Dileep Rao

DILEEP RAO was seen in James Cameron's record-breaking blockbuster "Avatar," the top-grossing film of all time. Earlier in 2009, Rao made his feature film debut with a lead role in Sam Raimi's horror hit "Drag Me to Hell."

Rao was born in Los Angeles, but his parents' jobs--his mother is a physicist, his father an engineer--took the family all over the world. In fact, Rao had traveled to more than 20 countries by the time he was eight years old and lived in Saudi Arabia for a time as a child.

His lifelong fascination with the natural sciences led him originally to become a pre-med student at the University of California at San Diego, with the serious intention of becoming a surgeon. While in college, however, he enrolled in an acting class, which sparked his interest in the theatre. That led to his participation in the La Jolla Playhouse Summer Conservatory, where he was trained by Tony Award-winning director Anna Shapiro. He gained his Equity card doing a variety of theatre roles and ultimately decided that his continuing education would be in the arts instead of medical school.

The following year, Rao was accepted into the American Conservatory Theater in San Francisco. Upon graduation, he landed a role in Tom Stoppard's "Indian Ink." His subsequent stage work includes touring with the Manhattan Theatre Club, and plays at the South Coast Rep, Berkeley Rep, and the opening of the Kirk Douglas Theatre in Los Angeles. He has collaborated with such noted stage directors as Les Waters, Gordon Davidson, David Emmes and Carey Perloff, and playwrights such as Joe Hortua, Charles Busch, and Charles L. Mee, the last on two world premieres.

Apart from his acting, Rao's international upbringing and broad range of knowledge and experiences enabled him to become a "Jeopardy" champion, scoring one of the game show's largest single-day winnings.

Warner Bros. Pictures