 His busy schedule meant that he missed out on successful films including "Kadhalukku Mariyadhai" (1997) and "Jeans" (1998), and the Tamil films he appeared in such as "Jolly" (1998) "Ini Ellam Sugame" (1998), "Aasai Thambi" (1998) were predominantly box office failures.Meanwhile, the success of "Kaadhal Desam"'s dubbed Telugu version, allowed him to make a breakthrough in Telugu films and his next ventures "Priya O Priya" (1997) and "Rajahamsa" (1998) were profitable.He also appeared in the youth-centric Kannada film, "Shanti Shanti Shanti" (1999), featuring alongside debutant Madhavan for the first time.