Sandalwood star Srinidhi Shetty shares her excitement on having signed KGF opposite Rocking Star Yash. The film’s trailers have already gone viral, and she speaks about the road ahead...Ikyatha Yerasala
The past week has been overwhelmingly exciting for this pretty lass, who’s now garnering attention for being Rocking Star Yash’s leading lady in the humungous multi-lingual project KGF Chapter 1, directed by Prashanth Neel. When she signed her debut film, little did Srinidhi Shetty know that the project would be such a colossal one. “This week has perhaps been the most exciting period of my life. Honestly, when I started off the KGF journey, I never imagined it to evolve into such a scale and magnitude. It’s now trending nationally, and everybody is waiting for the movie’s release. I couldn’t have imagined a better start to my career, so I’m overwhelmed and feel blessed,” she smiles.
Srinidhi’s rendezvous with fame happened when she took part in the Miss Diva competition in 2016 and was placed in the top three, and featured across various newspapers. “That’s when the KGF team spotted me and called me for a meeting. Fortunately, they liked me. I was aware through the news and social media that KGF was going to be a magnum opus and after watching Ugramm, I knew Prashanth’s next venture would be bigger, however, I didn’t know that it would turn out to have a pan-India presence,” she says, of the flick, which is being produced by Hombale Films and distributed by Farhan Akhtar’s Excel Entertainment in Hindi.
Srinidhi’s co-star Yash has a huge following in namma state. How was the experience of working with him? “ For a newcomer, I could not have asked for anything more. Yash is very focused and intense, so when you work with him, you get inspired to do more and feel like putting in more effort to match his. Prashanth is a man of few words and a perfectionist. He knows exactly what he wants and will get that out of his artistes,” shares the former Miss Supranational.
With KGF being one of the biggest projects of the Kannada film industry, is there too much pressure when picking her next project? “Every movie is unique and hence, I will not compare KGF with the projects I choose in the future. So, I’m not under any pressure. However, I’m looking for projects that can challenge me in every possible way as an actor. As of now, I haven’t signed anything,” she states.
As she reminisces her college days, the Mangalore hudugi reveals that she did her electrical and electronics engineering at Jain Engineering College in Bengaluru and then went on to work at Accenture for two years before she began participating in pageants. Srinidhi, who now shuttles between Mumbai and nammooru for work, shares, “I was a kid with a lot of dreams. And my parents encouraged me in every possible way. Although early on, I did not think of showbiz, I dreamed of being on TV and becoming a celebrity. I’ve always loved watching movies and pageants. As I grew up, my dreams turned into goals and I started working towards that direction. I took one step at a time and luckily, things worked out in my favour.”
When she’s not shooting, Srinidhi likes to trek and swim. “I enjoy watching movies and TV shows and I also spend a good amount of time playing badminton,” she signs off.
