A non-descript boy with poor means from an
equally non-descript, dusty hamlet some 160 kms south of Madras does not always
make a plot for a great tale. Limitations are aplenty. For
starters, there are millions of such specimens. Each one has a tale in
him, each one's life is an epic in itself but the sheer numbers daunt one from
picking a sample. A sample who would have, providence permitting, managed to inch his
way 160 kms up north to Madrasapattinam and got noticed. As for the hero of this tale, notice the
world did and for good measure, stood up and stared in awe too. It still does.
Because Villupuram Chinnaiah Pillai
Ganesan was no ordinary specimen. Everything about his childhood and teen
years was bordering on the predictable and mundane, except for his unstoppable
passion for acting. He could have chosen
no other profession, since he was probably good at nothing else. But he was
good at that one thing. With empty pockets and tons of talent, this
non-descript lad descended on Kodambakkam in the fifties, lorded over it for
well over 5 decades and evolved as the best in the business. 'Villupuram' and 'Chinniah Pillai' evaporated from his name in course of time and presently
Sivaji came to replace them. And Sivaji Ganesan was born!
Tamil Nadu's history has, for as long as
one could remember, been intertwined with the history of cinema. We Tamil
folks, (Ayyayyo!) are crazy about this
form of art. We lived and breathed cinema, we continue to - only the
milieu has changed from tent kottais and tharai tickets to surround-sounds and scotch whiskeys.
We Tamils unabashedly love this medium and do not, for a moment, try to hide
our faces and slink under our seats while caught amidst frenzied throngs doing Palabhishekam
on our heroes’ cut-outs, throwing chillarai onto the screen and lighting
camphor and doing arathi first day, first show. Right from the humble
rickshaw- puller to the corporate honcho. And we have a history of
display of such unbridled adulation for our silver-screen idols starting much
before the rest of the world woke up to the power, the film medium is.
Why, our MKT, Chinnappa and KB Sundarambal commanded astronomical
salaries some 70 years back which sums, inflation-indexed today, would put
today's mega-stars, super-stars and power-stars to shame, Bolly, Holly and all
other woods included! Our film stars of yore first got noticed, then became
popular, then became demi-gods and then rode to political power. We
Tamils are the pioneers in making Chief Ministers of our film stars and the
rest of the world just followed suit. Across the atlantic, the medium even made
a President out of a film star, emulating a phenomenon in our back yard who went by the name Marudhur Gopalan Ramachandran.
And our star-turned-politicians have not fared any worse than the
scoundrel-turned-politicians, as history would show.
Oh, yes, V.C.Ganesan I was talking about,
pardon the digression. He rode like a colossus over Tamil Cinema from the
mid-fifties till the end of the century. Well, so many others too have,
so what am I crowing about? Puratchi
Thalaivar, for one. Then what makes this VC Ganesan special? Why am I here
groping for words to write about the greatest of actors this universe has seen?
What possible facet of acting of
this Ganesan can I hope to highlight which has not been already written about?
I bother with this chore precisely because
he is the greatest actor the earth has ever seen but not ever willing to
acknowledge so. I consider it my duty to
add one more post to the cyber-world to register my indignation at that.
This post may hardly be read by one trillionth of the world's population
but I don't care. One vote does not elect a Prime Minister but that one
vote counts. One drop does not make a ocean but without such single drops an
ocean ceases to be. Being the five crore, forty eight lakhs sixty five
thousand, one hundred twenty sixth guy to write about the greatness of Sivaji
Ganesan does not make or unmake a legend. But I have registered my 'like'
here and that is what counts for me.
Judging film acting, specially in India is
so subjective, that it is next to
impossible to precisely define what constitutes good acting. At one end of the
spectrum, you have this arty- films where the protagonist utters not a word for
three hours (busy immersed in cattle-herding, beedi- smoking or playing chess )
and gets away with being branded the best actor on earth. At the other end
are these ultimate and penultimate stars,
who blast your ear drum with one-liners, two-liners, hundred liners and
punch dialogues even while busy cuddling
up with cuties half their age or bashing up the baddies. (Some multi-tasking
that). It's either the Mount
Everest or the Mariana trench for our actors. There is no in-between.
This is where my VC Ganesan comes into the picture. What an amazing
repertoire he could boast of! He can play with equal aplomb and felicity the pinnacle
of Everest or the nadir of a bottomless pit. And anything in- between. He can play
Kattabomman, the king, as effortlessly as Babu, the beggar. He can play
the Justice as well as the lawyer. In one scene he is the Rajapart and the
next, the Kallapart. He can play the
senile old man longing for love in the
evening of his years as well as a sadist womaniser. He can play the lecher and the leper, he can play the seer and the
stupid, he can play the playboy and the priest, why my man can play God
even. And when he does, even God descends to take a lesson or two on how
to play the part! There is no role on earth he has not played and if
there is any, it just does not exist! One just has to witness any two of
his films one after the other and I would bet my right hand that the uninitiated
would hardly realise both the roles were played by the same person!
Quite a few adjectives and invectives have
been heaped on the thespian by self-appointed judges of cinema over the
years. The oft-repeated being his ‘loud’
and ‘dramatic’ portrayal. Forgetting for
a moment that our society itself loves being loud and
dramatic. Are not our weddings
loud and garish? Are not our funerals
melodramatic? Are we not a nation of
hysterics? And Ganesan was only
mirroring you and me while playing the parts.
But he knew when to be loud and when to be silent. The ignorant say he is loud. I say he knew when
to tone up and tone down. They say he is histrionic - I say he knew
when to be one, when the role would demand one to be so. They say he is ‘dramatic’ – I say a drama needs to be dramatic. They
say he would not fit into the ‘class’ of art-house type performers – I say darn
you, cattle-grazing class, Ganesan knows what to give, how much to give and
when. They say he overacts – well, I now
bow my head. I take it as a
compliment. At least the carping critics
now acknowledge that Ganesan can act!
There can be no overdose unless there is a dose in the first place. No one can over- eat unless he starts
eating. And no one can over act unless
he knows a thing or two about acting. And remember, Ganesan is the yardstick to
determine how much is under-acting and how much is over. Yardsticks are not judged, they are just
considered as reference points upon which the commonplace is judged.
One can easily cite examples of hundreds
of different roles he has played, to counter each of the above inane arguments,
but that is not the point. Even trying
to defend the criticism would be beneath the dignity VC Ganesan deserves. (But I can’t resist the temptation; anyone
access to the internet and you-tube can try downloading the songs (i)
‘ennirandu padhinaru vayadhu’ (ii)
chinnanchiriya vannapparavai… (iii) olimayamana edhirkalam …. (iv) pasumai
niraindha ninaivugale…. No need to be conversant with the language. Just observe Ganesan emoting [and not emoting
where not required] without any
prejudice or preconceived notion of what is method-acting and what is
not. I am positive no one on earth could
have done better. But of course, that
was the heady combination of the sixties, the golden era of Tamil Cinema, Ganesan,
TMS, Kannadasan and Viswanathan-Ramamoorthy.
One cannot hope fore the luxury of an encore of such golden times, twice
in one’s short life-span).
Marlon Brando would have been proud to be
talked of as the Sivaji of Hollywood. So
would a Dilip Kumar and a Sanjeev Kumar..
Having said that, it is only fair and expected that the legend of Villupuram
Chinnaiah Pillai Ganesan was never ever nominated for the best actor award at
the national level, let alone an Oscar.
The similarity here between Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi never winning a
peace Nobel is striking. Awards do not
matter though they do provide some nourishment to souls like me, the unabashed
Sivaji admirers. They did deign to endow
him with a Dada Saheb Phalke award but just as an after thought. Long after several
international awards came his way.
Perhaps out of a guilty feeling, perhaps as a repentance. …
Just read Bharadwaj Rangan in The Hindu yesterday (the idea behind this post is that article) – quote- ‘….. V then said that she could not get (how) Tamil audiences rated
Sivaji Ganesan a great actor. “ How can someone so loud and theatrical…?” And I (Rangan) said, “watch Uyarndha Manidhan
and Motor Sundaram Pillai, and let’s continue this conversation”….’-unquote.
Here rests my defence, milord! Watch Ganesan without blinkers and then let’s
continue this conversation….
