Actor Vishnu Manchu had a clear inspiration in mind when he began developing Kannappa over a decade ago. “I was thinking on the scale of The Lord of the Rings,” he says of the script that he first began writing with screenwriter Tanikella Bharani. “After a few months, Bharani told me that he did not feel cut out to make a larger-than-life film. So, in 2015, he gave me the script to develop further,” recalls Manchu, who locked the script only by 2019.

Mukesh Kumar Singh’s directorial venture is inspired by the legend of Lord Shiva’s devotee Kannappa. As Manchu set out to mount the expansive project, he adhered to his thumb rule. “Don’t change the script when you are filming. [On set], improvisations can keep happening. But for me, changing the script is a sacrilege.” 

Akshay Kumar