Aishwarya Rai Bachchan was not the first choice of Mani Ratnam for the role of Nandani in Ponniyin Selvan I.

Mani Ratnam’s magnum opus Ponniyin Selvan I was a major hit and garnered much appreciation from the audience all thanks to its ensemble cast and the grand scale on which it was made. However, do you know that Aishwarya Rai Bachchan who played the role of Nandini in the film, was not the first choice of the director?

Yes, Mani Ratnam had a different cast in mind or Ponniyin Selvan I. Aishwarya Rai was not the original choice but he wanted Rekha to play Nandini in Ponniyin Selvan. Moreover, he even wanted to have superstar Kamal Hassan in the movie, but not for Vikram’s role.

Mani Ratnam talked about the same in an interview with Bollywood Bubble and said, “The first time I thought of making it was with Kamal Hassan before Vikram came in. I’ve thought of making this film with him for his Banner so we acquired the rights Kamal sir had acquired the rights for this book and we started working on it. It just didn’t fall into place because it was too huge and it didn’t make sense to compromise on it. We thought we leave it now and do it when the time is right.”

He added, “Yeah, probably it was too early a stage we then got into casting when I first thought of the film. The only person that I had in mind was Kamal sir and maybe Rekha was an automatic choice. It was a no-brainer for Nandini. We didn’t go further on with that.”

When asked why Rekha was the automatic choice for the role of Nandini in Ponniyin Selvan, the filmmaker said, “She fitted I mean, sometimes you just feel that kind of a person. I know somebody who’s deep, who is beautiful and who can carry both sides of it. She can portray both sides very well.”

Helmed by Mani Ratnam, Ponniyin Selvan is a Tamil language historical fiction novel by Indian author Kalki Krishnamurthy. The film stars an ensemble cast including Vikram, Aishwarya Rai Bachchan, Jayam Ravi, Karthi, Jayaram, Trisha, Aishwarya Lekshmi, Sobhita Dhulipala, Prakash Raj, Prabhu, R. Sarathkumar, R. Parthiban, Rahman, Lal, and Vikram Prabhu and turned out to be fifth-highest-grossing Tamil film of all time and the nineteenth-highest-grossing Indian film of all time.

Meanwhile, Mani Ratnam recently reunited with Kamal Haasan after 36 years for another gangster drama titled Thug Life. The makers recently unveiled the fierce look of Kamal Haasan from the movie and revealed that Dulquer Salman, Trisha, and Jayam Ravi will also star in the movie.