Akshay Kumar and Rajinikanth in 2.0
Akshay Kumar and Rajinikanth stars in 2.0.PR Handout

Director Shankar has revealed an interesting detail about his upcoming Tamil movie 2.0. Well, the filmmaker has said Akshay Kumar was not the first choice to act in the Rajinikanth's mega-budget movie, but an international actor. 

Speaking to Ananda Vikatan, Shankar has said that Arnold Schwarzenegger, who was the special guest at the director's Ai audio launch in Chennai, was approached to play the second lead in 2.0 after realising that he was in awe of Chitti's character in Endhiran - The Robot.

Shankar also knocked the doors of Kamal Haasan for the same character. The Ulaganayagan heard the complete story but was more interested to work on a sequel to Indian than 2.0. 

The maverick filmmaker adds that Lyca Productions was in talks with Akshay Kumar for the remake of Kaththi in Bollywood and came up with the idea to cast him for the role. Later, Shankar narrated the story to Akki, who was impressed with the storyline and gave the green signal for the multilingual movie. 

Shankar has clarified that Akshay Kumar is not playing the negative role as believed by many, but his role has multiple shades. 

Lyca Productions has spent over Rs 500 crore on the project and it will hit the screens in multiple languages on November 29. 

Meanwhile, the trailer of 2.0 is all set to be launched on Saturday, November 3.