After Silk Smitha, the next Indian adult star to have a biopic is Shakeela. Bollywood actress Richa Chadha will reportedly play her on screen, directed by slain journalist Gauri Lankesh’s filmmaker brother Indrajith Lankesh.
According to Hindustan Times, the film will focus on Shakeela’s entry in the film business at the age of 16 and her life’s journey.
A press statement from Chadha confirmed the news. “The film is the story of Shakeela, one of the most famous actors from Malayalam cinema from the 90s who rose to a spectacular amount of fame. Her fans were spread across Asia and she earned fanfare as a woman which was unheard of, back then. The film’s script was exciting and is a great story to tell and the story will make for a great watch for the audience. The preparations will begin soon and the film should be going on floors in end April or May,” read the statement.
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Shakeela, who hails from Nellore, Andhra Pradesh, has featured in over 100 B-grade and softcore movies in Malayalam, Tamil, Hindi, Kannada and Telugu. Her films have been dubbed and released in Nepalese, Chinese, and Sinhalese apart from most of the Indian languages. Owing to her, the soft-porn movie industry in India was colloquially called as “Razni films”.
In 2011, Vidya Balan starred in the Silk Smitha biopic titled The Dirty Picture. The Hindi film had received widespread praise for portraying Smitha as a powerful figure in a male-dominated society.