Early life, until 2002
She was born to a Tamil Palakkad Iyer family in Kerala. Balan grew up in Mumbai and attended St. Anthony's Girls High School in Chembur. She later attended St. Xavier's College, where she graduated with a sociology degree, and the University of Mumbai.
Her movie career started when she was signed to appear in the Malayalam film Chakram, alongside superstar Mohanlal but the movie was shelved. After that, she was signed for a Tamil film, Run, but for reasons undisclosed, she was dropped after a first schedule and replaced by Meera Jasmine. In the jinx driven industry, Balan was dropped from her second Tamil movie Manasellam opposite Srikanth, on the grounds of 'non-performance' and was replaced by Trisha Krishnan.
She then turned to television advertising. From 1998 onwards, she appeared in numerous television ads, many of which were directed by Pradeep Sarkar. She also took supporting roles in music videos, appearing with singers and bands such as Euphoria, Shubha Mudgal,
More about Vidya Balan (From Wikipedia)
Early Life, Until 2002
She was born to a Tamil Palakkad Iyer family in Kerala. Balan grew up in Mumbai and attended St. Anthony's Girls High School in Chembur. She later attended St. Xavier's College, read more...
Breakthrough, 2003 - Present
In 2003, she appeared in the Bengali film, Bhalo Theko, for which she won the Anandalok Puraskar Best Actress award in Kolkata. Balan next made her Hindi film debut in the critically read more...
Vidya Balan (Tamil: விதà¯à®¯à®¾ பாலனà¯, Malayalam: വിദàµà´¯ ബാല൯, Hindi: विदà¥à¤¯à¤¾ read more...
Her father, P. R. Balan, is the Vice President of ETC Channel whilst her mother is a homemaker. Balan also has an older sister named Priya. In a video interview, she stated that read more...
