Kiara Advani
Born Name: Alia Advani
Date of Birthday: 31 July 1992
Place of Birth: Bombay, Maharashtra, India (present-day Mumbai)
Height: 1.57 m
Occupation: Actress
Parents: Jagdeep Advani, Genevieve Advani
Relatives: Ashok Kumar (step-great-grandfather), Saeed Jaffrey (great-uncle)

Alia Advani (born 31 July 1992), known professionally as Kiara Advani ([kɪˈjaːra əɽˈʋaːɳi]), is an Indian actress who works predominantly in Hindi films. After making her debut in the comedy film Fugly (2014), she played a supporting role as MS Dhoni's wife in the sports biopic M.S. Dhoni: The Untold Story (2016).

Advani's career advanced with a critically praised role in the Netflix anthology film Lust Stories (2018), and for playing the leading lady in the Telugu political thriller Bharat Ane Nenu (2018), and the Hindi films Kabir Singh (2019), Good Newwz (2019), Laxmii (2020), Shershaah (2021), and Bhool Bhulaiyaa 2 (2022).

Early life and background
Kiara Advani was born to Jagdeep Advani, a Sindhi Hindu businessman and Genevieve Jaffrey, a teacher whose father was a Muslim from Lucknow and whose mother was a British Christian.

Born as Alia Advani, she changed her first name to Kiara prior to the release of her first film, Fugly, in 2014. Her choice of the name was inspired from Priyanka Chopra's character Kiara in the film Anjaana Anjaani (2010). She has stated that it was Salman Khan's suggestion to change her name, as Alia Bhatt was already an established actress.

Advani is related to several celebrities through her maternal family. Actors Ashok Kumar and Saeed Jaffrey are her step-great-grandfather and great-uncle, respectively, whereas model Shaheen Jaffrey is her aunt. Her mother Genevieve Advani's step-mother is Bharti Ganguly who is the daughter of Ashok Kumar.

Career
Early work (2014–2019)
Advani began her acting career with the Hindi ensemble comedy film Fugly (2014). Taran Adarsh of Bollywood Hungama wrote, "Kiara Advani catches you completely unaware" and has the "combination of looks and talent". Mehul S Thakkar of Deccan Chronicle found her "very striking" and said that she "shows a lot of promise". Fugly underperformed at the box office. Two years later, Advani appeared in the sports drama M. S. Dhoni: The Untold Story (2016), a biopic of cricketer M. S. Dhoni who served as the former captain of Indian cricket team. She had a supporting role opposite Sushant Singh Rajput (who essayed Dhoni), as the real-life character of his wife, hotel manager Sakshi Rawat. M. S. Dhoni: The Untold Story was a major commercial success with global revenues of over ₹216 crore (US$28 million).

Advani then starred in Abbas–Mustan's action thriller Machine (2017). It failed at the box office. She next collaborated with filmmaker Karan Johar, for their first of many films, in the Netflix anthological film Lust Stories (2018), where she starred opposite Vicky Kaushal as his sexually dissatisfied wife. Her performance received mixed reactions. Writing for NDTV, Raja Sen found her to be "positively lovely" in it. She also featured with Shahid Kapoor in the music video "Urvashi", sung by Yo Yo Honey Singh.

Advani expanded to Telugu cinema that year, appearing with Mahesh Babu in the action film Bharat Ane Nenu (2018) from Koratala Siva, about a student who unexpectedly becomes chief minister of Andhra Pradesh. Janani K of India Today opined that she "shines in her brief role" but added that her character was "more of an eye-candy who doesn't add any purpose to the story". Worldwide, the film earned ₹225 crore (US$30 million), making it one of Telugu cinema's highest grossers. She, however, failed to replicate this success with her second Telugu film, Boyapati Srinu's Vinaya Vidheya Rama (co-starring Ram Charan). In a scathing review for The Hindu, Sangeetha Devi Dundoo wrote, "It isn't Kiara Advani's fault that she looks lost in the melee." In the same year, she was seen in a guest appearance in Abhishek Varman's ensemble period film Kalank, produced by Johar.

Rise to prominence (2019–present)
Later in 2019, Advani received wider attention for Sandeep Reddy Vanga's romantic drama Kabir Singh, starring Shahid Kapoor. The film had a worldwide gross of over ₹378 crore (US$50 million) becoming her highest-grossing release, but critics panned it due to its depiction of misogyny and toxic masculinity. Her final role of 2019 came with her third collaboration with Johar in the comedy Good Newwz alongside Akshay Kumar, Kareena Kapoor Khan and Diljit Dosanjh, that revolves around two couples tryst with in vitro fertilization. Both Kabir Singh and Good Newwz grossed over ₹200 crores each domestically, ranking among the year's highest-grossing films.

In 2020, Advani gained mixed reviews for her appearance in Johar's production Guilty, a Netflix film about sexual assault. She then played the wife of Akshay Kumar's character in Raghava Lawrence's horror comedy Laxmii, in which Kumar's character gets possessed by a transgender ghost. Instead of theatres, Laxmii was directly released on Hotstar owing to COVID-19 pandemic, and met with negative reviews. Abir Sengupta's directorial debut Indoo Ki Jawani (2020), one of the first Bollywood films to release in cinemas post theatrical reopening and amid the 50% occupancy guideline due to the pandemic, featured Advani as a Ghaziabad based girl who finds love in dating apps.

Advani next featured in Dharma Productions's war film Shershaah (2021), based on the life of army officer Vikram Batra (played by Sidharth Malhotra), in which she played the role of Batra's girlfriend. The film released digitally on Amazon Prime Video, on which it became the most-watched Indian film. Anna M. M. Vetticad of Firstpost opined that Advani "sparkles" in her brief role. The following year, she appeared with Kartik Aaryan and Tabu in the horror comedy Bhool Bhulaiyaa 2. Shalini Langer of The Indian Express wrote that she "has little to do except pop up now and then".

Upcoming projects
Advani will then star in two romantic comedies for Dharma Productions, Jug Jugg Jeeyo (with Varun Dhawan) and Govinda Naam Mera (with Vicky Kaushal). Advani will also star in an untitled Telugu film directed by S. Shankar, co-starring Charan.