High School Musical’s Kelsi actress Oleysa Rulin is unrecognisable from geeky character 16 years later

REMEMBER Kelsi from High School Musical? She was the talented piano playing, glasses-wearing geek but now 16 years on, she looks almost unrecognisable.

High School Musical is one the most popular kid’s movies ever and in 2006 you couldn’t go anywhere without hearing the children singing “We’re all in this together” and “Breaking Free”.

And while Sharpay Evans, played by Ashley Tinsdale, was the Queen Bee of school, it was the prodigy composer Kelsi Nielsen who was the brains behind the much-loved music.

Unlike the other members of school, cap-loving Kelsi preferred to stay out of the limelight and instead opted to take her place behind the piano.

But now – 16 years since Disney’s hit TV show-turned-films first hit our screens, it seems actress Oleysa Rulin has changed a lot.

Olyesa’s latest Instagram snaps would give school frenemies Ashely Tinsdale and Vanessa Hudgens, who played Gabriella Montez in the film, a run for their money.

After playing the part of Kelsi, the Russian-born beauty went on to appear in a number of other films, including Major Movie Star, in which she appeared alongside Jessica Simpson.

From 2015 to 2016 she played Calista Secor in TV series Powers, while her most recent TV work has seen her play Zasha Gagarin in NCIS: Los Angeles.

When she isn’t on-screen, Olesya has turned her hand to writing and is the author of  Hounds of Love, a collection of poems which “takes readers on a journey of raw love and course heartache.”

She married husband Joseph Noel Pauline in 2021 and her Instagram page shows the couple renovating and decorating their home.