The next Disney Channel Original movie Spin has been greenlit and will begin production in the fall. Avantika Vandanapu stars as 15 year-old Rhea, a girl who rediscovers her long lost passion for creating music.
Via Deadline
What’s Happening:
- A new Disney Channel Original Movie is headed this way! Disney Channel has greenlit their next project titled Spin that will star Avantika Vandanapu (Diary of a Future President, Mira, Royal Detective) as Indian American teenager.
- Manjari Makijany (Desert Dolphin) will direct the feature for the network.
- Spin is written by Carley Steiner (Play Date) and Josh Cagan (The Duff) and tells the story of 15-year-old Rhea Kumar who lives with her multi-generational family and helps with her father’s restaurant. However her real passion and her talents lie in music.
- Zanne Devine (Secret Society of Second Born Royals, Easy A, I, Tonya) will serve as executive producer.
- Production is scheduled to start this fall in Toronto. Spin will premiere on Disney Channel in 2021
About Spin:
- “Rhea Kumar (Vandanapu) is an effervescent 15-year-old who lives with her tight-knit multigenerational family. After her mother’s death, she has been her father’s emotional rock, and her life revolves around her family’s restaurant, her eclectic group of friends, and her after-school coding club. Everything changes when she falls for aspiring DJ Max and a long lost passion for music is reignited. Rhea discovers that she has a natural gift for creating beats and producing music, but must find the courage to follow her true inner talent.”
What They’re Saying:
- Lauren Kisilevsky, vice president, Original Movies, Disney Channel: “We look forward to watching Avantika lead this vibrant story of a teen discovering unexpected aspirations to create, remix, perform and ultimately define her art. We’re equally thrilled to see this special story come to life in Manjari Makijany’s talented hands.”
About Avantika Vandanapu:
- 15-year-old Vandanapu started her artistic journey through dancing, focusing on Indian classical dance forms, along with ballet, jazz and contemporary. She won second place in the first North American edition of ZeeTV’s reality series Dance India Dance Li’l Masters.
- Vandanapu went on to act in multiple feature films in Indian cinema and more than 25 commercials for national and regional print and TV media.
- Most recently, she starred as Monyca in Diary of a Future President, on Disney+ and can be heard as the voice of Kamala in Disney Junior’s hit animated series Mira, Royal Detective.
About Manjari Makijany:
- Makijany is an Indian writer-director based in Los Angeles.
She’s an alum of American Film Institute’s Directing Workshop for Women (AFI DWW) and Hollywood diversity programs, such as Universal Directors Initiative and the Fox Filmmakers Lab. - Her debut feature Desert Dolphin, a coming of age sports-drama and India’s first skateboarding feature, will be released globally on Netflix in 2021.
- Her vision for storytelling and diverse film experience, both in India and America, has served as a fertile ground to craft her unique voice as a filmmaker.