கவுண்டமணி

                                                              

Tamil Cinema has seen many comedians since NSK days starting from NSK,Balayya,Chandrababu,Nagesh, famous duo of goundar and senthil,Janakaraj,Vadivelu,Vivek, and now Santhanam. Everyone had their own trademark styles from slapstick comedy to funny jibe at others to reformist dialogues to friendly banter.Each one followed their own style and held command for many years in filmdom with that.But our subject has been exceptional atleast to me and many of his hard-core fanatics.

Goundamani-He was born in Valagundapuram, a village near Udumalaipettai in Tamil Nadu, India. His father was Karupaiah and mother was Annam. He started as a theater artist and then switched over to cinema easily, says Wikipedia.One of the very few actors in the industry to have come from theatre background.People who have come from this area have only excelled in industry and shone more brighter than others and he has been no exception to that.Tamil people need not fret over the fact that we missed the famous comedy duo of Laurel and Hardy for we had our own Goundamani and Senthil.They had their own dialogue writer in the name of A. Veerappan who collaborated with them for over a hundred movies and they together hold a record of around 450 movies till date.

As Santhanam holds forte in most of the tamil movies now, Goundamani duo acted in every released tamil movie during their career peak.They had a sidetrack or track close to the hero of the film.His combinations with Sathyaraj are legendary and they brought the best in their abilities.Rumors were that he demanded astronomical salary and conditions of a single song and a fight sequence in the movies he acted and accordingly there were movies he did all of that with the famous being "Velvetta Velvetta" song in Mettukudi.He had an amazing run of movies with all of the top heroes from Kamal,Rajini,Sarathkumar,Sathyaraj,Karthik,Prabhu,Vijaykanth who ruled the roost during their prime period.Amazing combination of him with Kamal can be seen in Singaravelan and Indian.

In the movie Baba or for the fact any of the Rajini movie he was the only one actor to have made fun of Rajini, he had started that way back from 16 vayadinile days to the prime comedy being in "Mannan" movie.Hailing from theatre background he could do performance oriented character roles as well which he did with amazing talent in many movies.He is one of the very few artistes to not give any interviews to magazines, keep his family away from movie limelight and also not adorn any make up to film functions.It was told many in the film industry dint even know that he had two daughters until he conducted marriage for them, such was his secrecy about his family life in his cine industry.

There were strong rumors of his death in media circles for some time before it died out and now he is hale and healthy though it has been said that he had a kidney transplant.His last movie was Jaggubhai with Sarathkumar.KS Ravikumar has been a director who has leveraged Goundamani to his best in many of his movies.Shankar has used him to the most in his movies like Gentleman and Indian.

There was a brief lull in his career when he along with Sathyaraj were without movies after which both of them came with a bang.His close friend in cinema has been Sathyaraj which is evident in chemistry between them in cine functions.He has given some of the amazing funny dialogues till date ranging from:

• MURGASEIKU IPA MOINER 200RUPPEES MOI ELUTHUVAR
• nthennamo social matter panneeralam... aana divorce case ellam varuthuppa.. naan enna courta judga...
• maappile, konjam vanthu ennoda southindian dianava konjam paaruppa... 
• ethu yena da jilepi konda entha mari kondaiya nan parthathe elaya pa...
• Lady: Enakku kushpu madhri thekkanum..
  Gounder: Kushpu kittaye edhachum palaya patta irundha vaangi pottukko po..
  Lady: Enakku Ulaga Alagi Aiswarya madhri thekkanum..
  Gounder: Cheiiii.. Modhal modhalla oru ponnu olaga alagi nu per vaangi irukku.. adhellam ungalukku porukkadhe.. indha moonjiku veveveeeee veeveeeeveee nu thekanumaam..
• Senthil: Ennanga maganey panrathu namba onu nenacha aandavan onnu ninaikiran
  Goundamani: Dai Naaye Annadavan ninikirathu irukanumda Nee yenda nenacha...    
• ADADA, NAATLA INDHA THOZHILADHIBARGAL THOLLAI THAANGA MUDIYALAI PAA, PUNNAAKKU VIKARAVAN....KUNDOOSI VIKARAVAN ELLAM THOZHILADHIBARAAM

In his daughter marriage:

  

 Thanks for all our rollicking comedies, your all movies and dialogues would keep us entertained for decades to come.......................................

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