Vikrant Rona and Kabzaa co-producer Alankar Pandian to back Sharan-Aravind Kuplikar film

In February this year, for actor Sharan’s birthday, it was announced that his next, after Choo Mantar with Navaneeth, would be an untitled project with director Aravind Kuplikar, best known for the critically-acclaimed Puksatte Lifeu. At the time, the announcement poster mentioned it as the first production of Sridhara Krupa Combines, with Amrutha Iyengar on board as the leading lady.

We now have it on good authority that there’s a change in the production house handling the film. Aravind’s film is now being produced by Dwarakish Chitra, with Alankar Pandian of Invenio Origin, who has made Ayushman Bhava, The Terrorist, Vikrant Rona and Kabzaa in Kannada, as co-producer. The film, we hear, is currently on floors in Bagalkot, with Tharun Sudhir, who is working on Challenging Star Darshan’s Kaatera, filling in as creative director.

Aravind’s film is, reportedly, a social drama, in which Sharan will be seen as an electrician. It will have Poornachandra Tejaswi replacing Arjun Janya as music director and Advaita Gurumurthy handling cinematography. Achyuth Kumar, Sangita M Nair, Raju Talikote and Rangayana Raghu are also on the cast. According to a source, the film has a hard-hitting subject of relevance to the Bagalkot area, so the challenge for Aravind will be to marry this with some level of humour, given that Sharan’s audiences would expect that from the actor.

Sharan, who was last seen in his home production Guru Shishyaru, has Choo Mantar lined up as his next release, unless, of course, director Suni manages to finish Avatara Purusha 2 before that. Navaneeth’s Choo Mantar is a horror comedy, in which Sharan will be seen as a paranormal expert. The film also stars Aditi Prabhudeva, Chikkanna, Meghana Gaonkar, Rajini Bharadwaj, Prabhu Mundkur, among others. Chandan Shetty has composed the songs, while the background score is by Avinash.