''Mayavathi'' is a 1949 Indian

Tamil Tamil may refer to: * Tamils, an ethnic group native to India and some other parts of Asia ** Sri Lankan Tamils, Tamil people native to Sri Lanka also called ilankai tamils **Tamil Malaysians, Tamil people native to Malaysia * Tamil language, nati ...

-language film produced and directed by

T. R. Sundaram Tiruchengodu Ramalingam Sundaram Mudaliar (16 July 1907 – 30 August 1963) was an Indian actor, director, and producer. He was the founder of the Salem-based film production company Modern Theatres. Early life Sundaram was born in 1907 fro ...

. The film stars T. R. Mahalingam and

Anjali Devi Anjali Devi (; 24 August 1927 – 13 January 2014) was an Indian actress, model and producer in Telugu and Tamil films. She was well known for her role as the Devi Sita in ''Lava Kusa'' as well as for the titular roles in movies like Chenchu ...

Plot

The story is that of a princess falling in love with a prince who hates women. Another person, a barber is also interested in the princess. He uses several tricks to get her but fails every time. How the princess succeeds in winning over the prince forms the plot of the story.

Cast

The list is adapted from a review article published in

The Hindu ''The Hindu'' is an Indian English-language daily newspaper owned by The Hindu Group, headquartered in Chennai, Tamil Nadu. It began as a weekly in 1878 and became a daily in 1889. It is one of the Indian newspapers of record and the secon ...

newspaper. ;Male cast * T. R. Mahalingam as Surangathan *

S. V. Subbaiah S. V. Subbaiah (1920-1980) was an Indian actor who featured mainly in Tamil-language plays and films. He featured mostly in character roles that communicated emotional feelings. Early life Subbaiah hails from Sengottai in Tirunelveli distri ...

Kali N. Rathnam Narayana Padaiyatchi Ratnam (c. 1897 – August 1950), popularly known as "Kali" N. Ratnam, was a Tamil stage and film artist known for his roles as a comedian in Tamil movies of the 1930s and 1940s. Renowned Tamil actor and politician M. G. Ra ...

M. G. Chakrapani Maruthur Gopalan Chakrapani (13 January 1911 – 17 August 1986), commonly known as Ettan ("elder brother" in Malayalam), was an Indian actor and producer based in the Tamil film industry. He was the elder brother of actor-politician M. G ...

*K. K. Perumal *M. E. Madhavan *A. Karunanidhi *Narayana Pillai ;Female cast *

as Mayavathi *

C. T. Rajakantham C. T. Rajakantham (1917–2002) was a Tamil stage and film actress. She was the mother-in-law of playback singer Tiruchi Loganathan and grandmother of playback singers and popular music show judges T. L. Maharajan and Deepan Chakkravarthy E ...

;Dance * Lalitha * Padmini

Production

The story is based on a folk tale and the film was produced at Modern Theatres that was located on the outskirts of

Salem Salem may refer to: Places Canada Ontario * Bruce County ** Salem, Arran–Elderslie, Ontario, in the municipality of Arran–Elderslie ** Salem, South Bruce, Ontario, in the municipality of South Bruce * Salem, Dufferin County, Ontario, part ...

. The dances by Lalitha and Padmini were choreographed by K. K. Sinha.

Soundtrack

Music was composed by

G. Ramanathan Gopalan Iyer Ramanathan was an Indian music composer for Tamil movies. He is also known as ''Isai Methai'' (Genius of Music) or ''Sangeetha Chakravarthy'' (Emperor of Music) and is considered to be one of the influential Tamil music composers ...

while the lyrics were penned by A. Maruthakasi and Ka. Mu. Sheriff. Singer is T. R. Mahalingam.

Playback singer A playback singer, also known as a ghost singer, is a singer whose singing is pre-recorded for use in films. Playback singers record songs for soundtracks, and actors or actresses lip-sync the songs for cameras; the actual singer does not app ...

M. L. Vasanthakumari Madras Lalitangi Vasanthakumari (popularly referred to as MLV) (3 July 1928 – 31 October 1990) was a Carnatic musician and playback singer for film songs in many Indian languages. MLV and her contemporaries D. K. Pattammal and M. S. Subbulak ...

. ''Pennenum Maaya Peyaam Poi Maadharai'' is the first film song penned by A. Maruthakasi.

Reception

According to

Randor Guy Madabhushi Rangadorai (born 8 November 1937), better known by his pen name Randor Guy, is an Indian lawyer, columnist and film and legal historian associated with the English language newspaper ''The Hindu''. He is also the official editor of the ...

, this movie was a flop s at the box-office. This was supported in M. Karunanidhi's autobiography. Karunanidhi had written that to recover from this flop in 1949, mogul T.R. Sundaram decided to make "Manthiri Kumari" movie in a grand style and succeeded well in 1950."Mayavathi", nevertheless is "remembered for: Lalitha-Padmini’s dances, and the daring romantic scenes between the lead pair."

References

External links

* - First film song by A. Maruthakasi {{Modern Theatres Indian romance films Films based on Indian folklore Films scored by G. Ramanathan 1940s Tamil-language films 1940s romance films Indian black-and-white films