Sundaram Mathura-Nayagam (24 September 1906 - 03 February 1972) was a pioneer of Sinhala cinema, producing the first ever Sinhala talkie, ''

Kadawunu Poronduwa ''Kadawunu Poronduwa'' ( Sinhala: ''කඩවුනු පොරොන්දුව'', "The Broken Promise") was the first film to be made in the Sinhala language; it is generally considered to have heralded the coming of Sinhala Cinema. The fil ...

''.

Career

Hailing from

Madurai Madurai ( , also , ) is a major city in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu. It is the cultural capital of Tamil Nadu and the administrative headquarters of Madurai District. As of the 2011 census, it was the third largest Urban agglomeration in ...

, South India, Nayagam was originally an industrialist, making soaps and perfumes at factories both in Madurai and

Ceylon Sri Lanka (, ; si, ශ්‍රී ලංකා, Śrī Laṅkā, translit-std=ISO (); ta, இலங்கை, Ilaṅkai, translit-std=ISO ()), formerly known as Ceylon and officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka, is an ...

. With the flourishing of Indian cinema in the 1940s, he established his own cinema company, ''Sri Murugan Navakala Limited'', named after the Hindu deity

Murugan Kartikeya ( sa, कार्त्तिकेय, Kārttikeya), also known as Skanda, Subrahmanya, Shanmukha (), and Murugan ( ta, முருகன்), is the Hindu god of war. He is the son of Parvati and Shiva, the brother of Ganesha ...

. The company was based in Madurai, owning a studio (''Chitrakala Movietone'') at Thiruparankundram. Nayagam's first venture into film was the 1946

Tamil language Tamil (; ' , ) is a Dravidian language natively spoken by the Tamil people of South Asia. Tamil is an official language of the Indian state of Tamil Nadu, the sovereign nations of Sri Lanka and Singapore, and the Indian territory of Pudu ...

film '' Kumaraguru'', directed by Bengali director Jothish Sinha. His second film, a patriotic film entitled '' Thaai Nadu'', was also in Tamil, being released on the day of India's independence.

''Kadawunu Poronduwa''

According to Nayagam, his Sinhala friends enjoyed Hindi and Tamil films but were disappointed that they did not have films in their own language. Nayagam was thus inspired to produce a film in the Sinhala language. After considering several storylines, he settled on a popular Sinhala stage play, going on to produce ''Kadawunu Poronduwa''. The film was shot at his own studio, with all technicians from India but the cast brought from the island country for this purpose. The film's debut in Ceylon was attended by the head of the ministerial cabinet,

D. S. Senanayake Don Stephen Senanayake ( si, දොන් ස්ටීවන් සේනානායක,; ta, டி. எஸ். சேனநாயக்கா; 21 October 1884 – 22 March 1952) was a Ceylonese statesman. He was the first Prime Mi ...

; nevertheless, the film received mixed reactions in the country. While the average filmgoer was happy to watch a film that in their own language, critics said the film was ''overtly “Indian” in content and form.''

Filmography

References

External links

* {{IMDb name, 9502017 Sri Lankan film producers Film producers from Tamil Nadu Businesspeople from Madurai Tamil film producers 20th-century Indian businesspeople