A few days ago, it was reported that Kannada star Dhruva Sarja and director Nanda Kishore will team up once again for a new project, which will be bankrolled by Uday K Mehta. The latest on this is that the script pooja for the film took place on October 18, the birth anniversary of Dhruva’s late brother Chiranjeevi Sarja. The film will be officially launched on October 26, during the Vijayadasami festival, we hear. Sources in the know say that the film is a complete entertainer.
According to reports, the shooting of this yet-to-be-titled film will begin soon after Dhruva’s Pogaru hits the marquee. Incidentally, Pogaru is also directed by Nanda Kishore. The film stars Shanvi Srivastava and Rashmika Mandanna as the female leads. Dhananjay and veteran Telugu actor Jagapathi Babu have been roped in to play the villains. Chandan Shetty is composing the tunes, with Vijay Milton cranking the camera and Mahesh S doing the edits. BK Gangadhar is bankrolling the film under his banner Sri Jagadguru Movies, on a budget of Rs 25 crore.
Pogaru was scheduled for release on 24 April this year, but with the lockdown due to the outbreak of the pandemic, it was postponed. Now that theatres in Karnataka have reopened following the relaxation of lockdown rules, the new date of release is expected to be announced soon.
The first schedule of Pogaru was successfully completed last year, and the team went on a long break. Rumours started to make the rounds that the filmmakers were not happy with the script and opted for some fine-tuning. However, it was clarified later that the delay in the second schedule was due to the fact that Dhruva had to gain weight for his character. He had shed close to 30 kg to play a schoolboy in the first schedule and took time to regain the lost weight.
We also hear that the French bodybuilder Morgan Aste, popularly known as ‘The Big Rock’, American professional bodybuilder Kai Green, international athlete and Evolution Sports Nutrition ambassador John Lucas, and German fitness sensation Jo Lindner have been roped in for an important action sequence in the film.
Pogaru is a bilingual project, made in Kannada and Telugu simultaneously. It will mark the debut of Dhruva Sarja and director Nanda Kishore in the Telugu film industry.
Dhruva Sarja’s last film to hit the marquee was Bharjari, released in 2017, which was a huge hit. The film had Dhruva Sarja and Rachita Ram in the lead roles with Hariprriya, Vaishali Deepak, Sudha Rani, Tara, Srinivasa Murthy, Sai Kumar, Bharath Gowda and Avinash in supporting roles. Directed by Chetan Kumar, the film’s technical crew includes V Harikrishna for music, Shreesha Kuduvalli for cinematography and Deepu S Kumar for editing.
(Content provided by Digital Native)