Born in 1920, Gemini Ganesan, originally known as Ramaswamy Ganesan, is a renowned Tamil Actor. He is fondly called as “Kaadhal Mannan” since he excelled in romantic portrayals. In fact, his pairing with Savithri, with whom he was eventually married, was embraced by the audience. He was different from his colleagues
Sivaji Ganesan
and M G Ramachandran in the sense that he excelled in those roles wherein the boy longs for the girl’s love.
Gemini Ganesan received the prestigious Padmashree Award and also many other awards including Kalaimamani. Unlike his contemporaries Sivaji Ganesan and M G Ramachandran Gemini Ganesan was not a stage performer before entering into the film industry. Also, he was not interested in politics. Gemini Ganesan holds the distinction of being a graduate, since there were only few actors who were graduates during his period. Before entering film industry, he was a lecturer. Later, since he started to work with Gemini Studios, he was nicknamed “Gemini Ganesan”.
He had worked in the cinema industry for almost 50 years and had acted in around 200 films. He acted mostly in Tamil films, though he had worked in Hindi, Malayalam, Telugu and Kannada as well.
There is no doubt that Gemini Ganesan was a successful actor, but his personal life was always subject to criticism. He had married many women and that didn’t go well with critics. 1950s to 1970s was a golden era in his career, since he gave many hits at that time. Gemini Ganesan was instrumental in bringing Ulaganayagan
Kamal Haasan
to the film industry, when the latter was young. In fact, actor Kamal Haasan has great respect for him.
During the later stages of his career Gemini Ganesan acted in character roles; the notable ones are “Unnal Mudiyum Thambi” and “Avvai Shanmugi”. Gemini Ganesan has 8 children and everyone is well-settled. He breathed his last in 2005. He is still considered to be a legend in Tamil cinema.
Pushpavalli Family Tree (Infographic Family Tree)