(b. Oct. 1, 1927, Tamil Nadu; d. July 21, 2001, Tamil Nadu), original name Villupuram Chiniah Pillai Ganesan , one of the major stars of the Tamil cinema, who has acted in over 300 films. Named for the deity worshipped for success in all endeavours, Ganesan was primarily brought up by his mother, his father being in and out of the jail due to his involvement with the freedom movement. Dropping out of school and running away from home, Ganesan joined a drama company and played both male and female roles on stage. An amazingly prolific actor, Ganesan made his mark while playing the title role of the Maratha emperor Shivaji in C.N. Annadurai's play Sivaji Kanda Indhu Rajyam . The historical character gave him his screen name. When Annadurai formed the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) political party in 1949, Ganesan joined the party and made his film debut with the classic DMK film Parasakthi (1952), scripted by the future Tamil Nadu chief minister, M. Karunanidhi. Ganesan played a character that made him the party's dominant popular icon. By the mid-1950s, however, he had begun to move away from the DMK, journeying through several politically disparate alliances, with, for example the Congress Party and the Janata Dal. He turned his back on DMK's atheist policies and acted in several mythological films ( Sampoorna Ramayanam [1958], Thiruvillaiyadal [1965], among others), which brought him fame as an actor. But even before he parted ways with the DMK, Ganesan played a negative role in Thirumbi Paar . A few years later, he repeated the experiment in Rangoon Radha (1956) with success. Veerapandiya Kattaboman won Sivaji the Best Actor Award at the Afro-Asian Festival in Cairo. Twentieth Century Fox bought over the telecasting rights of one of his best known films - Thillana Mohanambal (1968) and The Washington Post hailed him as India's Clark Gable! A member of the Rajya Sabha from 1982-88, Sivaji had a more significant iconic presence among the Tamil middle-class leading to his 1980s-90s deification, than MGR could ever acquire. He has won several awards including the Padma Shri in 1966, the Padma Bhushan in 1984, and the Dadasaheb Phalke Award for his contribution to Indian Cinema in 1997.