R. Madhavan

Ranganathan Madhavan (born 1 June 1970) is an Indian actor, screenwriter, film producer, and film director who predominantly works in Tamil and Hindi cinema. Madhavan has appeared in over 70 films, he has won one National Film Award, five Filmfare Awards South, two Tamil Nadu State Film Awards, and five SIIMA Awards. He was awarded Padma Shri by Government of India in 2026 in field of Art. Since September 2023, Madhavan is the President of FTII, Pune.

Madhavan attained his first break in Tamil cinema with Mani Ratnam's romantic drama Alai Payuthey (2000) and followed it with romantic roles in Gautham Vasudev Menon's directorial debut Minnale (2001) and Madras Talkies' Dumm Dumm Dumm (2001). He had major commercial successes in Run (2002), Thambi (2006) and Rendu (2006) and gained praise for his performances in Kannathil Muthamittal (2002), Anbe Sivam (2003), Nala Damayanthi (2003) and Aayutha Ezhuthu (2004). Towards the late-2000s, Madhavan inclined to Hindi films with pivotal roles in three highly successful productions: the patriotic Rang De Basanti (2006), Mani Ratnam's biopic Guru (2007) and the comedy-drama 3 Idiots (2009), which went on to become the highest-grossing Indian film of all time at the time of its release. Simultaneously, he continued to appear in Tamil films like Evano Oruvan (2007) and Yavarum Nalam (2009).