Birthday Special: Power Star Pawan Kalyan! How the actor got his big break and became successful

Power star Pawan Kalyan has made his mark on Tollywood and has been tagged as a star, all thanks to a few insanely successful films. However, only a small number of actors have that charisma that can carry a huge fan base even if his films are not successful at the box office. Not only because of his bankability as an actor but also of his social activities, his career stretched over decades, appearing in multiple hits and high-grossing films and winning many accolades.

On the occasion of the star actor’s birthday, let's have a look on how the actor got his big break and became successful.

Pawan Kalyan started his career in 1996 with ‘Akkada Ammayi Ikkada Abbayi’, directed by E VV Satyanarayana, where he rose to become a headliner for exhibiting his skills in martial arts. Unlike many young upcoming actors, Pawan broke away from regular films early in his career. He started playing a wide range of disruptive characters. Pawan is notable for his frantic dialogue delivery, an intense style, and as a powerhouse of acting. Following this, Pawan leveraged his unusual presentation and style with the character in the film ‘Gokulamlo Seeta’ in 1997.

With this Bhimaneni Srinivasa Rao directorial film, Pawan had been respectfully labelled as one of the hardest working actors in Tollywood. He got his first break early in Tollywood by being the college goer called Ganesh in this blockbuster hit film. He won many accolades for his portrayal of a college goer who falls in love with his classmate Sandhya and realises love is just only part of the life in the end. In fact, he inspired many upcoming actors at that time with his portrayal.

In the same year, Pawan joined debutant A Karunakaran on the set of ‘Tholi Prema’. Among his hit films, Pawan made Telugu movie history with his portrayal of a happy-go-lucky guy Balu who falls in love with a goal-oriented woman Anu and struggles to express his love to her. Pawan was dedicated to his craft. He took his role seriously and did the work necessary to turn in an authentic performance. The actor has grossed more money in the box office sales than any other actor in the Tollywood. Shortly after, Pawan was considered as one of the most powerful actors in the Telugu film industry.

Then in 1999, Pawan played the carefree college goer in ‘Thammudu’, which was a huge success and placed him in the spotlight as a great actor. Known for his perfect delivery of lines, crooning folk songs and delivering emotions, Pawan has played the role better than any other actor in Tollywood. He is extremely talented and is brilliant in both comedic and dramatic scenes in the film. The younger generation strongly connected to this role which instantly made him the power star of Tollywood. After this film, Pawan landed a role in the Puri Jagannadh directed-film ‘Badri’ in 2000. This film cemented the actor’s place in the showbiz world.

The actor had an acclaimed role in the SJ Surya directorial film. Although he took on a casual role he played it very well and captured the audience from the moment he entered the screen. He became a youth idol with this eccentric role in the film. Since then he has worked closely with his friend Ali and has been delivering amazing performances.

In 2003, Pawan helmed ‘Johnny’, which was an absolute disaster at the box office, to be followed by eight consecutive bombs such as ‘Gudumba Shankar’, ‘Balu ABCDEFG’, ‘Bangaram’, ‘Annavaram’, ‘Jalsa’, ‘Puli’, ‘Teen Maar’ and ‘Panjaa’. It was not a major blow to his value as an actor. It looked like his career was over, but he always has his social side and works on his craft diligently. Nearly after ten years, he made a comeback with Harish Shankar directorial ‘Gabbar Singh’, which was one of the most successful Telugu films of the time, raking in more than Rs 50 crore on its long run, a record for heroes at the time.

He did a couple of films after that and he started his own production company named Pawan Kalyan Creative Works. He had established a political party named ‘Janasena' in 2014 to take the initiative on behalf of people. Currently, he is busy promoting his party and agenda all over the Telugu states and he is contesting for the chair of Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh in the next elections.