Tamannaah Bhatia signs Tamil, Telugu films

Mumbai, March 16 (IANS) Actress Tamannaah Bhatia has signed up for two new projects. One is a Telugu film, and one in Tamil.

She will be the lead protagonist in the third instalment of Telugu hit franchise "Raju Gari Gadhi", to be directed by Omkar. The film is expected to go on floors in June 2019.

The first instalment of the horror comedy was released in 2015 with Ashwin Babu and Dhanya Balakrishna playing the lead. Following its success at the box office, the director went on to wield the megaphone for the 2017 movie "Raju Gari Gadhi 2", starring Nagarjuna Akkineni and Samantha Akkineni.

On her role, Tamannaah said in a statement: "This is a female-centric role and something that has been on my creative wish list for 2019. The narrative really excited me as I'm shuttling between two different eras and hence portraying two different personas. There is a lot of layering and it will be interesting to navigate between time zones."

On the Tamil movie front, she has been roped in to play the principal antagonist in yet another film opposite Vishal. It is being directed by a debutant director.

Tamannaah and Vishal will be teaming up for the third time after "Kaththi Sandai" apart from currently shooting together for Sundar C's yet untitled action-based film.

The actress said she is playing a character with a grey shade in the new film.

"It is quite challenging as my role demands not just physical strength but also a lot of mental forte. There is a lot of mastery required in mind games, even when you're playing it on-screen and that's something that doesn't come very easy to me. In reality I'm quite the opposite, easy going and authentic, so getting into this character will be quite intimidating to be honest."