No sooner had the official poster of 800 was released than several political leaders and many others from the Tamil film industry said that actors should not act in the biopic of a person who had previously made remarks that were seeming to be in backing the war waged by Sri Lankan forces resulting in deaths of thousands of innocent civilians. The crushing opposition faced by Vijay Sethupathi impelled a clarification from Muralitharan who said that his statements made in the past about the civil war that ended in 2009 were taken out of Context.