One of the most anticipated biopics in the film industry right now happens to be Mahanati, which is based on the life of legendary actor Savitri. The Tamil-Telugu bilingual on the illustrious south actor is directed by Nag Ashwin, who is busy giving finishing touches to the film. Titled Mahanati in Telugu, the biopic will be released in Tamil under the title Nadigaiyar Thilagam.
In a statement, director Nag Ashwin had said that the biopic “is a celebration of Savitri’s life,” adding, “Savitri had immense, diverse talent, a director, playback singer, producer and someone who loved car racing. As a race-car driver, she won trophies. There are so many beautiful facets of this actor that she deserves to be reminisced today. (sic)”
On choosing Keerthy Suresh to play Savitri in the biopic, the film’s producer Priyanka Dutt of Swapna Cinema said: “Complementing our choice of Keerthy Suresh for the titular role of Savitri, Vijaya Chamundeswari had expressed it is a huge challenge to play this big role on her young shoulders. I found many qualities in Keerthy that kind of made me feel yes, she can pull it off. There were so many instances on the set that made everyone believe that Keerthy had mannerisms that bore striking similarities to Savitri’s. It was indeed a massive task for us, in this film we have done our best to distil Savitri’s life story into two hours of quality entertainment.”
Mahanati / Nadigaiyar Thilagam is scheduled for release on May 9 and the post-production work is happening at breakneck speed right now.
The film has an impressive star cast with Dulquer Salmaan playing Savitri’s husband and film star Gemini Ganesan. Vijay Deverakonda, Samantha Akkineni, Naga Chaitanya, Prakash Raj, Shalini Pandey, Mohan Babu, Krish and others are also part of the cast. According to reports, Samantha plays a journo in this flick and the story is told through her perspective. Dulquer Salmaan makes his Telugu debut via this project. With massive set pieces, the film will be unlike anything that’s been explored in Indian cinema.
(Content provided by Digital Native)