It focuses on a hotel waiter who strives to reach greater heights after he becomes an actor to attain the love of his restaurateur's daughter.

Server Sundaram earned Nagesh and Balachander their breakthrough in Tamil cinema and led to many successful collaborations between the two.

It became the first Tamil film to show numerous behind-the-scenes looks at various processes involved in film-making such as the studio interiors and song recording.

Raghavan is pleasantly surprised, but to ensure that Sundaram's film career does not suffer from discovering the truth, he asks Radha to keep it a secret.

While Sundaram is busy shooting for the climax scene of a film, his mother falls down the footsteps of her home and is badly wounded.

[12] Balachander stated that he wrote the story of Server Sundaram for Nagesh after watching his dramatic performance in the film Naanum Oru Penn (1963).

[28] Nagesh, who in turn was impressed with Lakshmi's performance in the play, asked Balachander to have Meiyappan include her in the film.

[29] K. R. Vijaya was cast as Sundaram's love interest Radha, and Muthuraman as his friend Raghavan,[9] reprising the roles played by Shobha and Raja on stage.

[18] Goundamani, who later became a successful comedian in Tamil cinema, made his acting debut with this film in an uncredited, non-speaking role.

[34] In one sequence, Manorama is seen as an actress performing a scene for a film directed by S. V. Ranga Rao's character, using the concept of a film-within-a-film.

[37]: 00:00—00:09 According to historian S. Theodore Baskaran, the film shows a "persistent theme in Tamil cinema", that of the bond between mother and son.

[40] Writing for The New Indian Express, Sharada Narayanan considered Server Sundaram to be a biography of Nagesh's own life, a view also shared by Hindustan Times' Gautaman Bhaskaran.

[41][42] Theodore Baskaran, Ashish Rajadhyaksha and Paul Willemen, and critic Baradwaj Rangan noted similarities between Nagesh and Charlie Chaplin.

[45] Writing for Daily News Sri Lanka, S. Jegathiswaran noted that in Server Sundaram, Nagesh showed that "after having gained the social status one shouldn't forget one's past.

"[46] TT Srinath wrote for The Hindu that the film tells viewers to "distance the problem or challenge and see it from afar, thus helping us recognise that what we are experiencing is perhaps not as daunting as we tend to believe.

The music troupe for the song consisted of Noel Grant (drums), Mangalamurthy (accordion), Nanjappa (flute), Fobes (violin), Henry Daniel and Joseph Krishna.

[54] According to Gopal Krishnan, in his book, Chords & Raaga, "Avalukkenna" involved a "complicated arrangement of mambo and bossa nova.

[57] Baradwaj Rangan, writing for The Hindu, said, "Listen to the lazy drawl with which certain words taper off in 'Avalukkenna,' an antidote to the rock 'n' roll bounce in the rest of the song.

"[58] Live versions of "Avalukenna" have been performed by various Indian singers including Karthik,[59] Haricharan,[60] Shweta Mohan and Rahul Nambiar.

[74] Writing for Sport and Pastime on 9 January 1965, T. M. Ramachandran wrote that filmgoers who had persistently been watching films featuring "top stars in action, singing a duet or doing a romantic scene", would find Server Sundaram a welcome change, given that a comedian was playing the hero.

He considered the story "very thin", but added, "The directors deserve to be congratulated on their ingenuity in presenting such scenes and in creating a sustaining interest in the whole film, especially to those moviegoers who have not witnessed the play."

[34][28] Actor Kamal Haasan compared his 2015 film Uttama Villain (which also starred Balachander) to Server Sundaram, finding it to be "both emotional and humorous" like the latter.

[78] The success of Server Sundaram led to many collaborations between Nagesh and Balachander, such as Neerkumizhi (1965), Major Chandrakanth (1966), Edhir Neechal (1968) and Apoorva Raagangal (1975).

[79][80] Film historian Mohan Raman noted that by casting Nagesh in Server Sundaram, Balachander "made the comedian a serious actor.