Director Vetri Maaran, who is currently busy filming Arasan, his upcoming film with Silambarasan, took his time out to attend actor Prashanth's grand birthday ceremony held on Monday. Sharing his wishes for the Andhagan actor, reflected on the early days in his career and his learnings from late veteran filmmaker Balu Mahendra.
"If I am standing here as an acclaimed director, Balu Mahendra sir is the reason for it. I learnt my skill sets from him, but producer S Kathiresan sir gave me the space to exhibit them. At that point, five various producers heard my narrations, but were not able to do films with me. It was at that point Kathiresan sir heard a story from me and trusted me, so I am thankful to him as well as Balu Mahendra sir," he said.
Explaining how he and Prashanth share a common ground, Vetri Maaran revealed how the actor too has imbibed knowledge from Balu Mahendra when he worked with him. "Prashanth is also Balu Mahendra's student. In that way, I am happy to be here," he added.
Several other notable names from the Tamil film industry including director KS Ravikumar, producer Kalaipuli S Thanu, and others were part of the event where Prashanth's upcoming film's title was revealed. He will star in as Ranjan in Telugu film Court's Tamil remake. Directed by Thiagarajan, Devayani's daughter Iniyaa Rajakumaran and Hari, producer S Kathiresan's son will make their debut as leads. Devayani's other daughter Priyanka is also playing a key role. GV Prakash is scoring the music for the upcoming courtroom drama.
Meanwhile, Vetri Maaran's upcoming film Arasan, which is set in the Vada Chennai universe, is currently in the second schedule of shooting. Andrea is returning as Chandra, along with Samuthirakani as Guna. Vijay Sethupathi, Yogalakshmi of Heart Beat and Tourist Family fame, and Jibin Gopinath are also set to play key roles. Recent speculations suggest that actor Vikranth and child artist Kamalesh Jagan of Tourist Family fame have also been added to the cast. The cast is also set to reportedly feature Kishore reprising his role, along with newcomers Manikandan and Nelson. However, this still remains unconfirmed. Although they exist in the same universe, Dhanush's character Anbu is not a part of Arasan.