The black-and-white photographs look sharp. The memories they bring to G. Ravishankar are sharper.
Looking at an image of the superstar-turned-chief-minister of Tamil Nadu from the location of the 1971 film Rikshawkaran , the retired sound-engineer at the AVM Studio, Chennai, says: “MGR wasn't sure about getting the right balance as he sat in the driver's seat for the rehearsal, so he wanted somebody from the set to step in for a trial. But, nobody moved: they were all in awe of him. Eventually director M. Krishnan Nair got in and he asked Velu to accompany him.”
He adds another anecdote. “That was a time when there was some talk within certain quarters of the industry about the increasing presence of Malayalis in Tamil cinema,” says Mr. Ravishankar, who moved to Kozhikode in 1995 after a three-decade-long career at AVM. “Besides MGR himself, there were music director M.S. Viswanathan and singer Yesudas. So he suggested Krishnan Nair drop his surname in the credit roll of Rikshawkaran .” That is why you see ‘direction M. Krishnan’ while watching Rikshawkaran .
There are many other rare pictures that too have fascinating tales to tell. They were captured on the camera by R.N. Nagaraj Rao, a widely respected photographer who often accompanied MGR, and are now with Mr. Ravishankar.
“A large percentage of MGR’s photographs was taken by him,” he says. “I was his tenant and he entrusted me with all the negatives; he probably thought that I would keep them safe long after he was gone. I have more than a hundred rare photographs,” says Ravishankar.
He will hand over them to the MGR memorial coming up at Vadavannur, where the actor-turned-Chief Mminister spent his childhood. “Chennai Mayor Saidai Duraisamy and other leaders of the AIDMK will receive the pictures from me at a function to be held at Vadavannur this week,” Mr. Ravishankar says. “It was after reading in The Hindu about the MGR memorial that I decided to give away these photographs.”
Some of those pictures date back to the 1940s. So you would get a glimpse of the history of Tamil cinema till the 1970s. There are stills from MGR’s famous films such as Madhurai Meetta Sundharapandiyan , Enga Veettu Pillai , Kudiyiruntha Kovil , Idhayakkani and Ulagam Sutrum Valiban.
There also vintage pictures in which MGR can be seen with the likes of C.N. Annadurai, the first Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu, a little Sridevi, Saroja Devi, M.N. Nambiar, and T.R. Sundaram, the producer of the first talkie in Malayalam, Balan .
