Former Tamil Nadu Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa aspired to become a lawyer like her father when she was in school. She was pushed into the entertainment world by her mother, Sandhya, to deal with the family’s financial problems. Within a short span of time, the actress went on to become the uncrowned queen of Tamil cinema, until she quit films for good. Do you know that once Jayalalithaa refused to act with superstar Rajinikanth? Let’s tell you the reason. Just a couple of years before she started her political journey, Jayalalithaa herself had written a letter in response to an article, which suggested that she was not getting good offers in films. Her letter went viral in no time.
According to the letter written on a Poes Garden letterhead and dated June 10, 1980, that year superstar Rajinikanth’s blockbuster film Billa was released. Jayalalithaa had made it clear that she was not struggling to stage a comeback. “In fact, I have been turning down some excellent offers. Perhaps you don’t know that the heroine’s role in Balaji’s Billa, opposite Rajinikanth, was first offered to me. It was only after I refused to do the film that Balaji signed Sripriya for the role,” she wrote in the letter.
“Everyone knows that Balaji is one of India’s leading film producers and Rajinikanth is a Tamil film’s superstar. If I am capable of turning down such a dazzling offer, does that not prove conclusively that I am not in the least struggling to stage a comeback?” she added. She also stated that she is no longer interested in a film career.
By God’s grace, she was extremely well off financially and could continue to live like a queen for the rest of her life.
Billa is a 1980 Tamil-language action thriller film from 1980 directed by R Krishnamoorthy and backed by Suresh Balaje.The film stars Rajinikanth, Sripriya, and Balaji in the main leads. The film was a remake of 1978 Hindi film Don, written by Salim-Javed and starring Amitabh Bachchan in the titular role.
Jayalalithaa rose to prominence as a leading film actress in the mid-1960s. She was a prolific actor and has appeared in 140 films between 1961 and 1980, primarily in the Tamil, Telugu, and Kannada languages. Jayalalithaa received praise for her versatility as an actress and her dancing skills, earning the sobriquet ‘Queen of Tamil Cinema.’
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