EXCLUSIVE: Indian Two Time Grammy Award composer and environmentalist Ricky Kej has signed to compose the original music for American-Bangladeshi writer-director Asif Akbar’s spy action-thriller MR-9 featuring Frank Grillo as a villain.
Based on the popular Masud Rana novels written by late novelist Qazi Anwar Hussain, top Bangladeshi actor ABM Sumon stars as secret agent Rana – code name MR-9 – of the Bangladesh Counter Intelligence Agency. Grillo plays his evil nemesis, Roman Ross.
The film was shot over the summer in the U.S. and Bangladesh and is now in post-production.
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“I take on very few motion pictures and I am very proud to be a part of MR-9,” said Kej. “Asif has not only made a fantastic, edge-of-the-seat, action thriller with heart but also we finally have an international spy who looks like us… and is South Asian.”
North Carolina-born, Bangalore-raised Kej has distinguished himself on the international music stage with his multi-layered orchestrations combining traditional Asian and Western instruments and singing voices with electronic sounds.
He is best known internationally for Winds Of Samsara, which won the Grammy for Best New Age Album in 2015. The album debuted at No. 1 on the US Billboard New Age Albums Chart in August 2014, a first for a person of Indian origin and stayed in the top 10 for 12 weeks straight.
Other major works include Shanti Samsara For Environmental Consciousness, which was launched to coincide with the 2015 United Nationals Climate Change Conference in Paris.
More than 300 actors, artists and musicians contributed to the album including former Police rock band drummer Stewart Copeland, the Soweto Gospel Choir, French pop star Bruno Mars and the U.K.’s Royal Philharmonic Orchestra.
Kej recently reunited with Copeland on Divine Tides. The work won Kej a second Grammy in the Best New Age Album category this year, shared with Copeland.
MR-9 film is adapted from Hussain’s original first novel Masud Rana: Dhonghsho Pahar (Demolition Hill). The later writer published 550 novels in the series, which is influenced by the James Bond franchise.
Alongside Grillo and Sumon, other cast members include Fortress star Kelly Greyson in the role of Roman Ross’s partner in crime and mistress.
Bangladeshi production company Jaaz Multimedia, LA-based Al Bravo Films and MR-9 Films are behind M-9. Producers are Al Bravo, Hemdee Kiwanuka, Colin Bates, Akbar, Philip Tan and Abdul Aziz with executive producers Niko Foster, Peter Nguyen and Phillip B. Goldfine.
The screenplay for the film has been adapted by Akbar, Aziz and Nazim Ud Daula from the first novel Masud Rana: Dhonghsho Pahar, originally published in 1966.
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