Chunky Pandey

26 Sep, 1962 | Mumbai

Actor

Biography

Chunky Panday is an Indian film actor. He has appeared in over 55 movies in a career that has spanned over two decades and has been nominated once for his supportive role in 'Tezaab'. He is the Amitabh Bachchan of Bangladesh. Chunky's real name is chuua, but is also known as Chandrakant Pandey. He married Bhavna in 1998 and has two daughters. he decided to make a comeback to Bollywood during 2002 and ended up appearing in over a dozen movies. Apart from appearing in movies, Chunky is also involved in a business 'Bollywood Electric' which hosts stage shows. He and his wife Bhavna also run a health food restaurant in Mumbai, India. Starting out his Bollywood career in 1987, with the film Daraar, Pandey shot to the spotlight with his role as Munna's (Anil Kapoor) friend in the movie Tezaab in (1988). This was the first big break for Pandey as he received a nomination as a best supporting actor from his performance in the film. Since then he has appeared in many films with mixed success throughout the late 1980s and 1990s. Unfortunately for Pandey, many of his films in which he had the leading role never did well at the box office. It was always his secondary leading roles that made the most impact. He was noted from his pairing with Govinda in the blockbuster hit film Aankhen (1993) and with Sunny Deol in Paap Ki Duniya (1988), Vishwatma (1992) and Lootere (1993) all of which were box office hits. His career began to fade from the limelight in the mid 90s due to the rising popularity and demand of megastars such as Aamir Khan, Shahrukh Khan, and Salman Khan. As a result, Pandey traveled to Bangladesh in the late 1990s to keep his acting career alive. Surprisingly Chunky became a superstar overnight in Bangladesh, starring in numerous Bengali movies. Ironically, Pandey had never spoken Bangla and his voice was dubbed over. After his hiatus from Bollywood since 1999, Pandey returned in 2002 playing supporting roles in Qayamat: City Under Threat (2003), Elaan (2005) and Ssukh (2005). Pandey was then critically acclaimed for his performance in Ram Gopal Varma's gangster thriller D - Underworld Baadshah (2005). Due to the praise, Pandey announced a full fledged comeback to Bollywood. In 2006 he won praise for his comical performance as a Nepali gangster in Apna Sapna Money Money and made a brief appearance in Don (2006). Recently he appeared in the multi-starrer action comedy Fool and Final. He is also associated with the upcoming Johnny Depp movie Shantaram. Chunky Pandeys (Rupinder Randhawa's father) is a judge in the very popular indian reality show, zara nachke dikha along with the very popular indian actress Malaika Arora khan.