Tenali Ramakrishna

Tenali Ramakrishna is a 1956 Telugu historical drama produced and directed by B. S. Ranga for Vikram Productions, based on Ch. Venkataramaiah’s stage play about the 16th-century poet and wit of Krishnadevaraya’s court. Akkineni Nageswara Rao plays Ramakrishna and N. T. Rama Rao plays Krishnadevaraya, with V. Nagayya, P. Bhanumathi and Jamuna; Viswanathan–Ramamoorthy composed the music. Released on 12 January 1956, it drew mixed reviews but was a commercial success, according to The Hindu, and won the President’s Silver Medal for Best Feature Film in Telugu.

What the story is about

Ramakrishna, a gifted but unrecognised Telugu and Sanskrit scholar from Tenali, sets out for Hampi with his wife Kamala and son Madhava to look for work. On the way he stops at a temple of the goddess Kali, who, amused by his courage and humour, offers him a choice between wisdom and wealth; he takes both, and she warns him he will be known as a Vikatakavi, a jester-poet whose cleverness mostly entertains others. Turned away in Hampi by the royal priest Tatacharya, he wins an audience with King Krishnadevaraya by solving a tricky inheritance dispute over seventeen elephants, and is made a court poet, earning the priest’s lasting rivalry just as the Deccan sultanates begin plotting against the Vijayanagara Empire.

Cast

• Akkineni Nageswara Rao as Tenali Ramakrishna
• N. T. Rama Rao as Krishnadevaraya
• V. Nagayya as Timmarusu
• P. Bhanumathi as Krishnasani
• Jamuna as Kamala, Ramakrishna’s wife
• Mukkamala as Tatacharya and Vangara Venkata Subbaiah as his assistant Appanna
• Sandhya as Queen Tirumala Devi, Mikkilineni as Kanakaraju and Kamaraju as Babur

How it was made

After the success of his first production, Maa Gopi (1954), Ranga planned a bilingual film on Tenali Ramakrishna, one of the Ashtadiggajas, the eight poets of Krishnadevaraya’s court, as the magazine Sithara recounts. He wrote it with Samudrala Sr., Kannadasan and Murugadasa, adapting Venkataramaiah’s comic Kannada play rather than the script of the 1941 Telugu film. Worried the play’s comedy alone would not carry a film, the writers added the politics of Krishnadevaraya’s reign. It was shot at Revathy Studios in Madras, as Ranga’s own studio was still being built. The Tamil version, Tenali Raman, starred Sivaji Ganesan as Ramakrishna and M. N. Nambiar as Tatacharya. Bhanumathi, initially reluctant, agreed because Ranga had shot films for her company; according to The Hindu, it is the only film in which she shared the screen with both Rama Rao and Nageswara Rao. Ranga shot the film with his brother-in-law B. N. Haridas, and P. G. Mohan edited it.

Music

Viswanathan–Ramamoorthy’s songs, with lyrics by Samudrala, were sung by Ghantasala, Madhavapeddi Satyam, P. Leela, P. Susheela and others, with Bhanumathi singing her own songs; they include an adaptation of Jayadeva’s ashtapadi “Chandana Charchita”. When Ghantasala refused payment for the 14 poems he sang, Ranga went to his home and gave his wife a hundred rupees for each. A review in Swatantra said the songs “help the film greatly”.

Release and reception

The film opened on 12 January 1956, with technical problems delaying it by a day or two in 13 centres; Tenali Raman followed on 3 February, and both versions were commercially successful. Reviews were mixed. Swatantra praised the pacing, Samudrala’s writing and Nageswara Rao, but found Bhanumathi “ill at ease”. Zamin Ryot called it disappointing, with a weak climax and thin characters, though it admired Ranga’s vision and the writing. Both criticised historical inaccuracies; Swatantra pointed out that the elephant puzzle was actually solved by Timmarusu, not Ramakrishna.

Awards and remake

At the 4th National Film Awards it won the President’s Silver Medal for Best Feature Film in Telugu and the All India Certificate of Merit for Best Feature Film. Ranga remade it in Kannada in 1982 as Hasyaratna Ramakrishna, which, according to The Hindu, was a commercial failure.

Where to watch Tenali Ramakrishna

We do not have a confirmed streaming platform for Tenali Ramakrishna on file. The OTT details on this page will be updated when a platform’s own listing confirms it.

Sources: the Wikipedia article on Tenali Ramakrishna and the reviews and articles it cites, linked above; Wikidata; our own cast and crew records.