Priya Prakash Varrier was a B.Com student who glided into the hearts of the nation with a literal wink and a smile. Her appearance in the song Manikya Malaraya Poovi from an upcoming Malayalam movie by Omar Lulu called Oru Adaar Love has created waves across the country. In the scene, she winks flirtatiously at a boy in a scene that is reminiscent of the endearing affairs and relationships in schools and colleges.
On Instagram (where her follower count has rose over one million), she reportedly became the third fastest celebrity to garner over 600k followers—after the US reality star Kylie Jenner and footballer Cristiano Ronaldo. As per the latest Google trends reports, she has outstripped even Bollywood stars like actor Deepika Padukone, and Sunny Leone in number of searches.
Over the course of a single day that the meme exploded (February 12), the number of searches outstripped that of Leone (shown in red) and Padukone (yellow).
Varrier is a first year B.Com student at Vimala college, Thrissur, in Kerala. Her father, Prakash, works with the central excise, and mother Preetha is a homemaker.
She had earlier said, in an interview with Onmanorama, that she was speechless by the response to the song. "I have acted in three short films, all shot within a year. I am also into modelling and have participated in beauty pageants. I am a dancer. I love performing Mohiniyattam. I also learn classical music. I used to post my pictures and videos on Instagram and Facebook. When I got call from Omar to confirm my lead character, it was like a dream come true. Though I have bagged prizes in school youth festivals, I never thought I would debut as a lead character in a movie," she said.
FULL INTERVIEW: The response has rendered me speechless: Viral winking girl Priya Varrier
