The exchange of cultural exports between South India and Bollywood shows no sign of slowing down as actors from both industries aim for versatility. The latest in line from Bollywood to join the Telugu film industry is actress Janhvi Kapoor.
According to reports, Kapoor will make her debut in the South in a sports drama, which also stars actor Jr NTR. The word on the street is that the late Sridevi and producer Boney Kapoor’s daughter has been approached by producers Mythri Movie Makers who will finance Jr NTR and director Buchi Babu’s film. But an official confirmation is yet to come by.
It’s not the first time that Janhvi’s name has been bandied about in relation to actors gearing up for a South Indian film debut. Earlier, rumours were rife that Janhvi was looking at debuting with South Indian heartthrob Vijay Deverakonda, who will soon make his Bollywood plunge with ‘Liger’.
Speculations didn’t end there. There were rumours that Janhvi was also in talks for Puri Jagannadh’s film ‘Jana Gana Mana’, but the conversations didn’t culminate into a formal announcement from either parties.
Kapoor made her debut with Ishaan Khatter in 2018 with the romance ‘Dhadak’ and has acted in films including ‘Gunjan Saxena: The Kargil Girl’ and ‘Roohi’.
Janhvi’s mother Sridevi was a popular actress in South India and began her journey in entertainment from that industry. Sridevi had acted in iconic films such as ‘Devaragam’ in Malayalam with Aravind Swami and ‘Moondram Pirai’ with Kamal Haasan.
From Bollywood, actors including Alia Bhatt are gearing up for their South Indian debut with ‘RRR’.
The boundaries between both industries are fast blurring. Bollywood superstar including Akshay Kumar has played villain in Rajinikanth’s film ‘2.0’ of late, while the trend of producing multi-lingual films that will have a Pan-Indian appeal are also on the rise.
Recently, Allu Arjun’s ‘Pushpa’s blockbuster success was proof that films are now becoming territory and language-agnostic.
