Vinayakan

Fire dance was Vinayakan's speciality long before cinema, when he led a dance troupe called Black Mercury in Ernakulam. Director Thampi Kannanthanam gave him an uncredited appearance in Maanthrikam (1995) and later cast him in Onnaman. Through the 2000s he caught attention in Stop Violence, Vellithira, Chathikkatha Chanthu, Chotta Mumbai and Thottappan, and he did a few Hindi films too. He acts mostly in Malayalam, occasionally in Tamil, and also composes music. Both sides of that work met in Rajeev Ravi's Kammatipaadam (2016). His role as Ganga won him the Kerala State Film Award for Best Actor, and the song "Puzhu Pulikal" was his first work as a music director. He later composed the title track of Trance (2020) and has sung for films including Role Models and Ordinary. Audiences also know him as Edakochi "Dude" in the Aadu series and as Ayyappan in Lijo Jose Pellissery's Ee.Ma.Yau. Nelson Dilipkumar's Tamil film Jailer (2023), with him as the idol smuggler Varman, took him to a wider audience, and he returned to the part in Jailer 2 (2026). The same year he appeared as Sultan Azam Khan in Aadu 3, and he plays Rejimon opposite Jayasurya in the fantasy caper Titans, which opened in theatres on 22 October 2026.