Danish Pandor's Dhurandhar moment is turning into a proper career shift. Bollywood Hungama reports that the actor, who played Pakistani gangster Uzair Baloch in Aditya Dhar's Dhurandhar franchise, has signed on for Aamir Khan and Ashutosh Gowariker's Lalkaara, a period sports drama built around the 1952 India-Pakistan Test series.

He'll reportedly play one of Aamir's on-screen friends, joining Jubilee actor Sidhant Gupta in a lead role alongside Khan. Character details beyond that are being kept close, which tracks for a film this size, still assembling its ensemble months before cameras roll.

Here's the part that'll settle a bit of speculation. Reports had suggested Vikrant Massey was in talks to join Lalkaara too. Sources close to the project have now told Bollywood Hungama that's not happening. He's not part of the film. No reason given, no further comment, just a flat correction of the record.

For Pandor, this is exactly the kind of signing you'd expect after a franchise like Dhurandhar breaks big. He's worked before, in Sacred Games, Double XL, Chhaava, but none of that translated into the recognition Uzair Baloch has. The spy thriller's success, per Bollywood Hungama, has already put a string of high-profile offers his way, and Lalkaara looks to be among the first he's actually locked in since.

The film itself is the bigger story. Aamir plays Lala Amarnath, independent India's first cricket captain, and that means training. Khan, Gupta and Pandor are reportedly deep into cricket coaching and physical transformation right now, trying to look like men who actually played the sport at that level rather than actors pretending to. More names are expected to join the cast before the shoot locks its final list.

Lalkaara also marks something else entirely: Aamir and Gowariker back together after Lagaan, twenty-five years on. That's not a small reunion to sell a film on. The script comes from Piyush Gupta, who wrote Dangal and Chhichhore, and Neeraj Singh of Nil Battey Sannata, and the pitch is friendship and rivalry playing out against a Test series that meant a great deal more than runs and wickets in 1952.

Farhan Akhtar and Ritesh Sidhwani's Excel Entertainment is producing, with Rajkumar Hirani Films on board too, which puts three of Hindi cinema's more dependable machines behind one film. Shooting is scheduled to start in November. Whether the remaining cast gets locked before then, and who else Gowariker needs for a story this layered, is the next thing to watch.