‘You are Sivaji’, he announced, his voice choking with emotion. Anna gave me the manuscript at eleven in the morning and he came back around six in the evening…I managed to memorise so much in merely seven hours. He was going home and on his return would audition me for the role. He handed me a 90 page dialogue manuscript and adviced me to go through it. Moreover he had the confidence that I could do it. ‘Ganesa, are you willing to act as Sivaji?’ I perspired profusely at this question…Anna asked me to try it out. Both had a brainstorming session to find alternatives…Anna thought a beard would look good on me. He told Anna that MGR had refused to act this role.
Narayanaswamy, the stage manager, was extremely worried. With hardly a week left for the play, D.V. For some reason MGR turned down the offer. Ramachandran was chosen to play the role of Sivaji and the costumes tailored for him. “Anna wrote the play Sivaji kanda Hindu Rajyam. Here are excerpts from Ganesan’s reminiscences of his lucky break: Annadurai (Anna) – a role that was rejected by M.G. A Streetcar Named Desire play opened in New York on Dec.3, 1947 and a 23 year old Brando became the talk of the town.Īkin to Brando’s story, we have Sivaji Ganesan, hailed as the Marlon Brando of Indian stage and screen, who seized an opportunity of his life time in 1946, at the age of 18, when he was offered the role of Maratha king Sivaji, for a play authored by C.N. Then, the director and producer of the play felt that Brando was ‘probably too young’, but left the final decision of selection to playwright Tennessee Williams, who wanted Brando to ‘have the role’. Two established movie stars, first John Garfield (1913-1952) and then Burt Lancaster (1913-1994) had to turn down the role. In his autobiography, Marlon Brando noted that his big break on stage in 1947, for a Tennessee Williams play, A Streetcar Named Desire, came when he was the third choice as the lead male cast. The motif of a new face seizing an opportunity of a lifetime when the chosen star rejects the role in stage or cinema is a recurrent theme. One day in 1962, both Brando and Ganesan met for lunch and exchanged pleasantries in Hollywood. In late career, both had their critics Brando was lampooned for his ‘method acting’ and Sivaji was critiqued for his ‘overacting’. Both blossomed as talent that has been unseen and unheard of Brando in the hands of Elia Kazan, and Sivaji in delivering the scripts of Anna and Karunanidhi. Both were school dropouts while Brando left school during his high school years, Sivaji Ganesan never even completed his primary schooling. Both set the definitions for what acting is, both on the stage and in movies in their cultural milieu. Marlon Brando (1924-2004) in the USA and Sivaji Ganesan (1928-2001) in South India were talented contemporaries. Compiled and edited by T.S.Narayana Swamy (in Tamil), English translation by Sabita Radhakrishna Sivaji Prabhu Charities Trust, Chennai, 2007, 250 pp. Sivaji Ganesan: Autobiography of An Actor. 26th Year on the Web Association of Tamils of Sri Lanka in the USAīook Review: Autobiography of Actor-Politician Sivaji GanesanĪkin to Brando’s story, we have Sivaji Ganesan, hailed as the Marlon Brando of Indian stage and screen, who seized an opportunity of his life time in 1946, at the age of 18, when he was offered the role of Maratha king Sivaji, for a play authored by C.N. Madras discovered: a historical guide to looking around, supplemented with tales of 'Once upon a city'.
His eldest son Ramkumar Ganesan performed his last rituals of his funeral at the Besant Nagar Crematorium, Chennai. He died at 7:45 pm that day at the age of 72. He was admitted in Apollo Hospital in Chennai on 21 June 2001. Sivaji Ganesan had respiratory problems and heart ailments.
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