''Yayathi'' is a

1938 Events January * January 1 – state-owned enterprise, State-owned railway networks are created by merger, in France (SNCF) and the Netherlands (Nederlandse Spoorwegen – NS). * January 20 – King Farouk of Egypt marries Saf ...

Indian,

Tamil language Tamil (, , , also written as ''Tamizhil'' according to linguistic pronunciation) is a Dravidian language natively spoken by the Tamil people of South Asia. It is one of the longest-surviving classical languages in the world,. "Tamil is one of ...

film directed by M. L. Tandon. The film featured

P. U. Chinnappa Pudukottai Ulaganathan Chinnaswamy Pillai (5 May 1916 – 23 September 1951), popularly known as P. U. Chinnappa, was an Indian actor and playback singer during the 30s era from Pudukottai, India. He is also credited as one of the first major ...

and M. V. Rajamma in the lead roles.

Plot

The story was based on the life of a puranic king

Yayati Yayati () is an emperor in Hindu tradition. He is described to be a Chandravamsha king. He is regarded to be the progenitor of the races of the Yadavas and the Pandavas. According to the Harivamsa, Yayati is the son of King Nahusha, and ...

found in the ''

Mahabharata The ''Mahābhārata'' ( ; , , ) is one of the two major Sanskrit Indian epic poetry, epics of ancient India revered as Smriti texts in Hinduism, the other being the ''Ramayana, Rāmāyaṇa''. It narrates the events and aftermath of the Kuru ...

''s ''

Adi Parva The Adi Parva ("Book of the Beginning") is the first of the eighteen ''parvas'' (books) of the Indian epic ''Mahabharata''. "Ādi" (wiktionary:आदि#Sanskrit, आदि) in Sanskrit means "first". Adi Parva traditionally has 19 parts and 236 ' ...

''.

Cast

The list is compiled from the database of

Film News Anandan Film News Anandan (born Mani) was an Indian film historian and photographer based in Chennai, Tamil Nadu. He was popularly known as the "walking encyclopedia" of Tamil cinema. Early life Anandan was born as Mani. His father P. K. Gnanasagara ...

and from the review article by

Randor Guy Madabhushi Rangadorai (; 8 November 1937 – 23 April 2023), better known by his pen name Randor Guy (), was an Indian lawyer, columnist and film and legal historian associated with the English language newspaper ''The Hindu''. He was also the of ...

;Male cast *P. U. Chinnappa *P. B. Rangachari *C. S. Shamanna *M. S. Subramania Bhagavathar *M. S. Babu *K. S. Harihara Iyer ;Female cast *M. V. Rajamma *C. S. M. Sulochana *T. S. Krishnaveni *S. C. Gomathi Bai *M. L. Rajambal

Production

The film was produced by Mohan Movietone of

Madurai Madurai ( , , ), formerly known as Madura, is a major city in the States and union territories of India, Indian state of Tamil Nadu. It is the cultural capital of Tamil Nadu and the administrative headquarters of Madurai District, which is ...

, and was directed by the

Hollywood Hollywood usually refers to: * Hollywood, Los Angeles, a neighborhood in California * Hollywood, a metonym for the cinema of the United States Hollywood may also refer to: Places United States * Hollywood District (disambiguation) * Hollywood ...

-trained filmmaker Manik Lal Tandon. The film was made in

Calcutta Kolkata, also known as Calcutta (List of renamed places in India#West Bengal, its official name until 2001), is the capital and largest city of the Indian States and union territories of India, state of West Bengal. It lies on the eastern ba ...

. An info is found in the review article that said, as reportedly said by M. V. Rajamma, that there were clashes between Chinnappa and Tandon during the shooting of the film and it was rumoured that the actor slapped the film maker.

Soundtrack

Music was composed by

Papanasam Sivan Paapanaasam Raamayya Sivan (26 September 1890 – 1 October 1973) was an Indian composer of Carnatic music and a singer. He was awarded the Madras Music Academy's Sangeetha Kalanidhi in 1971. He was also a film score composer in Kannada cinema a ...

who also penned the lyrics. There were 25 songs in the film and some are available as 78 rpm records now. The available songs are sung by

Reception

Writing in

the Hindu ''The Hindu'' is an Indian English-language daily newspaper owned by The Hindu Group, headquartered in Chennai, Tamil Nadu. It was founded as a weekly publication in 1878 by the Triplicane Six, becoming a daily in 1889. It is one of the India ...

review article in 2010,

says the film is remembered for "Chinnappa's performance and Tandon's deft direction."

References

{{reflist Hindu mythological films Films based on the Mahabharata Indian black-and-white films Films scored by Papanasam Sivan