In 1980, Urmila Matondkar started her career as a child artist. Perhaps the best known of her early movies is Shekhar Kapur’s Masoom.Her first big hit was the 1995 film Rangeela, in which she played a star-struck dancer. She was nominated for a Filmfare Best Actress Award for her work in Rangeela.Her first film with Director Ram Gopal Varma was Drohi. She has subsequently worked in many RGV productions, such as Daud, Satya, Kaun, Mast, Jungle, and Pyaar Tune Kya Kiya.Her most notable films in the '90s since Rangeela have been Judaai alongside Sridevi and Anil Kapoor for which she received various award nominations for Best Supporting Actress and Satya where she proved her strong dramatic abilities. Since 2000, she began to play roles of depth and substance, making an impact most notably in the films Pyaar Tune Kya Kiya (2001), Om Jai Jagadish (2002), Pinjar (2003), a drama based on India's partition, Maine Gandhi Ko Nahin Mara (2005) and Banaras. In 2007, Matondkar lent her voice for Asha Bhosle’s album Asha and Friends Vol 1, where she performed with Bhosle for the duet Mehbooba Dilruba.
