Mumbai: The rags to riches story of Kings United India, the dance troupe, which won $1 million with its victory on international show “World Of Dance”, has inspired a film. Earlier this month, the Mumbai-based hip-hop dancers Kings United India were declared the global champions of the American reality show “World Of Dance”. The judging panel of Jennifer Lopez, Ne-Yo and Derek Hough gave them a perfect score of 100 for their cinematic, “Baahubali” style performance.
Shailendra Singh has acquired rights to their story, and said he found it to be a “glocal” narrative. According to a source, they are looking out for a global director, planning a 2020 release and also have plans to have actual team members be a part of the film.
Singh said: “The story of Kings United is a true account of 22 young strugglers from the slums of Nala Sopara, uniting through dance to take on the world. They dedicated 12 years to reaching the top and became champions of the world. It’s an inspiration to anyone who has ever had a dream.”
Suresh Mukund, the group’s choreographer, is excited.
“Our journey has been full of trials and tribulations, victory and glory. But we had a dream, and the only thing we knew to do, was to keep chasing that dream. We believe that Shailendra Singh truly understands our story and can translate it in to film. We are very excited to embark upon this new journey with him,” he said.
Bollywood has already been inspired by the hip-hop dances, with Remo D’Souza basing his film “ABCD 2” on Mukund’s dance team at the time — Fictitious Dance Group that was formed in 2009 by Suresh Mukund along with Vernon Monteiro. They also changed their group name to ‘SNV Group’ based on the first name of their initials i.e, Suresh & Vernon. In 2012, SNV group finished eighth at the World Hip Hop Dance Championship, in Las Vegas, Nevada.
After the release of ‘ABCD 2’ based on their group, Mukund’s partner left the crew due to creative differences which was going on for quite sometime and the group split.
(with inputs added in IANS)
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