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South cinema superstar Mohanlal is celebrating his 64th birthday today. Apart from being an actor, Mohanlal is also a film producer, playback singer, distributor, director and businessman. In his four decade long career, he has worked in about 400 films.
He has also been awarded Padmashree and Padma Bhushan. Till now, he has received the National Award five times for his best performance in films.
He is the first actor to be given the rank of Lieutenant Colonel by the Army. Mohanlal also has many records to his name. He made a record of working in 34 films in a year, out of which 25 films proved to be hits.
On the occasion of his birthday, let’s take a look at Mohanlal’s life full of struggles and achievements…
Mohanlal was a professional wrestler who was the state wrestling champion from 1977 to 1978.
Interest in acting arose in sixth class
Mohanlal Vishwanathan was born on 21 May 1960 in Elanthoor village, Kerala. He was born to Vishwanathan Nair, a former bureaucrat and law secretary to the Government of Kerala, and Santhakumari.
Mohanlal grew up in his ancestral home Mudavanmugal in Thiruvananthapuram. He studied at Government Model Boys Higher Secondary School, Thiruvananthapuram and graduated in commerce from Mahatma Gandhi College, Thiruvananthapuram. Mohanlal was interested in acting since childhood.
This is the reason why he used to participate in school plays. When he was in sixth grade, he acted in a stage play called Computer Boy in which he played the character of a ninety-year-old man.
Mohanlal has also been a wrestler. He was the Kerala State Wrestling Champion between 1977 and 1978. Due to his interest in films, he did not pursue his career as a wrestler and entered films at the age of 18.
The first film was stuck for 25 years
Mohanlal first worked in the film ‘Thiranoottam’ in 1978. Mohanlal himself made it along with his four friends Maniyanpilla Raju, Suresh Kumar, Unni, Priyadarshan, Ravi Kumar.
Mohanlal played the role of mentally challenged servant Kuttappan in the film, but there were many problems in the release of this film. The film got stuck due to censorship problems and it took 25 years to be released.
Mohanlal was extremely disappointed by this, but then he got a chance to make his film debut with the film ‘Manjil Viranja Pokka’. In this film, he played the role of a villain in which he was liked a lot.
Was rejected because of looks
The film’s director Fazil had told in an interview that before casting Mohanlal in the film, he was auditioned. Two big directors were also sitting in the panel of this audition who were not impressed with Mohanlal’s looks and height.
For this reason, both of them had rejected him, but Fazil remained adamant on casting him in the film and the result of casting him in the film was that the film was a hit and people liked Mohanlal very much. After the success of this film, Mohanlal played the role of villain in about 25 films. His negative roles in the films ‘Sandhyakku Virinja Poovu’ and ‘Kuyileen Thedi’ were highly appreciated.
Around 1984, Mohanlal tried to get out of his villain image by doing lighter roles. During this time, he got the support of well-known filmmaker Priyadarshan who is famous for making light comedy films.
Priyadarshan and Mohanlal are close friends.
He played his first comic role as a lead in the film ‘Poochakkoru Mukkuthi’ directed by Priyadarshan, which proved to be a hit. After this film, Mohanlal and Priyadarshan had a great bonding. Mohanlal worked in about 44 films made by Priyadarshan.
Movies were released every 15 days
Around 1986, Mohanlal was at the peak of his film career. The situation was such that one of his films was released every 15 days. Not only this, in 1986, 34 of his films were released within a year, which is a record.
Till date, no actor has released so many films in a year. The interesting thing is that out of these 34 films, 25 films proved to be hits. During that period, an average of 20 films of Mohanlal were released every year. This is the reason why in his career spanning four decades, the number of his films has crossed 400.
Mohanlal with Suchitra after marriage.
Mohanlal married a fan
Mohanlal’s stardom was at its peak in the 80-90s. His magic was greatly appreciated by his fans, especially the girls were crazy about him. In such a situation, a fan named Suchitra had become crazy about Mohanlal after watching his films.
After a lot of hard work she was able to meet Mohanlal. Initially Mohanlal treated her like a common fan, but after a couple of meetings he also became serious about Suchitra.
Suchitra wanted to marry him, but was afraid of the family. One day Suchitra’s aunt met Mohanlal’s father and talked about their marriage. Both their families had no problem with this relationship, but they wanted the marriage to happen after matching the horoscopes. The horoscopes of both were matched, but their horoscopes did not match and the family members broke the relationship.
Mohanlal forgot the relationship and moved ahead, but Suchitra did not agree. She waited for Mohanlal for two years and a day came when Mohanlal agreed to marry her without matching the horoscopes. After marriage on 28 April 1988, they became parents of two children, a son and a daughter.
Learned magic for stunt, show canceled due to risk
Mohanlal was not afraid of taking risks in his career and always insisted on experimenting. This is the reason why he also learned magic in 2008. He did this to perform a stunt named Burning Illusion. For this, Mohanlal had taken training for 18 months from magician Gopinath Muthukad. However, this stunt was canceled as it was extremely dangerous.
Mohanlal was going to perform these stunts in a program organized by Kerala Police and Tourism Department. In this stunt, Mohanlal was to be handcuffed and chained, locked in a box and thrown into a ball of fire. Considering the risk, Mohanlal’s fans and well-wishers opposed the stunt and it was eventually cancelled.
Along with acting, he also tried his hand in business.
Apart from film production and distribution, Mohanlal also has the business of restaurant and spice packaging. Along with this, he is also the owner of film distribution company Maxlab Cinema and Entertainment. He has also started a film post-production studio named ‘Vismaya Max’ in Trivandrum.
The house is in Burj Khalifa of Dubai
Mohanlal is fond of luxury life. Apart from having a house in Ooty, he also has a flat in Burj Khalifa, Dubai. His house is on the 29th floor of this building. Not only this, he also has a chain of restaurants named ‘Mohanlal Tastebuds’ in Dubai.
According to reports, his net worth is approximately Rs 376 crore. Mohanlal has 6 luxury cars worth Rs 7.5 crore. These include Mercedes-Benz, BMW, Jaguar and Range Rover.