Ratheena Sharshad – Budding female director of Malayalam cinema with ‘Puzhu’ to her credit

Ratheena Sharshad, also called Ratheena S is a budding female director of Malayalam cinema, who made an impressive directorial debut with Puzhu starring megastar Mammootty & Parvathy. The psychological drama released on OTT platform in the year 2022, received favourable reviews for its script, direction and performances.

Actress Revathy helped Ratheena to get introduced to film world

She belongs to a family which enjoys movies a lot. Since young Ratheena Sharshad used to write, and hence her thoughts diverted to direct a film script. She learnt business and graphics. One day while travelling to Chennai, she got opportunity to get acquainted with popular actress-director Revathy. When asked how to get into films, it was Revathy who suggested her to try assistant direction. She also got actress’ e-mail id and mobile number.

In between, she got into a job, got married, even resigned the job while she was carrying her first child. It was during those days when she got drawn again towards the world of reading. Once again she started dreaming about movies. So, she sent a mail to actress Revathy, and through a friend visited Revathy’s manager too. Thus she got her entry as assistant director through an Indian-English film directed by Revathy. Yet she couldn’t continue in that job for long.

Only after the delivery of second child, she decided to full involve in films. She joined the production company, Sevan Arts of her family friend Vijay Kumar, and he suggested her to join production team. She was a part of production team of the popular TV soap, Kumkuma Poovu. Later she got opportunity to become a part of a few Priyadarshan films, produced by same house, and got introduced to different fields of filmmaking.

She got Mammootty for her maiden project

As she was in entertainment industry for a while, she is acquainted to several people working in this field. Since young Ratheena Sharshad has been a huge Mammootty fan and she had predecided that, whatever she do, the first script she writes would be for Mammootty. She had a lot of hardships to get contact number of Mammootty, often sent him messages to meet him, and finally got his date.

She narrated film story to Mammootty while the production work of ‘Uyare’ was going on. She worked as executive producer for the film. The first project she discussed with him was a big one. With the arrival of pandemic, it was not possible to make a film in big frame, and Mammootty suggested her to do a small film. He also introduced her to the Unda’s scenarist Harshad, who wrote the script of Puzhu. That’s how ‘Puzhu’ happened. Her experience in the field as an executive producer for many years, helped her a lot with her debut project.

More about Ratheena Sharshad

1. In 2020, she separated from her husband. She has two sons from this marriage.

2. She started her career as an executive producer at Sube Films. Later she worked with Aleph Entertainment Private limited for almost 7 years.

3. To do a film with Mammootty, it was Ratheena’s dream for 10-15 years.