Ileana D'Cruz

Ileana D'Cruz



She was born 1 November 1987 and she is an Indian film actress, who appears in Telugu, Tamil and Hindi films. She won the Filmfare Award for Best Female Debut – South for the 2006 Telugu film Devadasu. She has appeared in films like Pokiri (2006), Jalsa (2008), Kick (2009), and Julayi (2012), establishing herself as one of Telugu cinema leading actresses. D'Cruz made her Kollywood debut with Kedi and made a comeback in Shankar's Nanban (2012).In 2012, she made her Bollywood debut with Anurag Basu's critically and commercially successful Barfi!, for which she received critical appreciation and the Filmfare Award .

Ileana D'Cruz

 Life and education

D'Cruz was born in Mumbai, and was brought up partly in Mumbai and partly in Goa.Her first name comes from Greek mythology, meaning Helen of Troy.Her family relocated to Parra, Goa when she was 10 years old.Her mother tongue is Konkani.

During that time, the manager of the hotel her mother was working in, suggested that she has a beautiful face with a vibrant smile and should start modelling and fixed a meeting with Marc Robinson. Though initially reluctant, she was persuaded and her first portfolio was created in January 2003, which she described as a "disaster". She began gaining notice through photo shoots and ramp shows and her second portfolio was set up the following year, which landed her three advertisements from Electrolux, Emami Talc and Fair and Lovely. The latter, in particular, which was directed by Rakesh Roshan, gave her exposure and brought in several offers for acting in feature films.


Career


In 2005, D'Cruz was called for an audition by director Teja, but the project was cancelled.She instead made her feature film debut in the Telugu language romance film Devadasu (2006), directed by Y. V. S. Chowdhary. She underwent acting classes with Aruna Bhikshu, before starting to work on the film. She recalls that during filming she felt "pressured almost cried and didn't want to go further", but went ahead after her mother encouraged her, giving her "the lecture of a lifetime at 3 am. A review from Indiaglitz stated that she "has chiseled features and a figure to die-for." Devadasu became the year's first major commercial success, eventually grossing around INR140 million, whilst earning D'Cruz the Filmfare Award for Best Female Debutant.She next appeared in the gangster film Pokiri in which she portrayed an aerobics teacher, who is harassed by a corrupt police officer.The film was a high financial success, emerging as the highest-grossing Telugu film at the time.

She made her Tamil-language film debut in Kedi (2006). Although the film did not do so well at the box-office,D'Cruz remained too busy to accept all the film roles offered to her.Her Telugu film Khatarnak (2006) in which she acted opposite Ravi Teja did not do as well as expected, which has been attributed to her glamorous appearance not going down well with the audience.She subsequently experienced a setback in her career as her following releases Rakhi (2006) and Munna (2007) proved critically and financially successful.

She next appeared in the Rajkumar Santoshi action comedy film Phata Poster Nikhla Hero opposite Shahid Kapoor. The film released on September 20, 2013 to mixed reviews, and the film was eventually declared a flop at the box office. However, D'Cruz received mixed to positive reviews for her performance, with the Times of India saying that she was "good with emotions but not so tuned into comedy yet."