Isha Koppikar reminisced about her early struggles as an actor recently. Speaking to Hindi Rush, Isha said that she once asked her Chandralekha co-star Nagarjuna to slap her for real so as to elicit the right reaction from her. "I was this committed actress who wanted to do method acting," said Isha. The actor added that Nagarjuna touched her so gently that she was not even feeling the impact, and because she was in her second film, she could not produce the appropriate reaction quickly enough. "I could get angry in real life but could not in front of the camera," said the actor about her struggle to emote. She went on to add that even when anger came out of her, her directors would tell her that it did not feel authentic.

"Now, I have become better at, but not in those days," she said. The actor also revealed that because of her difficulty to emote so convincingly, she asked Nagarjuna to keeping slapping her till the point where it left marks on her cheek and he apologised for it. "I told him 'Why are you saying sorry, I asked for it.'"

Directed by Krishna Vamsi, Chandralekha is the Telugu remake of Priyadarshan's Malayalam film of the same name, starring Mohanlal and Sreenivasan, among others. The film also stars Ramya Krishna as Chandra, an affluent businessman's daughter whom Nagarjuna's character rescues after she meets with an accident. He then pretends to be Chandra's husband to help cope with his financial situation. However, soon, a strong husband-wife-like relationship form between both.

Isha Koppikar last appeared as Eliza in 2024's Ayalaan, opposite Sivakarthikeyan. Last seen in Kuberaa with Dhanush, Nagarjuna is set to play Simon in Lokesh Kanagaraj and Rajinikanth's Coolie. He also produces Akhil Akkineni and Sreeleela's Lenin through his Annapurna Studios banner.