Senior star Nandamuri Balakrishna has scored back-to-back five-million-dollar films in North America, a significant milestone considering his strong mass image and his age as a senior hero.
Starting with Akhanda (2021), Veera Simha Reddy (2023), Bhagavanth Kesari (2023), Daaku Maharaaj (2025), and Akhanda 2: Thaandavam (2025), all these films joined the prestigious million-dollar club in North America.
A section of people on social media who dislike Balakrishna dragged caste into this rare milestone, calling it “caste funding.” If his caste was funding his movies, why did Jr NTR’s War 2 perform so low from the very first bookings in North America? Or what about other heroes who share the same caste? Are their movies also “funded” and still collecting a million in the U.S.?
Some educated youth are still blinded by caste and view everything through that lens, unable to move past it. Balakrishna’s success is easy to understand. These five films may not all be blockbusters, but each one shows genuine effort without taking the audience for granted. That builds goodwill for the actor. This is what consistency looks like: when a hero keeps delivering, even if a film isn’t perfect, the next one performs better. That’s how theatre success works.
Look at other senior stars like Ravi Teja and Nagarjuna -their North America numbers don’t even reach a quarter of Balakrishna’s. The reason is simple: the type of films they attempt. Even Chiranjeevi, when he makes a poorly received film like Bhola Shankar, earns peanuts but Balakrishna hasn’t had an outright bad film in his last five.
Even current-generation heroes like Siddu Jonnalagadda, Ram, and Vijay Deverakonda have struggled in the North American market. It all comes down to the star, the expectations on them, and the content they deliver. Caste does not fund movies, and no star is an exception, whether it’s Balakrishna, Ram Charan (Game Changer), or NTR (War 2).
