Sai Pallavi Senthamarai Kannan (born 9 May 1992), known professionally as Sai Pallavi, is an Indian actress who works in Tamil, Telugu and Malayalam films.
She is the recipient of numerous accolades, including four Filmfare Awards South and two South Indian International Movie Awards.
Sai Pallavi was born on 9 May 1992 in a Badaga Hindu family in Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu.
Her hometown is Kotagiri in the Nilgiris district, Tamil Nadu.
Born to Senthamarai Kannan and Radha, She has a younger sister, Pooja Kannan, who has also worked as an actress.
She was raised and educated in Coimbatore, doing her schooling at Avila Convent School.
2005
Pallavi appeared in uncredited roles as a child actress in Kasthuri Maan (2005) and Dhaam Dhoom (2008) and appeared in few advertisements.
2008
Due to her passion for dance, which was supported by her mother, she participated in the dance reality show Ungalil Yaar Adutha Prabhu Deva on Vijay TV in 2008, and was a finalist in Dhee Ultimate Dance Show (D4) on ETV in 2009.
2014
In 2014, while she was studying in Tbilisi, Georgia, film-director Alphonse Puthren had approached her six years before, through clippings from a reality show which she had participated, showcased in Facebook.
Alphonse initially gave her an offer to act in his film which she refused, and after six years, he phoned to Pallavi, in which she thought him as a stalker and wanted to lodge a police complaint on him.
But later misunderstood after Alphonse forcibly introduced himself.
Then, She accepted the role of Malar in his film Premam.
She shot the film over the holidays and, after the shooting finished, returned to her studies.
She went on to win several "Best Female Debut" awards that year, including the Filmfare Award for Best Female Debut.
Years later, in an interview, Alphonse revealed that Asin was initially considered for the character Malar, played by Pallavi, following a fan's request.
2015
Pallavi made her acting debut with the 2015 Malayalam film Premam, which was the second highest-grossing Malayalam film at that point.
In late 2015, Studio Green signed up Pa. Ranjith to direct a film for their production house after they had bought and distributed the director's successful previous venture, Attakathi (2012).
He confirmed that he would shortly begin work on a project titled Madras with Karthi in the lead role.
For that she was the first and director's strong choice of the female lead but she denied the film offer due to pursue her medical studies in Georgia.
He had chosen to cast Sai Pallavi, after another project for Pramod Films, which would have been a Tamil remake of the Malayalam film Charlie (2015) with Madhavan, was suddenly shelved.
After securing the actress's dates to shoot the film, Vijay finalised the technical crew to include his regular collaborators such as cinematographer Nirav Shah and editor Anthony.
For Sai Pallavi, it became her first Tamil language film following a series of projects which she dropped out of, she was replaced in or was shelved.
2016
She has since established herself in South Indian cinema with acclaimed performances in films like Kali (2016), Fidaa (2017), Middle Class Abbayi (2017), Maari 2 (2018), Athiran (2019), Paava Kadhaigal (2020), Love Story (2021), Shyam Singha Roy (2021) and Gargi (2022).
Pallavi won the Filmfare Award for Best Actress – Telugu for Fida and Love Story.
Despite completing her medical studies in 2016 from the Tbilisi State Medical University, which is recognised by Medical Council of India, she has not yet registered as a medical practitioner in India.
Then she took a month break from her studies to act in her second Malayalam film, Kali, which released in March 2016.
She portrayed Anjali, a young wife who must deal with her husband's extreme anger issues, earning a nomination for Filmfare Award for Best Actress – Malayalam.
2017
The year 2017 marked her debut in Telugu with Sekhar Kammula's Fidaa, in the role of Bhanumathi, a feisty village girl from Telangana.
Her performance in the film is regarded as one of the "100 Greatest Performances of the Decade" by Film Companion.
She went onto win her first Filmfare Award for Best Actress – Telugu.
Her next project with director A. L. Vijay announced that he would be working on a film with her for Lyca Productions and that he would direct a script he had written "three and a half years ago".
She had previously been cast and then replaced in Mani Ratnam's Kaatru Veliyidai (2017), while she opted out Vijay Chander's Sketch (2017).
Likewise, earlier, her films Charlie and Rajiv Menon's Saravam Thaala Maayam were indefinitely postponed.
Finally, it was Diya, which is a Tamil–Telugu bilingual film and had an average run at the box office.
2020
She was featured by Forbes magazine as one of India's 30 under 30 in 2020.
She took her Foreign Medical Graduate Examination (FMGE) on 31 August 2020 in Trichy.
Besides Badaga, Pallavi can speak fluently in Tamil, English, Hindi and Georgian.
She later learnt Telugu following a career in her respective cinema industry.
Pallavi said in an interview that though she was not a trained dancer, but she always wanted to do something that involved dancing.
She participated in several cultural events at school, gaining popularity as a dancer.
