Samuthirakani to play MGR’s secretary in Thalaivi

While recently there were reports that Priyamani had been brought on board to play the controversial role of Sasikala in the biopic, we hear from reliable sources that director-turned-actor Samuthirakani had also been finalised for the project. A source close to the team says, "Samuthirakani will play the role of minister RM Veerappan, who was also MGR’s secretary during his political journey. He will have combination scenes with Arvind Swamy in the first half and his look will be something new for the audience. The team is making sure that every character in the film resembles the original personality.”

There are also speculations that the actor was initially approached for another version of Jayalalithaa’s biopic directed by Priyadarshini. However, he had apparently given the nod to Thalaivi and has already started working on it. Bankrolled by Vishnu Vardhan Induri and Sahilesh R Singh, the Hindi version of the film has been titled Jaya. GV Prakash will compose the music and Vijayendra Prasad has penned the dialogues.