3 min readHyderabadMay 7, 2026 04:28 PM IST
Rajinikanth was on the set of Jailer 2 when RB Choudary walked in with a request. He wanted to retire after one more film and wanted to cast Rajinikanth in it. The actor said yes on the spot but Choudary never made it to that film.
“I didn’t do a film with him earlier,” Rajinikanth said on Thursday. “He called me during the Jailer 2 shoot and said, ‘I have done 99 films. I’ll retire after my 100th film, and you should do that film with me.’ I said I’ll do it 100 percent.”
On Tuesday, he was returning from a family wedding in a village in Rajasthan when cattle strayed onto the highway, the vehicle he was travelling in lost control, and crashed into a roadside wall. He died on the spot.
Rajinikanth spoke about the kind of producer Choudary was, not in the language of formal tributes, but in the specific way you speak about someone you watched work. “RB Choudary was a great man who introduced many directors and contributed immensely to the film industry. He created countless job opportunities for technicians and workers in cinema,” he said. “He produced 99 films, and there were never major problems or issues in his productions. Even if any issue arose, he would personally step in, solve it directly, calmly have a cup of coffee, and move on.”
Also Read: Vijay consoles emotional Jiiva as he breaks down after father RB Choudary’s death
Director KS Ravikumar had spoken to Rajinikanth just two months before the accident about organising a formal appreciation event for Choudary, a public acknowledgement of how many directors he had introduced and how many careers he had quietly sustained. The event was still being planned when the news came from Rajasthan.
Choudary’s banner, Super Good Films, produced films across Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam, and Hindi cinema over more than four decades. Nattamai, Gokulam, and Suryavamsam are among the titles most associated with his name. His final completed production, Maareesan, directed by Sudheesh Sankar and starring Vadivelu and Fahadh Faasil, released in July 2025.
Story continues below this ad
Condolences pour in
On social media, soon after the news of his death broke, several prominent actors paid tribute to the legend. Chiranjeevi, who had worked with Choudary most recently on Godfather in 2022, said his contribution to Indian cinema was beyond words. Pawan Kalyan, who acted in Choudary’s 1998 production Suswagatham, said he could not believe the news and spoke specifically about the producer’s ability to pick stories that connected with family audiences.
When Choudary’s body was brought back to his residence in Chennai, the film fraternity showed up in person. Mammootty, Dhanush, Suriya, Chiyaan Vikram, Siddharth, and TVK chief Vijay were among those who arrived to pay their respects. Choudary is also the father of actors Jiiva and Jithan Ramesh, which meant the grief in that house was not only professional.
The breadth of who came, across Tamil, Telugu, and Malayalam cinema, reflected something about how Choudary operated. He was not associated with one corner of the industry. He built across it, and the industry turned up accordingly.
Leave a Reply