Nadia was born in 1910 and the legendary Nadia was Indian cinema`s earliest and most popular stunt actress. She performed all her stunts on her own, thereby earning the moniker "Fearless" Nadia. This quality of hers made her an exceptional name in the film industry, not only among actresses, but actors too, who refused to do those dangerous stunts.

Nadia was born as Mary Evans to Greek-Welsh parents in Australia. She started her career as a circus artiste and was an expert at performing all sorts of strange activities. Nadia then joined a ballet company to polish her capabilities even more and made her screen debut as a chorus girl in Wadia Movietone`s Lal-e Yaman.

Nadia`s first lead role was in the film Hunterwali that was directed by her husband Homi Wadia. Nadia had a slightly accented Hindi tone and she was the blue-eyed blonde, who won instant stardom with her portrayal of the masked, whip-swishing Princess Madhuri. The film Hunterwali also proved to be Wadia Movietones first major triumph.

Nadia followed forth with her career by the famous "train" film after Hunterwali; titled Miss Frontier Mail. This film was a crime thriller and it highlighted a spectacular fight sequence atop a moving train. Nadia was immensely successful in her career and enjoyed her work, because of the thrill and excitement in her every shot. Her other hits included Lutaru Lalna, Hurricane Hansa, and Diamond Queen. Nadia was uniformly presented in all these films and the ultimate successful hit in this actress`s career was the film - Punjab Ka Beta.

Majority of Nadia`s hits featured her daredevil nature and people particularly went to enjoy this gooseflesh, while the actress was seen swinging from chandeliers, leaping from buildings and wrestling on moving carriages among her co-stars. However, none of her stunts in her career could be compared with the one fight over the coaches of a moving train. Nadia continued to do films all through the 1950s. However, her last film was Khiladi, cmpleted in 1968. The Indian film industry lost one of its fabulous actresses in 1996. In 1993, three years before Nadia`s death, Riyad Vinci Wadia made a documentary film on the life of Nadia and titled the film as Fearless: The Hunterwali Story.

Filmography of Nadia