Gemini Studios was an Indian

film studio A film studio (also known as movie studio or simply studio) is a major entertainment company that makes films. Today, studios are mostly financing and distribution entities. In addition, they may have their own studio facility or facilities; how ...

based in

Madras Chennai, also known as Madras ( its official name until 1996), is the capital and largest city of Tamil Nadu, the southernmost state of India. It is located on the Coromandel Coast of the Bay of Bengal. According to the 2011 Indian ce ...

Tamil Nadu Tamil Nadu (; , TN) is the southernmost States and union territories of India, state of India. The List of states and union territories of India by area, tenth largest Indian state by area and the List of states and union territories of Indi ...

. It was launched when

S. S. Vasan Subramaniam Srinivasan (4 January 1904 – 26 August 1969), popularly known by his screen name S. S. Vasan, was an Indian journalist, writer, advertiser, film producer, director and business tycoon. He is the founder of the Tamil-language maga ...

, a businessman of many ventures (including the ownership of

Ananda Vikatan ''Ananda Vikatan'' is a Tamil-language weekly magazine published from Chennai, India. History ''Ananda Vikatan'' was started by Late Pudhoor Vaidyanadhaiyar in February 1926 as a monthly publication. The issue for December 1927 was not publishe ...

) bought Motion Picture Producers' Combines from Krishnaswamy Subrahmanyam and renamed it. The studio re-opened under the name Gemini. Despite the common beliefs about a lucky racehorse or the astrological sign of his wife, it was the logo Vasan chose that led to the name. Subrahmanyam had shown him a picture of his very young boys, blowing on toy trumpets in the nude. Vasan chose the pose to craft the logo and hence the name Gemini—The Twins. The new facade also had statues of ‘The Gemini Twins’, blowing the bugle. Gemini Studios served as a breeding ground for innumerable artists and technicians for the south Indian Film Industry. The

Gemini twins Castor and Pollux (or Polydeuces) are twin half-brothers in Greek and Roman mythology, known together as the Dioscuri or Dioskouroi. Their mother was Leda, but they had different fathers; Castor was the mortal son of Tyndareus, the king of ...

became a household symbol and the Gemini flyover was named after the original studio at that junction. Gemini Studios is one of the few producers in Tamil cinema to survive beyond 100 productions along with AVM, Modern Theatres, Thenandal Films, etc. A chapter called "Poets and Pancakes" is based upon Gemini studios which is an excerpt from a novel ''My years with the Boss'' by Asokamitran is in the English curriculum o
Class 12th Flamingo textbook by NCERT.

Early history

S.S.Vasan bought from his friend K. Subramanyam a Film distribution business ''Motion Picture Producers' Combines studio'' on Mount Road for Rs.86,427-11-9,the odd figure arrived at through including the interest on unpaid wages of the employees and it was renamed as Gemini Studios in the year 1940. G. Kamble, a painter from Kolhapur worked at the studios in his early life.

Timeline

Aftermath

After the studio was abandoned for two decades, the headquarters was demolished and replaced by a luxury hotel called The Park in 2002.

References

External links

Gemini Studio Official Website
{{Authority control Film distributors of India Film production companies of India Film production companies based in Chennai Indian film studios Mass media companies established in 1940 Indian companies established in 1940 Indian companies disestablished in 1975 Mass media companies disestablished in 1975