Varun Dhawan is currently in the mood to relax. After a quick family trip to Goa, which included steady date Natasha Dalal, the actor air dashed to the Maldives for another vacation. But Mirror has learnt that the holiday is more like the calm before the storm as the actor has four back-to-back shoots, with films belonging to different genres, lined up. He gets back into action by mid-November with Good Newwz director Raj Mehta’s next, which romantically pairs him with Kiara Advani. Anil Kapoor and Neetu Kapoor play pivotal roles in the film.

“The film is tentatively titled Jug Jug Jiyo and is a dramedy that revolves around the lives of two couples of different generations, played by Varun and Kiara, Anil and Neetu. The situational comedy, spun around a North Indian family promises to be a riot, with the older couple’s strained relationship bringing lots of laughs,” reveals a source. The film will be shot in a marathon schedule, in real locations in Chandigarh, followed by a brief stint in Mumbai as well as abroad, as Varun’s character is an NRI. Another A-lister is expected to join the gang soon.

After wrapping up Jug Jug Jiyo, Varun will begin 2021 with Stree director Amar Kaushik’s horror comedy, titled Bhediya. Buzz is, Shraddha Kapoor is his leading lady. “It’s diametrically opposite to what Amar did in Stree. This one is more like a dark monster comedy. The shoot will commence early next year in Mumbai. Not just Varun, but even his filmmakerfather, David Dhawan, loves the subject,” the source adds.

Right after Bhediya is Sanki, with Sajid Nadiadwala, and written by Rajat Arora. “It’s an unabashed commercial entertainer with action, drama and comedy. Varun will try his hand at playing a larger-than-life action hero in this one. The film begins in mid-2021, and is currently being scripted,” the source shares.

While reports suggested that Shah Rukh Khan’s next with South filmmaker Atlee has been titled Sanki, the source confirms that it is Sajid Nadiadwala who has the title registered under his name and is all set to make the film with Varun in the titular role. “The title has been with Sajid for almost a decade now and was one of the titles in consideration for his directorial debut, Kick,” the source points out.

Following a hat-trick of films with comic elements, Varun gets into the serious space with Sriram Raghavan’s Arun Kheterpal biopic. “Ekkis is a period war film which requires multiple people on the set, with real action scenes set against tanks, crowds, and guns. They don’t want to risk by shooting a film of that scale in the middle of a pandemic and hence, Varun has decided to get a line up in place that will be devoid of big crowd scenes,” the source signed off.

Before the pandemic, Varun had started prepping for the Arun Kheterpal biopic and had had multiple script reading sessions with Sriram. The film was scheduled to go on the floors then in May. 

Salman suggested it during Kick, reports are rife that SRK’s next is called thus, but it’s Sajid who is making a film with it
Hiren Kotwani (MUMBAI MIRROR; November 4, 2019)

It’s been almost a year since Zero released (December 21, 2018) and there’s no confirmation yet on Shah Rukh Khan’s next after his exit from Saare Jahaan Se Achha, the biopic on Indian astronaut, Rakesh Sharma. Industry buzz is that the actor has short-listed three directors, Rajkumar Hirani, Gurinder Chadha and Atlee Kumar, and it was widely speculated that he would make the much-awaited announcement on his birthday, November 2. According to some reports, the film with the South director is titled Sanki with him playing a hot-headed guy.

While there’s no word on this film or any other yet, we can say that it definitely won’t be called Sanki because the title belongs to Sajid Nadiadwala, who has registered it with the Film Producers Guild of India. A source affiliated to the Guild informed Mirror, “Salman had suggested that Sajid register the title when they were making Kick. Even though they eventually stuck with Kick for their film as it was a remake of a Telugu film with the same title, Sajid still owns the title Sanki and without his NOC (No Objection Certificate), no one else can use it. In fact, there are three other producers in the queue for this much-wanted title.”

While Sajid was unavailable for comment, his spokesperson confirmed that the filmmaker owns the title and added that the script of Sanki is ready, along with the casting. “We will be officially announcing the project soon after Christmas,” said the spokesperson.