Rambha (born Vijayalakshmi; 5 June 1976) is an Indian actress. In a career spanning of almost two decades, Rambha had appeared in more than 100 films across eight regional languages, predominantly in

Telugu Telugu may refer to: * Telugu language, a major Dravidian language of India *Telugu people, an ethno-linguistic group of India * Telugu script, used to write the Telugu language ** Telugu (Unicode block), a block of Telugu characters in Unicode S ...

and

Tamil Tamil may refer to: * Tamils, an ethnic group native to India and some other parts of Asia **Sri Lankan Tamils, Tamil people native to Sri Lanka also called ilankai tamils **Tamil Malaysians, Tamil people native to Malaysia * Tamil language, nativ ...

, in addition to

Malayalam Malayalam (; , ) is a Dravidian language spoken in the Indian state of Kerala and the union territories of Lakshadweep and Puducherry (Mahé district) by the Malayali people. It is one of 22 scheduled languages of India. Malayalam was des ...

Kannada Kannada (; ಕನ್ನಡ, ), originally romanised Canarese, is a Dravidian language spoken predominantly by the people of Karnataka in southwestern India, with minorities in all neighbouring states. It has around 47 million native s ...

, and

Hindi Hindi (Devanāgarī: or , ), or more precisely Modern Standard Hindi (Devanagari: ), is an Indo-Aryan language spoken chiefly in the Hindi Belt region encompassing parts of northern, central, eastern, and western India. Hindi has been de ...

along with few

Bengali Bengali or Bengalee, or Bengalese may refer to: *something of, from, or related to Bengal, a large region in South Asia * Bengalis, an ethnic and linguistic group of the region * Bengali language, the language they speak ** Bengali alphabet, the w ...

Bhojpuri Bhojpuri (;Bhojpuri entry, Oxford Dictionaries
, Oxford U ...

and

English English usually refers to: * English language * English people English may also refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * ''English'', an adjective for something of, from, or related to England ** English national ide ...

films. She was one of the prominent actresses in India in the 90s and 2000s.

Early life and background

Rambha was born as Vijayalakshmi in

Vijayawada, Andhra Pradesh Vijayawada, formerly known as Bezawada, is the second largest city in the States and union territories of India, Indian state of Andhra Pradesh and is a part of the state's Capital Region. It is the administrative headquarters of the NTR distric ...

on 5 June 1976 into a Telugu family.References for the subject's ethnicity:

She did her schooling at Atkinsons Senior Secondary School, Vijayawada. While she was studying in her seventh standard, she acted as ''Ammavaru'' (Mother Goddess) for her school's Annual Day competition. The event had been attended by director Hariharan who stayed in contact and later introduced her as the female lead in

film, '' Sargam''. Her first on-screen name was Amrutha, which she later changed as Rambha after the character name in her Telugu debut movie ''

Aa Okkati Adakku ''Aa Okkati Adakku'' () is a 1992 Indian Telugu-language comedy film written and directed by E. V. V. Satyanarayana, and produced by M. Saravanan and M. Balasubramaniam under the AVM Productions banner. It stars Rajendra Prasad, Rambha, and ...

''.

Career

Rambha gave up her education aged 15 and then started her career with Hariharan's

film '' Sargam'' (1992) opposite

Vineeth Vineeth Radhakrishnan (born 23 August 1969) is an Indian actor, classical dancer, voice artist and choreographer who primarily works in Malayalam, Tamil and Telugu language films. He has also starred in a few Kannada and Bollywood films. He h ...

. The film performed well at the box office, and she was spotted by director E. V. V. Satyanarayana who then cast her in the

film ''

'' (1992), where she was paired opposite Rajendra Prasad. The film performed well and prompted several films offers for the actress from several different film industries across India. During the height of her career in the late 1990s, Rambha deliberately continued to pick glamorous roles to garner film offers. In successful films such as ''

Hitler Adolf Hitler (; 20 April 188930 April 1945) was an Austrian-born German politician who was dictator of Germany from 1933 until his death in 1945. He rose to power as the leader of the Nazi Party, becoming the chancellor in 1933 and then ...

'' (1997) starring

Chiranjeevi Chiranjeevi (born Konidela Sivasankara Varaprasad; 22 August 1955) is an Indian actor, film producer and former politician, who predominantly works in Telugu cinema. Chiranjeevi starred in over 150 feature films in Telugu language, Telugu, as ...

, Rambha appeared in roles which were inconsequential to the plot and purely depicted as the lead actor's love interest. She started her career as a producer with help of her brother in ''

Three Roses ''Three Roses'' is a 2003 Indian Tamil-language action-adventure film directed by Parameswar, starring Rambha, Jyothika and Laila. The film features Vivek, Urvashi, Rekha Vedavyas, Tony Ooki and Billy Herrington in supporting roles, with t ...

'' (2003), in which

Jyothika Jyothika Saravanan (; born 18 October 1978) is an Indian actress, model and film producer who predominantly appears in Tamil films.

, Laila and Rambha played the lead characters. However, the film failed at the box office, and she fell heavily into debt after the film's release. She sold her house at Mount Road, Chennai in order to pay the debt, while she was also booked in a cheque-bounce case filed by the financiers of the movie. Rambha has acted in several languages and always maintained a successful balance in

Bhojpuri Bhojpuri (;Bhojpuri entry, Oxford Dictionaries
, Oxford U ...

and

. In 2010, Rambha shot alongside

Prakash Raj Prakash Raj (born Prakash Rai; 26 March 1965) is an Indian actor, film director, producer, television presenter, and politician. Known for his works in Tamil, Telugu, Kannada, Hindi, and Malayalam-language films, he is the recipient of several ...

for a thriller film titled ''Vidiyum Varai Kathiru''. The film was shot in three languages namely Tamil, Telugu and Malayalam, but the film did not have a theatrical release. After her marriage she had given up films as she felt her popularity in films has faded away where she notice that she was not getting meaty roles as she used to and has judged a very popular Tamil TV show ''

Maanada Mayilada ''Maanada Mayilada'' is an Indian dance competition show airing from 2007 till 2015 on Kalaignar TV. The show was conceived, produced and directed by noted choreographer Kala Master. She is also one of the judges and the only constant judge th ...

'', and the Telugu dance show ''

Dhee ''Dhee'' () is a 2007 Indian Telugu-language action comedy film directed by Srinu Vytla and produced by Siri Venkateswara Films. The film stars Vishnu Manchu and Genelia D'Souza while Srihari and Brahmanandam play supporting roles. It was r ...

''. After a long gap she came back from

Toronto Toronto ( ; or ) is the capital city of the Canadian province of Ontario. With a recorded population of 2,794,356 in 2021, it is the most populous city in Canada and the fourth most populous city in North America. The city is the ancho ...

, she appeared as a judge of

Zee Telugu Zee Telugu is an Indian Telugu-language general entertainment pay television channel in India. It was launched on 12 September 2004 as ''Alpha Telugu'' and was rebranded as ''Zee Telugu'' on 18 May 2005. The channel is owned by Zee Entertainmen ...

dance show ABCD-Anybody Can Dance and judged

Kings of Comedy Juniors Kings of Comedy Juniors ( ta, கிங்ஸ் ஆப் காமெடி ஜூனியர்ஸ்) is a 2017-2018 Indian Tamil language children stand-up comedy reality television show, which airs on Vijay TV. The first season of the sho ...

Vijay TV Star Vijay is an Indian Tamil language general entertainment pay television channel owned by Disney Star (formerly Star India), a subsidiary of Asianet Star Communications. The channel's headquarters is in Chennai, Tamil Nadu. Star Vijay chang ...

. She is a brand ambassador for Kolors health care, Chennai.

Personal life

Rambha married Indrakumar Pathmanathan, a Canada-based Sri Lankan Tamil businessman, on 8 April 2010 at Karnataka Kalyana Mandapam in

Tirumala Tirumala is a spiritual town in Tirupati district of the Indian state of Andhra Pradesh. It is one of the suburbs of the Tirupati, Tirupati urban agglomeration. The town is a part of Tirupati Urban Development Authority and located in Tirupa ...

. They settled in Toronto. They have two daughters and a son.

Filmography

*''In the order of languages in which she appeared the most to the least.''

Telugu

Tamil

Hindi

Kannada

Malayalam

Bengali

Bhojpuri

English

Television

References

External links

* * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Rambha 1976 births Living people Indian film actresses Indian television actresses Telugu actresses Actresses in Bengali cinema Actresses in Bhojpuri cinema Actresses in Hindi cinema Actresses in Kannada cinema Actresses in Malayalam cinema Actresses in Tamil cinema Actresses in Telugu cinema Actresses in Telugu television Actresses in Tamil television Actresses from Vijayawada 20th-century Indian actresses 21st-century Indian actresses