Sheela

Sheela Biography

Sheela was a popular actress of yesterdays. She worked most for Malayalam and Tamil movies. She holds a unique record. Prem Nazir – Sheela pair holds the Guinness books of world records for acting maximum number of movies as hero and heroine. They acted 107 movies as pair, almost an unbreakable record. Apart from Prem Nazir, she has acted with contemporary heroes of her times. Satyan, Madhu and Vincent were among them. Yet she is remembered most for her pairing and wonderful screen chemistry with Prem Nazir.

Sheela is a part of the historic movie of Malayalam Chemmeen. Based on the novel Chemmeen written by Thakazhi Sivasankara Pillai, when Ramu Kariyat decided to do a movie, he casted Sheela in the leading role opposite Satyan and Madhu. Karuthamma – the role played by Sheela was the love interest of Madhu, but her parents get her married to Satyan. Chemmeen is the best movie ever made on Malayalam screen and it’s the biggest blockbuster hit of this language too. This movie with Salil Chaudary’s music was the first Malayalam movie to receive President’s award for best film in National awards.

Sheela has done wonderful acting in movies like Vazve maayam opposite Satyan and Kalli Chellamma opposite Prem Nazir. Her debut movie was Paasam of Tamil, yet she concentrated most on Malayalam movies. Her strong contender was none other than Sarada and very often, her work was compared with her. In the movie Tulabharam, for which Sarada got National awards, Sheela played supporting role as Sarada’s friend. She had won less awards comparing with Sharada, both in state level as well as national level. Yet she had fans all over Kerala, particularly college boys of that time. She won Kerala state awards thrice during early 70’s.

She has worked as Christian lady in many movies as well as Hindu queen – the heroine of Vadakkan Pattukal. Kadathunattu Maakkam and kannappanunni belong to this category. During 80’s she took break from Malayalam movies. In 2005, she returned to silver screen with her powerful performance in Satyan Anthikad’s Manasinakkare. Then followed a string of movies – Chandra mukhi and Akale need special mention. In Manasinakkare, we saw the comic face of this actress and Kerala viewers gave a warm welcome. That’s the reason why she is busy in acting field now.

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Updated: May 27, 2018