Name:Joseph Vijay

Born:Joseph Vijay Chandrasekhar,June 22, 1974 (1974-06-22) (age 34),Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India

Other name(s): Ilaya Thalapathy, Dr. Vijay

Occupation :Actor, playback singer

Years active:1992–present

Spouse(s):Sangeetha Sornalingam (2000–present)

Children:Divya Jason Sanjay born on August 26, 2000 in London and Saasha, born on September 9, 2005 in Chennai.

Joseph Vijay Chandrasekhar was born on June 22, 1974, to film producer and director S. A. Chandrasekhar and Shoba Chandrasekhar, a classical and a playback singer. He had a sister named Vidhya Chandrasekhar who died at the age of two. Vijay went on to do Visual Communications at Loyola College, Chennai. He was interestingly classmates with present-day film artistes Surya Sivakumar, Yuvan Shankar Raja, Karthik Raja, and Vishnuvardhan.

Brand ambassadorship

In 2002, Vijay was chosen as Coca Cola's brand ambassador in Tamil Nadu. He had acted in a variety of South Indian Coca Cola advertisements, along with Katrina Kaif. A year later, the company later decided they could increase their product sales without the help of a celebrity endorser. In February 2009, Vijay was once again chosen as the brand ambassador for Coca Cola products.

Chennai Super Kings

In 2008, Vijay was signed up as the star ambassador for the Indian Premier League cricket team Chennai Super Kings, along with actress Nayantara, who was later fired from the position. Currently, the other ambassador of the team is Krishnamachari Srikkanth.

Vijay debuted as a lead role actor in the 1992 film Naalaya Theerpu, produced by his father. After a few other films, he co-stared with Vijayakanth in the film Sendhoorapandi. This film helped Vijay to become popular in the interior areas of Tamil Nadu. Films like Rasigan, Vishnu, and Deva followed, which all helped to increase Vijay's star value. Vijay is also one of the few lead actors of his generation to co-star with veteran actor Sivaji Ganesan. This opportunity came in the film Once More, directed by S. A. Chandrasekhar in 1994. In 1995, Vijay was in the lead role in the film Rajavin Parvaiyile which also starred Ajith Kumar, another currently reigning film actor in Tamil cinema.

The year 1996 saw a blockbuster hit in the Vikraman-directed film Poove Unakkaga which helped Vijay to establish as a bankable star in Tamil films. He found more success with films that followed, which had an unorthodox climax like Love Today, Kadhalukku Mariyadhai and Priyamudan. Kadhalukku Mariyadhai made Vijay receive that year's Tamil Nadu State Film Award for Best Actor.

Following Thulladha Manamum Thullum, the films Endrendrum Kadhal, Nenjinile, Minsara Kanna and Kannukkul Nilavu failed to meet his previous success. He decided not to commit in films that took a year to release, which changed his trend. His next venture was Kushi which was a blockbuster of 2000. The following films like Priyamanavale, Friends and Badri were once again successful for Vijay.

Later on, he starred in Shahjahan, Thamizhan, Youth, and Bagavathi which maintained Vijay's success. However, the films that followed, which were Vaseegara, Pudhiya Geethai, and his delayed film Udhaya became low grossers and flopped. This highly affected Vijay's success rate and he was looked down upon by film critics and producers.

His string of failure films was broken by Thirumalai in 2004 which had Vijay in a new facial appearance. Ghilli, which was also released in 2004, is considered to be one of Vijay's biggest hits today. Directed by Dharani and produced by A. M. Rathnam, it was a remake of the Telugu film Okkadu, and ran for 200 days in theatres in Tamil Nadu. His last hit of the year 2004 had followed, which was Madhurey. It was in this year which Vijay began to portray his current mass-hero, stereotypical acting style, giving him a major turning point in his career. The following year had other major successes such as Thirupaachi, Sachein and Sivakasi