Atlee turns 40 with five films, every one a hit, from Shankar's assistant to Jawan a look at his career

Dubai: Atlee turns 40 today, and he is spending the day the way his films usually arrive: with a countdown, a cryptic poster and a fanbase decoding every frame.

The director behind Theri, Mersal, Bigil and Jawan has made only five feature films. All five were commercial hits. The latest, Jawan, earned around ₹1,150 crore worldwide and took Shah Rukh Khan to the biggest numbers of his career. His sixth, Raaka with Allu Arjun and Deepika Padukone, is teasing a motion capture reveal tonight to mark his birthday.

Allu Arjun also tweeted wishing him a Happy Birthday.

Here is who he is, and how he got here.

The boy from Madurai

Atlee was born Arun Kumar on 21 September 1986 in Thiruparankundram, on the edge of Madurai in Tamil Nadu. Atlee is the name he signs his work with, and the one the industry knows him by.

He studied visual communications at Sathyabama University in Chennai, where he made a short film, En Mel Vizhundha Mazhaithuli.

Knocking on three doors

With the short film as his calling card, he approached three of Tamil cinema’s biggest directors for work: Mani Ratnam, S Shankar and Gautham Vasudev Menon.

Shankar said yes.

That apprenticeship put him on two of the largest productions of the era. He worked as an assistant director on Enthiran, the 2010 Rajinikanth science fiction film, and on Nanban, Shankar’s 2012 Tamil remake of 3 Idiots. He even appeared on screen in Nanban’s song Asku Laska.

Nanban mattered for another reason. It starred Vijay, the actor whose films would later define the middle of Atlee’s career.

Raja Rani: the debut

He became a director at 26.

Raja Rani, released in 2013, was a romantic drama produced by filmmaker A R Murugadoss with Fox Star Studios. It starred Arya, Nayanthara, Jai, Nazriya Nazim and Sathyaraj, and earned more than ₹50 crore at the box office, roughly Dh21 million at today’s rates.

It won him Best Debut Director at the Vijay Awards and the Tamil Nadu State Film Award for best dialogue writer.

The Vijay trilogy

What came next made him the most bankable young director in Tamil cinema.

Theri (2016) was an action thriller starring Vijay as a former police officer living under a new identity with his young daughter. It was later remade in Hindi as Baby John.

Mersal (2017) put Vijay in multiple roles in a revenge drama built around the medical profession, and became one of the most talked-about Tamil releases of that year.

Bigil (2019) was the biggest of the three. Vijay played a football coach leading a women’s team, alongside Nayanthara and Jackie Shroff, with music by A R Rahman. Made on a budget of around ₹180 crore, it grossed an estimated ₹285 crore to ₹300 crore, roughly Dh119 million to Dh125 million.

Atlee also appeared briefly in Bigil himself, in the song Singappenney.

Jawan: going national

His first Hindi film was the one that took him beyond the south.

Jawan, released on 7 September 2023 and produced by Red Chillies Entertainment, starred Shah Rukh Khan in a dual role alongside Nayanthara, Vijay Sethupathi, Priyamani and Sanya Malhotra, with Deepika Padukone in a special appearance.

It broke the Bollywood opening day record, collecting $15.6 million worldwide on its first day, roughly Dh57 million. By the end of 2023 it was the highest-grossing Indian film of the year, with $138.6 million worldwide, around Dh509 million, according to Variety.

Jawan became the first Indian film to cross $16 million at the UAE box office, around Dh59 million, making it the biggest Indian release ever in the region at the time.

The producer

Atlee also runs his own production company, A for Apple Studios.

Through it he has backed the Tamil comedy horror Sangili Bungili Kadhava Thorae in 2017, the thriller Andhaghaaram in 2020, and Baby John in 2024, the Hindi remake of Theri starring Varun Dhawan.

Off camera

Atlee married actress Priya Mohan on 9 November 2014. The couple have two children.

His working circle has stayed remarkably stable across his films. Editor Ruben and cinematographer G K Vishnu have worked with him repeatedly, and Nayanthara has appeared in three of his five features: Raja Rani, Bigil and Jawan.

Raaka at 40

His sixth film is his largest yet.

Raaka, produced by Sun Pictures and starring Allu Arjun and Deepika Padukone, is a visual effects-led science fiction action film, developed with visits to VFX studios in Los Angeles. It is being made in Telugu and English, marking Sun Pictures’ first Telugu production.

The studio has spent the past five days teasing the number 37. Fans worked out early that 3 multiplied by 7 is 21, the date of Atlee’s birthday. On Monday, a new poster tied the number to a record, tagged it #Mocap, and promised a reveal this evening.

Sun Pictures marked the day with a birthday message praising his grand filmmaking and storytelling. Tributes from colleagues and fans have been trending across X since the early hours.

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