Acting

Nithya Menen

Born 8 April 1988 · Bengaluru, Karnataka, India · 38

Nithya Menen (born April 8, 1988) is an Indian actress and playback singer who works predominantly in Malayalam, Telugu, Tamil, and Hindi cinema. After appearing on screen as a child artist in *The Monkey Who Knew Too Much* (1998), she made her debut in a leading role with the Malayalam film *Aakasha Gopuram* (2008) and entered Kannada cinema with *Josh* (2009). Her breakthrough in Telugu cinema came with the romantic comedy *Ala Modalaindi* (2011), for which she won the Nandi Award for Best Actress. Over the following years, Menen established a prolific career across South Indian film industries, appearing in *Urumi* (2011), *Ishq* (2012), *Ustad Hotel* (2012), and *Bangalore Days* (2014). She won two Filmfare Awards for Best Actress – Telugu for *Gunde Jaari Gallanthayyinde* (2013) and the romantic drama *Malli Malli Idi Rani Roju* (2015). Her notable releases during this period also included *S/O Satyamurthy* (2015), the romantic drama *O Kadhal Kanmani* (2015), *24* (2016), *Janatha Garage* (2016), the psychological thriller *Awe!* (2018), and the Tamil action thriller *Mersal* (2017), which earned her the Filmfare Award for Best Supporting Actress – Tamil. In 2019, she made her Hindi film debut in *Mission Mangal*. For her performance in the drama *Thiruchitrambalam* (2022), Menen won the National Film Award for Best Actress and the Filmfare Award for Best Actress – Tamil. In streaming, she starred in the thriller series *Breathe: Into the Shadows* (2020–2022), the comedy-drama series *Kumari Srimathi* (2023), and *Masterpeace* (2023). Her subsequent credits include *Kadhalikka Neramillai* (2025), *Thalaivan Thalaivii* (2025), and *Idli Kadai* (2025).