Thalaivi: Kangana Ranaut is taking Tamil, Bharatanatyam lessons to portray Jayalalithaa, reveals director Vijay

Kangana Ranaut is set to portray late politician and actress Jayalalithaa on screen. Director Vijay recently spoke about the actress’ preparations for this challenging role in _Thalaivi_. As per reports, Vijay stated that Kangana was gaining weight to play the part. The actress is also taking Tamil classes and Bharatanatyam lessons in order to sink into Jayalalithaa’s skin with conviction. In.com quoted Vijay as saying, “For the next one year and a half, I’ll be occupied with Thalaivi. It will portray the life of a strong woman who comes up and makes a mark in a male-dominated society. We’ll be starting the shoot of the film in July end.” [caption id=“attachment_6785711” align=“alignnone” width=“825”] Kangana Ranaut. Image from Facebook[/caption] Make-up specialists will be brought down from the US to work on Kangana’s look in the film. However, Vijay revealed that casting for other important roles (such as MGR and Sasikala) in Thalaivi are yet to be confirmed. Noted writer Vijayendra Prasad will be penning the script. When asked about the biopic, Ranaut had earlier told Firstpost, “I am honoured to be doing this film. I feel that we do not have a direct relationship with Tamil and Telugu speaking audience, so I would definitely want to have a strong bond all across India. It’s my endeavour to connect with that audience with such an empowered role. She [Jayalalithaa] was a big legend there. Her story is very similar to mine, so I put my biopic on the back-burner.”