Varalaxmi Sarathkumar (born 5 March 1985) is an Indian actress who appears in Tamil, Telugu, Kannada and Malayalam films. She made her debut with the Tamil film Podaa Podi (2012).
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Early life and family
Varalaxmi was born to actor Sarathkumar and Chaya on 5 March 1985 in Bangalore (Bengaluru), Karnataka, India.
Varalaxmi did her schooling from St. Michael's Academy, Chennai. She is a graduate in Microbiology from Hindustan Arts and Science college, Chennai with a Masters in Business Management from the University of Edinburgh. She honed her acting skills at Anupam Kher's Acting School in Mumbai, before becoming a professional actress. Her stepmother is actress Raadhika.
Personal life
On 2 March 2024, Varalaxmi got engaged to Nicholai Sachdev, who is a gallerist based in Mumbai. They married on 3 July 2024.
Career
Varalaxmi auditioned for Shankar's Boys (2003) and was selected to play the lead role, before her father requested her to turn down the opportunity. Similarly, she also missed out on opportunities to act in Balaji Sakthivel's Kaadhal (2004) and Venkat Prabhu's Saroja (2008).
Varalaxmi signed on to star in Vignesh Shivan's romantic drama film Podaa Podi (2012) during June 2008, citing that the opportunity to portray a London-based dancer had excited her. The film went through a protracted development, taking four years to make, before being released in October 2012. Co-starring Silambarasan, Varalaxmi won critical acclaim for her performance. Rediff.com noted she was the "scene stealer" and added "she comes across as a genuine, warm person, able and willing to accept those around her for themselves, and rattles off her dialogues with such spontaneity and charm that she wins you over right away". Likewise, a critic from Sify.com wrote she "is the big surprise here as she makes a promising debut and brings alive her character with not just those smart lines, but with the kind of confidence and candour". The film performed moderately at the box office but performed well in the multiplexes.
In 2014, she embarked on her second venture, the Kannada film Maanikya (2014), starring alongside actor Sudeep. This film proved to be a major success and emerged as one of the highest-grossing Kannada films of that year.
In 2016, she announced on Twitter that she has been cast alongside Mammootty in the Malayalam film Kasaba. In her tweet, the actress said that the big opportunity to work alongside Mammootty came to her apparently due to her performance in the Tamil film Tharai Thappattai. Varalaxmi was also committed to starring in Aakasha Mittaayee, the Malayalam remake of the Tamil film Appa but left, citing the behaviour of its producers whom she called "mannerless". In 2017, Varalaxmi appeared in Vikram Vedha, Nibunan, Vismaya, Sathya, Kaattu and Masterpiece. Varalaxmi turned as Host for a TV show titled Unnai Arindhaal (2018) on Jaya TV. She played the antagonist's role in Sandakozhi 2 (2018) and Sarkar (2018). She worked on her first Telugu film, Tenali Ramakrishna BA. BL (2019).
Varalaxmi played the lead role in Velvet Nagaram (2020). She has played a role in Danny (2020) in which she tried out the role of a cop. She has also starred in leading roles such as Chasing (2021) and Singa Paarvai (2021). She appeared in The Telegu film Yashoda (2022) starred Samantha Ruth Prabhu playing the title role, while Varalaxmi Sarath Kumar played the other important role. She playing a crazy character in Nandamuri Balakrishna’s Veera Simha Reddy (2023) as well as lead role in Sabari (2024).
Varalaxmi worked on Sundar C's masala film Madha Gaja Raja, alongside Vishal, which was released 13 years later in January 2025 owing to financial difficulties.