Making a list of artistes and technicians, from Kerala, who went to other language film industries is no easy task. Today there are innumerable Malayalis who work in different departments of various language film industries in India. Not just Indian cinema, there is the odd-Malayali presence even in Hollywood.
For instance Kochi’s own Thomas Berly, the hero of Thiramala , was on the crew of the classic The Old Man and The Sea . The list of those who migrated is long - Prem Nazir, Sathyan, Mammootty, Mohanlal, Jaya Bharathi, Sheela to name a few. Then there are the technicians such as cameraman A Vincent, director KS Sethumadhavan, and of course, Resul Pookutty. Similarly there are singers such as Yesudas, Jayachandran, Chitra, and Sujatha, to name a few, who have also shone in other language films.
If one were to compile a list of names of those who migrated, the first names on such a list would probably be that of Chembai Vaidyanatha Bhagavathar and the legendary mridangist Palakkad Mani Iyer as they were the first to venture out of Kerala to other language industries. And between them, Chembai can claim the honour of being the first Malayali singer in a non-Malayalam film - in the Kannada film Vani .
He not only appeared before the camera, in the film, but also sung nearly half a dozen songs in it. The filming started in 1940, but it was another three years before it was released. Both Chembai and Mani Iyer were not ‘actors’ in the conventional sense, they were musicians performing concerts (as musicians) in the film.
The story of how Chembai and Mani Iyer landed up in the film is interesting. The film was born out of violinist T Chowdiah’s desire to make one. A violinist of renown, Chowdiah was a celebrity in old Mysore. Around the end of the 1930s when Kannada cinema was taking its first steps, Chowdiah was drawn to it. He wanted to make a film based on the life of a musician, but he was clueless about how a film was made.
So he expressed his desire to renowned Kannada dramatist K. Hiranniah and sought his help. Together they floated a production venture, ‘Sree Pictures’. Chowdiah wanted the confluence of three icons in his films - Chembai, Mani Iyer and himself. An ardent fan of Chembai, he wanted Chembai to don the hero’s role. Mani Iyer had taken violin lessons from Chowdiah. The three, very talented musicians had already performed together in many music concerts in and around the old Mysore province and had a huge number of fans. In the light of this knowledge, Chowdiah thought the three of them could get together for a film that would be widely appreciated.
Hiranniah wrote the script with Chembai as the hero, and with Chowdiah went to meet Chembai at his house in Kalpathy. A surprise awaited them - Chembai refused. He had his reasons, he said singing and acting couldn’t be mixed but offered, instead to, come aboard as playback singer.
Although Chowdiah was frustrated, he was not ready to quit. He succeeded in getting Chembai to agree to come before the camera to shoot the concerts. Hiranniah restructured the script, Chembai was given a huge amount as advance by Chowdiah, Chembai donated the entire sum to the Chembai Parthasarathy temple.
As per the new script Chowdiah was the hero. The story was about the tough, poverty-stricken life of a musician. Mani Iyer was ready to be a part of Vani , as a mridangam player. Bellari Lalitha, Pandari Bhai, Bellari Retnamala, Dhanabhagyam, BR Subbayya, KV Achutha Rao, Sarathy, BVK Moorthy were the others in the film. V Krishna was the cinematographer.
Hiranniah was the director while Chowdiah was the composer. Chembai and Mani Iyer had appeared in several song scenes in the film which had 14 songs. There was even a full music concert by Chembai which lasted nearly 15 minutes. The camera shots focused on the magical movement of Mani Iyer’s fingers as also the extraordinary talent of Chowdiah.
Unfortunately, the film flopped.
This was probably the first Indian film that told the story of the life of a musician. The print of Vani was lost, but later a print was found and major parts of it could be retrieved following technical processes by the Pune-based National Film Archives. There is an opinion that Chembai had probably sung songs for other characters in Vani , if that is true he would be the first Malayali playback singer.
Nirmala was the first Malayalam film which used playback system and T Govinda Rao is positioned as the first Malayalam playback singer. Nirmala was released in 1948, while Chembai worked in Vani , which released in 1943.
