Hindi
Disney UTV to produce Tamil film Theeyaa Vela Seiyyanum Kumaru
MUMBAI: Disney UTV Studio has said that its next Tamil film would be titled Theeyaa Vela Seiyyanum Kumaru (Kumar! You‘ve Gotta Work Really Hard, Yaar!).
Written and directed by Sundar C who had earlier directed the studio‘s superhit Kalakalappu, the film stars popular south stars Siddharth, Santhanam, Hansika, Ganesh Venkatraman and many others. The shooting for the film is currently in progress and it is scheduled to release in June 2013.
Commented Disney UTV, Chief – South Business, Studios G. Dhananjayan, “Our association with Sundar C has been hugely successful with Kalakalappu in 2012 and we are glad to continue this with Vela Seiyyanum Kumaru this year.
Comedy films have found a wide audience in South with many recent successes and we are hopeful to create another good film in this genre. We are working towards an eclectic slate for this year and this project is yet another step in that direction.”
Sundar C, known as a ‘Genius of Comedy‘ in South Cinema, is presenting Siddharth in an interesting lead role for the first time along with Comedy Super Star‘ Santhanam and one of the top actresses of South Hansika. Ganesh Venkatraman in a pivotal role adds strength to the cast of the film.
The film is to be shot at Kumbakonam, Hyderabad and Chennai.
While Settai will be UTV‘s first film in Tamil this year; it will release in April. It will be followed by Theeyaa Vela Seiyyanum Kumaru that is to open in June. This will be later followed by the Gaurav and Vikram Prabhu starrer Sigaram Thodu in December 2013.
Hindi
Remembering Gyan Sahay, the lens behind film, television and advertising
From a puppet rabbit selling poppadums to Hindi cinema, he framed it all.
MUMBAI: There are careers, and then there are canvases. Gyan Sahay, the veteran cinematographer, director, and producer who passed away on 10 March 2026 in Mumbai, had one of the latter. Over several decades in the Indian film and television industry, he turned lenses, lights, and the occasional puppet rabbit into something approaching art.
A graduate of the Film and Television Institute of India (FTII) in Pune, Sahay built his reputation as a director of photography across a career that stretched from the early 1970s all the way to the digital age. He was the kind of craftsman who understood that a well-composed shot is not merely a technical achievement but a quiet act of storytelling.
For most Indians of a certain age, however, Sahay will forever be the man behind the rabbit. His direction of the iconic long-running television commercial for Lijjat Papad, featuring its now-legendary puppet bunny, gave the country one of its most cheerfully persistent advertising images. It was the sort of work that sneaks into the national subconscious and takes up permanent residence.
His big-screen credits as cinematographer include Anokhi Pehchan (1972), Pagli (1974), Pas de Deux (1981), and Hum Farishte Nahin (1988). In 1999, he stepped behind a different kind of camera altogether, making his directorial debut with Sar Ankhon Par, a drama that featured Vikas Bhalla and Shruti Ulfat, with a cameo by Shah Rukh Khan for good measure.
On television, Sahay was particularly prized for his command of multi-camera production setups, a skill that made him a go-to technician for large-scale shows and reality programmes. In an industry that has never been especially patient with complexity, he was the calm hand on the rig.
In later life, Sahay turned teacher. He participated regularly in masterclasses and Digi-Talks, often hosted by organisations such as Bharatiya Chitra Sadhna, sharing hard-won wisdom on cinematography, the comedy of timing in a shot, and the sweeping changes brought by the shift from celluloid to digital. He was also said to have been involved in a project concerning a biographical film on Infosys co-founder N.R. Narayana Murthy.
Tributes from the film industry poured in following the news of his passing, with colleagues remembering him as a senior cameraman who served as a rare bridge between two entirely different eras of Indian cinema. That is, perhaps, the finest thing one can say of any craftsman: he kept up, and he brought others along with him.
