Dulquer Salmaan and Bhagyashri Borse star in director Selvamani Selvaraj's period film Kaantha as the hero and heroine of a film within the film. The horror film in the movie requires Bhagyashri's character Kumari to slap Dulquer's TK Mahadevan. It is an endeavour that Bhagyashri Borse was not up for initially, as she had not done anything like it ever before in a film. "Behind the scenes, I was a little hesitant about doing the same, but I think he wanted that perfection. He asked for it. He was ready to, like, go through that to get that performance out of him, and I really respect that," said Bhagyashri to Sudhir Srinivasan while talking about the sequences with her Kaantha co-star Dulquer.

Director Selvamani Selvaraj interjected Bhagyashri and said that Dulquer's "face was red for some time" after the slapping scenes in the film. Bhagyashri replied to the director, saying, "Anyways, don't make me feel more bad about it." Kaantha follows an ego battle between a director (Samuthirakani) and the hero (Dulquer) in a film within the film. It also stars Gayathrie Shankar, Rana Daggubati, Ravindra Vijay, Nizhalgal Ravi, and Bagavathi Perumal, among others.