After many years, veteran actor Ramarajan met his Karagattakaran co-star Kanaka, with the duo exchanging warm memories from the past. On Monday, the stars of the iconic 1989 film shared lunch together and fondly reminisced, engaging in heartfelt conversations about their journey and memories associated with the film and their career.
Directed by Gangai Amaran, the film also starred Santhana Bharathi, Chandrasekhar, Goundamani, Senthil, Shanmugasundaram, Raja Bahadur, Gandhimathi and Kovai Sarala. The film revolves around two karakattam dancers who fall in love with each other and their pursuit in overcoming hurdles to be together. Karagattakaran was a landmark film in Tamil cinema, becoming a major commercial success and propelling the careers of Ramarajan and Kanaka. The latter marked her debut in the Tamil film industry. Karagattakaran was also celebrated for bringing the art of Karagam to popular culture, Ilaiyaraaja's evergreen music, screenplay, and Goundamani and Senthil's comedy track. It is to be noted that the film marked the duo's 100th film as a combo.
While Ramarajan continued to act until 1999 in many films, they gradually came down after the 2000s. After a 11-year gap in 2012, he acted in the film Medhai which was followed by another hiatus. In 2024, he acted in Saamaniyan. Kanaka also played several roles in leading Tamil and Malayalam films before discontinuing acting in 2000.
It is noteworthy that Kanaka has largely stayed away from media appearances and public interactions for many years. It is also significant that this is one of the rare occasions where both of them have met and spoken after a long time.
In 2019, Amaran had expressed interest in doing a sequel for Karagattakaran with the original cast, which however, did not materialise as Ramarajan opposed to making a second part to the classic.
