Cinematographer Santosh Sivan is going to play Raja Ravi Varma in a Malayalam film, Magara Manju which will be dubbed in Hindi and English. Directed by Lenin Rajendran, the film will begin shooting next week at Cochin.

Santosh wasn’t very keen on doing the film at first but Lenin convinced him that he would be perfect for the role. And since Santosh has always had a soft corner for Raja Ravi Varma since his childhood days, he agreed. He claims to have got his visual aesthetics from the painter himself as the former was the director of photography for M F Husain’s Gaja Gamini and also for Meenaxi: Tale of 3 Cities.

His co-star in the film, Karthika, is the daughter of yesteryear Tamil actress Radha. He likes the way their pair looks. Some parts of the film will be shot in Goa and Trivandrum. Santosh has only acted once before; in Aditya Bhattacharya’s Raakh (1989) with Pankaj Kapur.

-Sampurn Media