Mahesh Babu

Ghattamaneni Mahesh Babu (born 9 August 1975) is an Indian actor, producer, media personality, and philanthropist who works mainly in Telugu cinema.

He has appeared in more than 25 films, and won several accolades including, Nine Nandi Awards, five Filmfare Telugu Awards, four SIIMA Awards, three CineMAA Awards, and one IIFA Utsavam Award.

One of the highest-paid Telugu film actors, he also owns the production house G. Mahesh Babu Entertainment.

Ghattamaneni Mahesh Babu was born on 9 August 1975 in a Telugu family in Madras (now Chennai), Tamil Nadu, India.

He is the fourth of the five children of Telugu actor Krishna and Indira, after Ramesh Babu, Padmavathi, and Manjula and before Priyadarshini.

Their family hails from Burripalem in Guntur district, Andhra Pradesh.

Mahesh spent his childhood mostly in Madras under the care of his maternal grandmother Durgamma and the rest of his family.

Babu and actor Vijay are childhood friends and playmates in street cricket.

He was educated at St. Bede's Anglo Indian Higher Secondary School, Chennai.

He obtained a Bachelor's degree in Commerce from the Loyola College, Chennai.

The younger son of veteran Telugu actor Krishna, Mahesh made his debut as a child artist in a cameo role in Needa (1979), at the age of four, and acted in eight other films as a child artist.

At the age of four, Babu visited the sets of the Telugu film Needa (1979) where its director Dasari Narayana Rao shot a few sequences of his as a part of the narrative in the presence of the former's brother Ramesh.

Needa marked his debut as a child actor.

In 1983, he acted in Poratam (1983) upon being requested by its director Kodi Ramakrishna.

He went on to act as a child artist in the films Sankharavam (1987), Bazaar Rowdy (1988), Mugguru Kodukulu (1988) and Gudachari 117 (1989).

He played a dual role in the film Koduku Diddina Kapuram (1989).

Babu then appeared in Bala Chandrudu (1990), and Anna Thammudu (1990).

He made his debut as a lead actor with Rajakumarudu (1999) which won him the Nandi Award for Best Male Debut.

In 1999, Babu made his debut as a lead actor with the romantic comedy Rajakumarudu, directed by K. Raghavendra Rao and co-starring Preity Zinta.

The film was commercially successful, and people began referring to him with the title Prince.

The film had a 50-day run in 80 centres and a 100-day run in 44 centres.

Rajakumarudu collected a share of ₹10.51 crores from Andhra Pradesh.

It was dubbed in Hindi as Prince No. 1 and in Tamil as Kaadhal Vennila.

Babu achieved his breakthrough with the supernatural drama Murari (2001), and the action film Okkadu (2003).

Following their poor performance at the box office, he starred in Krishna Vamsi Murari (2001).

He regarded Murari an important film in his career and the role he played in it one of his favourites.

Murari was a commercial success and earned him the Nandi Special Jury Award, in addition to his first nomination for the Filmfare Award for Best Actor – Telugu.

Idlebrain.com rated the film 3.5/5 stating, "The credit for the success or failure of this film should go to Krishna Vamsi. This film is bound get a little bit of dissent from the viewers of C class areas. But, this film is classic masterpiece for the class audience and highly recommended for the Mahesh and Krishnavamsi fans. This film will be a good fare for the people if they watch this film with no expectations. Just watch this film to experience Krishna Vamsi paint the silver screen with his classic strokes."

Though his 2002 releases Takkari Donga and Bobby performed poorly at the box office, his performance in the former fetched him his second Nandi Special Jury Award.

For Takkari Donga A critic from Deccan Chronicle wrote that "A smooth, technically brilliant movie after a considerable time in Telugu, Takari Donga is entertaining and, in spite of its stereotypical pitfalls, is certainly a refreshing break from the deluge of routine love stories".

He went on to act in other commercially successful films such as Arjun (2004), Athadu (2005), Pokiri (2006), Dookudu (2011), Businessman (2012), Seethamma Vakitlo Sirimalle Chettu (2013), Srimanthudu (2015), Bharat Ane Nenu (2018), Maharshi (2019), Sarileru Neekevvaru (2020) and Sarkaru Vaari Paata (2022).

Pokiri held the record of being the highest-grossing Telugu film, Maharshi won the National Film Award for Best Popular Film, while Sarileru Neekevvaru, his highest grosser, collected over ₹260 crore at the box office.

Referred to in the media and by his fans as "Prince", he is one of the most popular actors of Telugu cinema.

In addition to being an actor, he is a humanitarian and philanthropist – co running the charitable trust and non-profit organisation Heal A Child.

He is also associated with Rainbow Hospitals as their goodwill ambassador.

He entered into the film exhibition business alongside the late Narayandas Narang of Asian Group with the inauguration of the seven-screen multiplex, AMB cinemas at Gachibowli, Hyderabad.

He married actress Namrata Shirodkar in 2005, with whom he has a son and a daughter.

The film was again dubbed and released theatrically in Tamil during January 2017 as Ivan Oru Thunichalkaran.

For his performance, he received the Nandi Award for Best Male Debut.

He starred in two films the following year – Yuvaraju and Vamsi.