3 min readHyderabadApr 8, 2026 06:38 PM IST
Shortly after midnight on Wednesday, Allu Arjun stepped onto the balcony of his Jubilee Hills residence in Hyderabad to a street packed with fans who had been waiting for hours to wish him on his birthday. By morning, his new film with director Atlee had an official title, Raaka, announced to the world on his 44th birthday. The scale of the moment felt proportionate to where he stands today: one of the highest-paid actors in Indian cinema, a National Award winner, and the man whose dialogue from Pushpa found its way into casual conversation across the country.
But there was a time when none of this was certain. And it started, of all places, on a film set where someone else was the star.
A family film in more ways than one
The year was 2001. Chiranjeevi’s film Daddy was a Telugu family drama directed by Suresh Krissna and produced by Allu Aravind under the Geetha Arts banner. Chiranjeevi played the lead: Raj Kumar, a wealthy audio company owner and passionate dance school operator whose generosity is repeatedly taken advantage of by the people around him. Simran played his wife, and Rajendra Prasad appeared in a supporting role.
The role: Gopi
Allu Arjun appeared as Gopi Krishna, a dance student at Raj’s school. In one of the film’s key emotional turns, Raj chooses to use the money set aside for his daughter’s medical treatment to save Gopi, who has been hit by a car. His wife Shanti cannot come to terms with that decision and leaves him.
It was a supporting role for Allu Arjun, who was 19 at the time. The role did not demand much dialogue, but it placed him in the frame alongside one of Telugu cinema’s biggest stars, in a film that was being produced by his father.
To be accurate, Daddy was not the very first time Allu Arjun appeared in a film. That happened in the 1985 film Vijetha, also starring Chiranjeevi, in which a three-year-old Allu Arjun appeared in a brief, uncredited role. He was barely old enough to remember it, and few people know it happened.
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The Daddy appearance carried more weight because it was credited, intentional, and came at a point in his life when he was actively preparing for a launch as a lead. Between Daddy and Gangotri, he trained in acting with Kishore Namit Kapoor in Mumbai, the same trainer his cousin Ram Charan would later work with.
Gangotri and what came next
Gangotri released on March 28, 2003, directed by K. Raghavendra Rao. The film was co-produced by Allu Aravind and C. Ashwini Dutt, and marked Raghavendra Rao’s 100th directorial. Allu Arjun played a character named Simhadri. Critical reception was mixed but commercial performance was solid, and the film ran 100 days in 54 centres, a strong number for a debut.
What follows is a story most Telugu film fans know well. Arya in 2004, Bunny in 2005, Desamuduru in 2007, then a decade of consistent blockbusters before Pushpa: The Rise in 2021 changed the scale entirely. The National Film Award for Best Actor came in 2023. Pushpa 2: The Rule broke box office records that had stood for years.
