Venkatesh's Narappa headed for an early July release?

With theatres in Andhra Pradesh and Telangana expected to reopen in July, Telugu film producers are busy planning the releases of a few medium-budgeted projects and long-delayed films of prominent stars in the initial weeks of the month. One of the first major releases in the first half of July could be the Venkatesh, Priyamani-starrer Narappa, the official Telugu remake of Vetrimaran's blockbuster Asuran (available to watch on Amazon Prime Video), a report in the portal Telugu Cinema states.

While the initial plan was to push Narappa's theatrical release behind by a few months, the producers, Suresh Productions, have considered otherwise now. Directed by Srikanth Addala, Narappa wrapped its shoot earlier this year. The same banner is meanwhile looking to release the actor's other film Drushyam 2, directed by Jeethu Joseph, directly on an OTT platform (Amazon Prime Video) sometime after the theatrical release of Narappa. Drushyam 2's shoot was completed in a record 45-day-long schedule and the makers had secured a deal to release it directly on a major streamer a couple of months ago. 

With big stars like Venkatesh and Nagarjuna accepting the change in tide, it's expected that several major stars will join the OTT bandwagon soon. Venkatesh is also awaiting the release of F3, the sequel to his 2019-hit F2, later this year. There's some distance to go before the film's shoot wraps up. Some of the other highly anticipated Telugu films in 2021 include RRR, Acharya, Viraata Parvam, Pushpa, Love Story, Radhe Shyam and Tuck Jagadish to name a few.