Padmini

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Padmini
Padmini (1932-2006)
Birth name	Padmini
Born	June 12, 1932 Thiruvananthapuram, Travancore, British India
Died	September 24, 2006 Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India
Notable roles	As a dancer in the Tamil film Thillana Mohanambal

Padmini (June 12, 1932 - September 24, 2006) was an Indian actress and trained Bharathanatyam dancer who acted in over 250 Indian movies.

Apart from Bollywood she also acted in films in other Indian regional languages viz. Malayalam, Tamil, Kannada and Telugu. She was fluent in all of the aforementioned languages, and was able to use her own voice to dub the films between these languages.

[edit] Biography

Born and raised in Thiruvananthapuram in what was then the princely state of Travancore (now the Indian state of Kerala), Padmini was the second daughter of Thankappan Pillai and Sarawathi Amma. Her sisters, Lalitha and Ragini, were also renowned film actresses. Together, the threesome were known as the Travancore sisters.

Padmini and her sisters were disciples of the noted Indian dancer Guru Gopinath . They learnt Keral natanam style of dancing from him. Film director Subrahmaniam noticed her talents while she was presenting 'Parijatha Pushpapaharanam 'in Trivandrum

At the age of 17, Padmini was cast as the heroine in Kalpana (1950), launching her film career. She acted in films for nearly 30 years.

Padmini was renowned for her linguistic ability, and dubbed her own voice onto versions of her movies destined for the Tamil, Telugu, Kannada and Malayalam markets. This cross-cultural linguistic ability made her a very significant figure in the history of 20th-century moviemaking in India.

Padmini co-starred with several of the most well-known actors in Indian film, including Sivaji Ganesan, M.G. Ramachandran, Raj Kapoor, Prem Nazir and Rajkumar.She had acted with Sivaji Ganesan in nearly 60 films.

Some of her popular Malayalam films include Prasanna, Snehaseema, Vivaahitha, Adhyaapika, Kumaarasambhavam, Nokkethadoorath kannumnatt, Vasthuhara, Dolar, etc.

She also starred in almost 400 Tamil films. Ezhe petum patukal was her first film in Tamil. Her association with superstar Sivaji Ganesan starts ith the film PanaM in 1952. Some of her noted Tamil films include Anp, Thankaperuma, Thillana Mohanambal, Viyatnam veeDu, Ethir Parathe, Mankayir thilakam , Poove Poo chooti vaa.

In two of her popular Bollywood films - Mera Naam Joker and Jis Desh Mein Ganga Behti Hai - she was paired against the legendary Bollywood star, Raj Kapoor. Her other Bollywood films included Payal (1957), Babubhai Mistry's Mahabharat (1965), etc.

Her most famous film was Thillana Mohanambal, a Tamil film where she plays a dancer pitted against a musician.

After her marriage in 1961 Padmini semi-retired from films and focused on married life and refining her classical dance. She settled in the United States and in 1977 opened her classical dance school in New Jersey, The 'Padmini School of Fine Arts'. Her school is today one of the largest Indian Classical Dance institutions in America.^{[citation needed]}

Padmini died of a heart attack in a hospital in the city of Chennai on September 24, 2006.