Kalai Kovil

An impoverished man rises from rags to riches by becoming a veena vidwan, but almost loses it in the lap of a danseuse and the lavishness of liquor. == Cast ==

;Male cast • S. V. Subbaiah • R. Muthuraman • Nagesh • V. Gopalakrishnan • V. S. Raghavan ;Female cast • Chandrakantha • Rajasree • Jayanthi • S. N. Lakshmi == Production ==

After the success of Kadhalikka Neramillai (1964), its producer and director C. V. Sridhar decided to make his next directorial venture based on the life of a musician. His frequent collaborator, writer Chithralaya Gopu met up with him at Marina Beach to discuss their next project which he wanted to be a comedy, but Sridhar told him to listen to the story he already finished writing, the story that became the film Kalai Kovil. Gopu was assigned as the film's assistant dialogue writer. After listening to the story, composer M. S. Viswanathan decided to produce the film along with Ganga under the banner Bhagyalakshmi Productions. Chitti Babu played the veena offscreen for Muthuraman. S. V. Ranga Rao was Sridhar's initial choice for the lead role; since he did not turn up on the sets on the first day of the shoot, he was replaced with S. V. Subbaiah who initially refused to play the role as he was asked to sport a fake beard which he was not comfortable with but later relented. == Soundtrack ==

The soundtrack was composed by Viswanathan–Ramamoorthy (a duo consisting of M. S. Viswanathan and T. K. Ramamoorthy) and the lyrics were penned by Kannadasan. The song "Deviyar Iruvar" is set in the Carnatic raga known as Shree, while "Thangaratham Vanthathu" is set in Abhogi. Shyam was the violinist of the latter song, which attained popularity. He felt diffident in playing the classical-themed song as he was then more comfortable with westernised songs. R. Muthuraman was featured as a Veena artiste. Hence, some of the songs had Veena for background music. The Veena was played by Chitti Babu (musician). == Release and reception ==

Kalai Kovil was released on 25 September 1964. The film received positive reviews from critics who praised the music, performances of the cast, the screenplay, dialogues and direction by Sridhar. The film was commercially unsuccessful. == References ==