Keerthy Suresh
Suresh in 2016
Born	(1992-10-17) 17 October 1992 (age 31)[1] Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India[2]
Occupation	Actress
Years active	2000–2005; 2013–present
Parents	Suresh Kumar (father) Menaka (mother)

Keerthy Suresh (born 17 October 1992) is an Indian film actress who appears in Tamil, Malayalam and Telugu films. She won the National Film Award for Best Actress for portraying actress Savitri in the biopic Mahanati (2018).^[3]

She is the daughter of producer Suresh Kumar and actress Menaka.^[4] Keerthy began acting as a child actress in the early 2000s and returned to films after studying fashion design. She had her first lead role in the 2013 Malayalam film Geethaanjali.^[5] She went on to star in films such as Ring Master (2014), Idhu Enna Maayam (2015), Rajini Murugan (2016), Remo (2016), Nenu Sailaja (2016), Bairavaa (2017), Nenu Local (2017), Thaana Serndha Kootam (2018), Mahanati (2018), Sandakozhi 2 (2018) and Sarkar (2018).

Early life

Keerthy was born to Malayalam^[6] film producer and director Suresh Kumar and Tamil actress Menaka.^[7][8] She has an elder sister Revathy Suresh, who works as a VFX specialist and had previously worked for Shah Rukh Khan's production house Red Chillies Entertainment.^[9][10] Until class four, Keerthy did her schooling in Chennai, Tamil Nadu.^[11] She then studied in Kendriya Vidyalaya, Pattom, Thiruvananthapuram before coming back to Chennai to join the Pearl Academy, where she completed her degree in fashion design.^[10] She also spent time on an exchange program in Scotland for four months, before completing a two-month internship in London. Despite making a career in acting, she has stated that she was also "seriously considering a career in designing".^[9][12]

Career

In the early 2000s, Keerthy worked as a child actress in a few of her father's productions, such as Pilots (2000), Achaneyanenikkishtam (2001) and Kuberan (2002) and some television serials.^[10] 11 years after Kuberan, she made her debut as a lead actress in Priyadarshan's horror film Geethaanjali,^[13] in which she had a dual role. She was still studying during that time and shot for Geethanjali during her semester break.^[14] Reviews on the film and her performance were mixed, with Sify writing that she "does put in some effort but makes only a limited impression in a double role",^[15] while Rediff wrote that she "has got a plum role but whether she impresses with her acting prowess is another matter".^[16] In 2014, Keerthy had her next release Ring Master, directed by Rafi of Rafi Mecartin duo, in which she shared screen space with Dileep. She played a blind girl,^[17] which she said was much more challenging than her double role in Geethanjali.^[18] The film was a commercial success,^[19][20] being termed a "super hit" by Sify.^[21]

In 2014, Keerthy accepted her first projects outside of Malayalam and signed on to appear in several Tamil film projects simultaneously. Her first film release was A. L. Vijay's romantic comedy Idhu Enna Maayam (2015), opposite Vikram Prabhu, though the film did not perform well at the box office.^[22] Her busy schedule throughout 2015 meant that she had to opt out of films which she had already started working on, including Krishna's Maane Thaene Paeye and Deekay's Kavalai Vendam, in order to accommodate bigger projects.^[23] She consequently worked on two films with Sivakarthikeyan in quick succession, Rajini Murugan and Remo, while also playing the lead role in Prabhu Solomon's Thodari, alongside Dhanush.^[24] Her Telugu debut was the 2016 film Nenu Sailaja with actor Ram Pothineni. In January 2017, Keerthy appeared in Bairavaa, opposite actor Vijay and directed by Bharathan.^[25] She also appeared in Tamil film Paambhu Sattai and Telugu film Nenu Local in 2017.

In early 2018, she appeared in Agnyaathavaasi and Thaana Serndha Kootam. She also acted in Nag Ashwin's Telugu-Tamil bilingual epic Mahanati where she portrayed the late southern actress Savitri and for which her performance has received critical acclaim.^[26] Her recently released movies include Saamy 2, The Sequel of Saamy, opposite Vikram, Sandakozhi 2 opposite Vishal, and Sarkar starring Vijay, directed by AR Murugadoss.

As of 2019, she has signed on to appear in multiple projects such as the Malayalam film Marakkar: Arabikadalinte Simham directed by Priyadarshan,^[27] a yet to be titled Telugu film under the director Narendra Nath. She has a cameo appearance in the Nagarjuna starrer Manmadhudu 2, which is directed by Rahul Ravindran. She is also set to make her Bollywood debut in Maidaan opposite Ajay Devgn.

Filmography

Discography

Keerthy has sung the following songs for her films:

Television

Awards and nominations

References

External links

• Keerthy Suresh at IMDb
• Official website