Olesya Rulin
Olesya Rulin (born March 17, 1986 in Moscow, USSR) spent her early childhood in a poor, 12-house village which is called 'Likhoslavl' located three hours north of Moscow. She was eight when she emigrated to the United States to rejoin her father who had emigrated two years earlier. They lived first in Texas then later in Utah. She can read, write and speak in fluent Russian. She's also a trained ballet dancer. When she was 12, she entered a model search contest at the urging of her mother and won representation by four different agencies. Prior to acting full-time, she worked for a year as a certified nursing assistant and also at stores such as Victoria's Secret ; she was working at a Nordstrom's when the first High School Musical came out.
In addition to her role in High School Musical and High School Musical 2, her other credits include the Disney Channel Original Movies; Halloweentown High, The Poof Point and Hounded, the television series Everwood and the feature films; Forever Strong, Mobsters and Mormons and The Dance. She was studying economics in Paris when the casting for High School Musical 2 was being done. Rulin is also set to reprise her role as composer/pianist Kelsi Nielsen in High School Musical 3: Senior Year, which is scheduled to be released in 2008.