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When God created Villupuram Chinnaiah Ganesan, he probably made
him for only one thing _ acting.
For, Chinnaiah Ganesan, later to be known as `Sivaji` Ganesan,
was to acting what Michaelangelo was for painting, Mozart for music
and Bradman for cricket.
Acting was not what he did for a livelihood, it was life itself
for him.
"I cannot imagine what I would I have been if I had not made it
as anactor," he was to confess later to one of his interviewers.
God perhaps threw away the mould after creating him. Till his
last, Sivaji was sui generis.
But his taking to acting was in itself a drama of sorts. Born in
1927 in Sirkali in Tamil Nadu, Sivaji Ganesan, became part of a
travelling troupe in Villupuram at the age of seven.
His first role in a play was as a white soldier. When his father
came to know about that, he gave him a dressing down. Despite this
tongue-lashing, Sivaji`s ardour for acting did not go away.
As it happens, he ran away from his home and joined a drama
troupe named Yadharthanama Ponnuswamy and Company. Before he got any
part in their plays, Sivaji enacted his own drama saying that he was
an orphan. Soon, he was on his way to what destiny had ordained.
Though naturally endowed with a booming voice and a protean face
that could mirror myriad emotions, it was during his drama days that
Sivaji fine-tuned his innate skills.
He learnt dance (bharathanatyam, kathak, kathakali) and
music, and before long he was a complete artiste.
During his drama days, Sivaji was well known for his portrayal of
Noorjahan (yes, a woman`s role).
Popular acceptance came to him when he acted in C N Annadurai`s
`Sivaji Kanda Indhu Rajyam`, a historical on the Maratha emperor
Shivaji.
He was asked to play the role at the last moment when the lead
actor (a directorial touch by the ultimate Auteur) backed out.
It is said he memorized the entire 95 pages of dialogues in a
day. His performance was so intense and engrossing that the
eponymous name became his real name.
Sivaji followed Annadurai into filmdom. He made his film debut
playing the lead role in `Parasakthi` (1952). The film is one of the
most controversial films in the history of Tamil cinema, replete
with booming and resonant monologues.
It owed its success in large part to its dialogues written by
`Kalaignar` M Karunanidhi who used the film to express his ideas on
religion, God and priesthood.
The success of the film not only made Sivaji a star, but also the
official icon of the DMK party for some years.
The film set Karunanidhi on a long career of writing for films.
For Sivaji, it was the equivalent of scoring a triple hundred on
debut. It was such a consummate portrayal that nobody believed that
it was his first movie.
In fact, as he himself said: "I climbed the Everest in the first
movie itself".
From then on, there was no looking back. He acted in almost all
kinds of genres, in all kind of roles with all kinds of shades.
"His oevre is mind-boggling. There is no single actor in the
world who has had so much variety to offer," Kamal Hassan used to
say.
Moving away from the DMK`s atheistic politics, he acted in
several mythologicals _ `Sampoorna Ramayanam` (1958) and
`Thiruvilaiyadal` (1965), nationalist historicals _ `Veerapandya
Kattoboman` (1960), his most famous film, and biographicals _
`Kappalotiya Thamizhan` (1961).
`Veerapandiya Kattaboman` won Sivaji the Best Actor Award at the
Afro-Asian Festival in Cairo.
Twentieth Century Fox bought over the telecasting rights of one
of his best known films _ `Thillana Mohanambal` (1968) and The
Washington Post hailed him as India`s Clark Gable!
His famous movies were: `Pempudu Koduku` (1953), `Poongothai`
(1953), `Mudhal Thedhi` (1955), `Amara Deepam` (1956), `Tenali
Raman` (1956), `Rangoon Radha` (1956), `Ambikapathy` (1957),
`Schoolmaster` (1958), `Maragatham` (1959), `Pasamalar` (1961),
`Pavamanippu` (1961), `Iruvar Ullam` (1963), `Karnan` (1964), `Motor
Sundaram Pillai` (1966), `Kandan Karunai` (1967), `Thangai` (1967),
`Kaval Deivam` (1969), `Vietnam Veedu` (1970), `Gnanavoli` (1972),
`Muthal Mariyathai` (1985) and `Thevar Magan`
(1992). | 
