Her tryst with the entertainment industry began as a kid. This former head girl of Lady Andal School, was an anchor on a kiddies show on the Splash channel.
At the age of 14, she debuted in films as Laila’s sister in Kanda Naal Mudhal and later acted in Azhagiya Asura. Today, Regina Cassandra, awaiting the release of her Kedi Billa Killadi Ranga (KBKR), brings much of her ingrained confidence and spunk to her character in the film.
Regina, who has had a successful stint in Tollywood with the Telugu Siva Manasalo Sakthi and Routine Love Story, is making a comeback of sorts in Tamil, after a gap. Sharing screen space with Sivakarthikeyan, Vimal and Bindu Madhavi, in this film directed by Pandiraj, Regina is waiting for audiences to see her potential. Talking about her role, the city-bred girl says, “It’s a rural story where I play a girl working in a Xerox shop. She’s a firecracker of a character, who dominates Sivakarthikeyan. The film is a laugh riot.”
Regina transformed herself into a small town girl for the role. “We shot for around 25 days in Trichy and later in Chennai. Pandiraj’s fluency in the local lingo helped me a lot and I tried to copy his voice modulation and pronunciation for the role. I can read and write Tamil,” she reveals. Working with Pandiraj and Sivakarthikeyan kept in her splits most of the time.
“Siva is very down to earth and since he hails from Trichy, he arranged home food for me when I fell sick with jaundice there during the shoot. Every day I would get a casserole full of idlis since that’s all I could eat!” recalls Regina.
Regina has done many TV commercials during her school days itself, right from the age of four. But her family insisted that she take a break to complete her graduation in Psychology. “I missed many film offers due to my studies,” she grins. But today, she is happy with the roles she is getting. In Nirnayam, she will soon be seen playing a mom to a little girl as well.
With an earlier appearance in the Kannada flick Suryakanthi, and with three Telugu projects coming up, she has a foothold in several industries. “I want to be versatile and be a part of good cinema. Language is no barrier,” she concludes.