With rising COVID-19 cases in Mumbai, Bollywood on the back foot

Prabhas with Sunny Singh and Kriti Sanon

On Tuesday, Mumbai woke up to the news of an impending lockdown to curb the rising COVID-19 cases in the city. The development may put a strain on the film industry that limped back to normalcy after being hit hard by the lockdown in 2020. While the units have been following on-set guidelines since last year, it is learnt that the suits at Disney+Hotstar have informed the makers of Six Suspects, the Pratik Gandhi and Richa Chadha-starrer, to limit their crew strength to 50. "The number of people on the floor has to be 25. While the team was earlier shooting six days a week for eight hours each, it has been cut down to six-hour stints," says the source. Similar instructions have been issued by Amazon Prime Video and Netflix to their respective productions, Four More Shots Please 3 and Dongri to Dubai.

Prabhas and Saif Ali Khan's Adipurush is among the biggest films currently on floors. Despite its ambitious theme, director Om Raut has planned the shoot such that no more than 25 people are on set at the same time. "Om shoots his stars against the chroma background, and is simultaneously doing the VFX work," says a production source.

Shoot of Tiger 3 will resume this week in a bio-bubble

Meanwhile, the unit of Jimmy Sheirgill's Your Honour 2 has been filming between Goregaon and Malad, moving from one location to another. What remains a constant is the adherence to SOPs [standard operating procedures] like daily temperature checks and ensuring the crew is masked up. Prasoon Garg from Applause Entertainment reveals that they have divided the unit into three bands. "It is divided basis their access to parts of a set. Only one band can go on the floor while those belonging to the remaining two bands handle behind-the-scenes work, thus reducing crowding on the set. We have also made different batches for lunch so that the entire unit doesn't gather at the [cafeteria]," he explains.

The unit of Your Honour 2 is divided into different batches for lunch

While Bollywood awaits fresh SOPs in the event of a lockdown, filmmakers continue to make progress on their projects - where Shah Rukh Khan's Pathan is being filmed in a bio-bubble, the shoot of Salman Khan's Tiger 3 will resume at SRPF Grounds later this week.