K. V. Reddy
"[7] Kadiri Venkata Reddy was born on 1 July 1912 in a Telugu family in Tellamitta Palle near Tadipatri in Anantapur district in present-day Andhra Pradesh.
[15] After graduation, K. V. Reddy started a business named "The Standard Scientific Instruments Company" with his friend A. V. V. Krishna Rao.
[18] K. V. Reddy was invited by his childhood friend Moola Narayana Swamy to work in the production department of a film he was co-producing.
[21] While working as a production manager at Vauhini, K. V. Reddy prepared the script for a film based on the life of 15th century Telugu poet Pothana.
[18] Though it was opposed by various people in the company for K. V. Reddy's lack of directorial experience, Narayana Swamy greenlit the project.
[22][15] After the huge success of Bhakta Pothana, Narayana Swamy who had interests in other business ventures focused on film production.
[19] Narayana Swamy invested the capital required for building the studio while B. N. Reddy took up the responsibility of managing the construction work.
[10] But K. V. Reddy and his writers Pingali and Kamalakara Kameswara Rao changed the tone from the tragedy of King Lear to a more entertaining one for the film.
[28] Pathala Bhairavi was made as a bilingual film, shot in Telugu and Tamil simultaneously with both the versions having the same title.
The film focuses on a gardener's son who has to amass wealth equal to that of the king of Ujjain to marry his daughter and a sorcerer who has to sacrifice an intelligent and brave young man to Goddess Pathala Bhairavi to gain access to a statuette which can grant any wish.
After the film's release, the term Pedda Manushulu had negative connotations in Telugu culture for a long time.
[38] Taking only that point, replacing the younger brother with a sister, Narasaraju, Madhusudana Rao and K. V. Reddy wrote the script of Donga Ramudu.
[10] After the success of Pathala Bhairavi, Vijaya Productions selected the film's technical crew for an adaptation of Sasirekha Parinayam, also known as Mayabazar.
[44] In addition to the principal technicians and actors, a crew of 400, including light men, carpenters, and painters, worked on Mayabazar during production.
"), "Asamadiyulu" ("Friends"), "Tasamadiyulu" ("Enemies"), "Gilpam" and "Gimbali" ("bed-" and "room-mat"), later became part of Telugu vernacular.
He initially wanted to make this film for Annapurna Pictures' maiden production, but dropped the idea as the producer D. Madhusudhana Rao was not keen on it.
[53] Titled Pellilnati Pramanalu, the film starred Akkineni Nageswara Rao and Jamuna, with music composed by Ghantasala.
The film was simultaneously made in Tamil as Vaazhkai Oppandham with a slightly different cast that released the following year.
[55] Also, Ravana's reputation as a renowned Lord Siva devotee, made Rama Rao consider reprising the role in this film with a more layered representation of the character.
However, he accepted the role due to his respect towards K. V. Reddy for having directed Donga Ramudu (1955), the maiden venture of his own production house Annapurna Pictures.
[63] The songs and poems written by Balijepalli Lakshmikantha Kavi for his magnum opus play Satya Harischandriyamu in 1924 were already popular with the audience.
The film starred N. T. Rama Rao as Lord Siva and B. Saroja Devi in a triple role as Uma, Chandi and Gowri.
[75] K. V. Reddy started directing a folklore film titled Bhagya Chakramu for his own production company, Jayanthi Pictures with N. T. Rama Rao in the lead role.
In this situation, N. T. Rama Rao approached him with two scripts written by his collaborator Pingali — Chanakya Chandragupta and Sri Krishna Satya.
His son Srinivasa Reddy worked as an assistant director to his father on Uma Chandi Gowri Sankarula Katha (1968) and Bhagya Chakramu (1968).
Singeetam Srinivasa Rao, who would later become a doyen of South Indian cinema, worked with K. V. Reddy from Donga Ramudu (1955) till Uma Chandi Gowri Sankarula Katha (1968).
S. V. Ranga Rao acted in three of his films — Pathala Bhairavi, Pellinaati Pramanalu, Sri Krishna Satya.
Later, while making Yamadonga, my VFX supervisor and I spent two days just to figure out how KV Reddy had pulled off such amazing special effects back then.
[11] In 2012, on the occasion of K. V. Reddy’s birth centenary, a book on his film career was written by H. Ramesh Babu and Tanneeru Srinivas.
[85] Vedantam Sripatisarma, a film critic, wrote of him, "Kadiri Venkata Reddy stands out as one of the most seasoned minds of yesteryears who missed no moment in entertaining the viewer even inside a subject involving melancholy and drama.
