Varun in Ekta's next, David Dhawan to direct-Pg 6

Prashant Singh , Hindustan Times
Mumbai, January 05, 2013

First Published: 14:41 IST(5/1/2013)
Last Updated: 14:47 IST(5/1/2013)

Along with Sidharth Malhotra and Alia Bhatt, Varun Dhawan made a hit debut with Karan Johar's Student Of The Year. And now, even as speculations are rife about the trio's next ventures, we can confirm that Varun is set to star in Ekta Kapoor's big-budget remake of a south Indian film. The producer, who is known to be close to Varun's mentor Karan, has apparently bought the rights to this Telugu film for Rs. 2 cr.

The title of the movie, however, is currently a closely-guarded secret. "Except for Ekta and her core team, no one knows what film this is. Varun has been confirmed for this film, which is apparently Ekta's most ambitious project till date. It's going to be a classy romantic comedy. She wants it to be like a modern-day Himmatwala (1983), but the treatment will be plush: on the lines of The Wedding Crashers (2005). The film will go on the floors by mid-year," says an insider.

Ekta is believed to have beaten several other big names from Bollywood to bag these remake rights. "Salman Khan and Boney Kapoor were also interested in the film, but she went out of her way to seal the deal first," adds the insider.

In fact, we hear that Ekta has apparently paid three times the amount initially quoted by the makers. "She wanted to the buy the rights immediately after she watched the film. Her team got in touch with the makers and offered them twice the sum they were quoting. However, when the deal was struck, her offer had tripled. She finalised the deal within one night," says the insider.

Although Varun is already on board, we also have confirmed news that Ekta has something big in store as far as the leading lady and director are concerned. Despite repeated attempts, both Ekta and Varun remained unavailable for comments.

Anyways YAY he finally signed his next