I was born and brought up happily in Madras. My area of joy was Egmore, my grandparents’ house. It was opposite Museum theatre – a very special place in my life. The green space behind the theatre used to be our play area. That was our Amazon, our Congo. I was Tarzan and Phantom there. 

In the evenings we would watch plays at the theatre. It was also where my career in theatre started in 1961. My parents lived in Nungambakkam and I visited them in the weekends. It was a very small house, but it was where the Nungambakkam Ladies Club held there meetings, the Padma Seshadri Bala Bhavan School was started, and the United Amateur Artistes’ drama rehearsals used to happen in the evenings. Though my father was an ordinary government servant, since he was a theatre personality, I had the opportunity to meet many actors including Makkal Thilagam Sivaji Ganesan, Gemini Ganesan and Savithri Amma. 

In the 1960s – 70s the Marina beach used to have this famous eatery. I would have watched Kadhalikka Neramillai 20 times just to see the Marina beach. My cinema career too started in Madras. It made me a big actor. The city taught us a lot of values, it taught us friendship. There was an innocence about Madras that is lacking in Chennai. Sadly, we have started to fight for survival here.  

(As told to Deepa H Ramakrishnan )