Star of the week - JAYA PRADA

Profile

Name: Lalitha Rani
DOB: 3 April, 1962
Star sign: Aries
Birthplace: Rajahmundry, Andhra Pradesh, India
Occupation: Actor and politician

Achievements:

• Jaya Prada is the recipient of two Filmfare awards and has starred in Telugu, Tamil, Hindi, Kannada, Malayalam, Bengali and Marathi films, completing 300 films during a 30-year film career.

• She was a Member of Parliament (MP) from Rampur from 2004 to 2014.

• She was one of the most successful actresses of her time, but left the film industry at the peak of her career. Jaya achieved success with the movies Sanjog, Sharaabi and Sargam, all of which earned her Filmfare nominations for best actress.

Interesting facts:

• Jaya Prada’s father, Krishna Rao, was a Telugu film financier. Her mother, Neelaveni, was a home-maker and a very pious lady. Young Lalitha attended a Telugu medium school in Rajahmundry and was also enrolled in dance and music classes at an early age.

• When Jaya was 14 years old, she performed a dance at her school's annual function. A film director in the audience offered her a three-minute dance number in the Telugu film Bhoomi Kosam following that.

She was hesitant, but her family encouraged her to accept it.

• Jaya was paid only 10 rupees for her work in the film, but the rushes of those three minutes of film were shown to the major figures of the Telugu film industry. Major filmmakers offered her starring roles in quality films after that.

• Jaya became a huge star at the age of 17 with major hit films. She continued to act in more films in Telugu throughout the 70s and 80s. K. Viswanath remade Siri Siri Muvva (1976) in Hindi as Sargam, introducing Jaya Prada to Bollywood in 1979. The film was successful and she became a star there as well.

• Jaya couldn’t capitalise her success, as she couldn’t speak Hindi. She was relaunched in Hindi films with the hit film Kaamchor (1982) after she took Hindi lessons.

• The actress made a successful team not just with Amitabh Bachchan and Jeetendra, but also with her immediate screen rival Sridevi, with whom she has acted in about a dozen films.

• Indian director Satyajit Ray described her as one of the prettiest women in the world.

• As she became involved in her political career since 1994, at the age of 32, her involvement with films reduced.

• She also owns the Jaya Prada Theater in Chennai.

RELATED POST

COMMENTS