From amateur theatre artist to a legend:Tracing NTR’s meteoric rise

Vamanan

Nandamuri Taraka Rama Rao, known famously as NTR, deserved more from Chennai on his centenary in May this year than just a function at the Andhra Club. It was Chennai that made him Telugu cinema’s mega star, and he left his footprints on Tamil cinema too. He made the city his home for more than three decades from the late 1940s when it was the capital of the Madras Presidency and the headquarters of South Indian cinema, a position it gradually lost once the linguistically divided states developed their own film production infrastructure. Again, it was during NTR’s tenure as chief minister of undivided Andhra Pradesh that the ‘Telugu Ganga’ project to bring water from river Krishna to Chennai was envisaged and carried forward in 1983.

Hailing from an agrarian family in coastal Andhra Pradesh, NTR had attracted the attention of Telugu film personalities as an amateur theatre actor in his college days. His first visit to Chennai from Vijayawada was on the morning of May 21, 1947, for a screen test for film director L V Prasad.

He landed only a cameo in Prasad’s ‘Manadesam’ (1949), as a violent cop in the political melodrama on the freedom struggle. But B A Subba Rao, a film studio manager with ambitions of turning a director, was impressed by NTR’s handsome appearance, regal demeanour and deep voice, and cast him as the swashbuckling hero in his ‘Palleturi Pilla’ (1950), an entertainer that proved to be a winner at the box office. Ironically, the film was plagued by financial problems during its making and a desperate NTR wanted to take the train back home. But he stayed, featuring prominently in the lead in two more films in the same year directed by Prasad: ‘Shavukaru’, a sensitively told rural melodrama, and ‘Samsaram’, a family drama about a scheming sister and complicit mother wrecking the domestic life of a middle-class government clerk, played by NTR. Though ‘Shavukaru’ was not a commercial success, it achieved critical acclaim, while ‘Samsaram’ was a big hit. NTR thus had three successful films in his first year as a celluloid hero in Telugu films.

But this was only the first bloom of spring, and greater triumphs were round the corner. The prestigious Vijaya Pictures, which had opened its account with ‘Shavukaru’, signed NTR on a contract for two years and made ‘Pathala Bhairavi’ (1951), directed by K V Reddy. A folklore featuring a young commoner pitting his wits and valour against an evil magician to win the hand of a princess, it was the perfect vehicle to launch NTR as a ‘mass’ action hero. The film gathered such a spectacular reception from the Telugu audience that a Tamil version was released, which also received a superlative response. Not to be left out, Gemini Vasan came out with a Hindi version. ‘Pathala Bhairavi’ was the Telugu entry at the Madras edition of the first international film festival of India, held in February 1952. NTR, who until then had been walking up and down the streets of Chennai, began to go around in a Buick car presented by the producers.

‘Pathala Bhairavi’ signalled the first of a series of bilingual films of the 1950s when Telugu and Tamil film producers rubbed shoulders in Chennai. Films such as ‘Kalyanam Panni Paar’/ ‘Pelli Chesi Choodu’ (1952), ‘Marumagal’/ ‘Ammalakkalu’ (1953), ‘Chandirani’ (1953), made in Tamil, Telugu and Hindi by actress Bhanumathi and ‘Panam Paduthum Paadu’/ ‘Vaddante Dabbu’ (1954) made NTR as much a Tamil star as a Telugu one. In the 1954 film, NTR and Sowcar Janaki can be seen dancing to a lovely song picturised on the banks of the Cooum in Chennai with the Napier Bridge in the background.

But it was the Telugu-Tamil bilingual ‘Maya Bazar’ (1957) which saw the rise of NTR as Krishna beyond comparison. While NTR reprised the role of Krishna for his Telugu fans in many Telugu films, the apogee of NTR’s Krishna act in Tamil was attained in ‘Karnan’ (1964). At one go, NTR had outshone all the Krishnas in the history of Tamil cinema. While NTR was almost wasted as Rama in the Tamil film ‘Sampoorna Ramayanam’ (1958), his portrayal of Rama in the Telugu and Tamil productions of ‘Lava Kusa’ (1963) was mesmeric and unique.

While NTR re-made Tamil hits like ‘Haridas’ (‘Panduranga Mahathmyam’), ‘Bagappirivinai’ (‘Kalasi Vunte Kaladu Sukham’), ‘Pasa Malar’ (‘Raktha Sambandam’) and ‘Jagathalaprathapan’ (‘Jagadhekaveeruni Katha’), many of his Telugu films were dubbed in Tamil. ‘Rechuka’ for example, became ‘Natyathara’. He directed ‘Chanakya Chandragupta’ (1977), besides playing Chandragupta to A Nageswara Rao’s Chanakya and Sivaji’s Alexander.

(The writer is a film historian and has authored several books)

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