Kaviyoor Ponnamma is an Indian actress who appears in Malayalam films and television. She began her career performing in theatre dramas before foraying into cinema. She has also acted in TV serials and commercials and has playback singing credits in few films. Ponnamma is a four-time Kerala State Film Award for Second Best Actress winner. Her sister Kaviyoor Renuka was also an actress. Often called as the Mother to all actors, she has acted as mother of almost all actors in her career panning over decades.[1] At the age of 20, she played the mother of Sathyan and Madhu in the 1965 movie Thommente Makkal. She gained critical acclaim for acting as the mother of the actor Mohanlal.[2][3]
Life and career
As a five-year-old, she learned music and used to sing in stage shows.[4] She started acting in dramas when she was 14 years old with Mooladhanam by Thoppil Bhasi. After five years, came her first movie Kudumbini, in which she did the title role of the mother of two kids.[5]
Personal life
She was born to T. P. Damodharan and Gauri, as the eldest of seven children, on 10 September 1945 in Kaviyoor, Thiruvalla.[6] She has six siblings in which Kaviyoor Renuka (d. 2004), her younger sister, was also an actress.[7]
Ponnamma was married to film producer Maniswami in 1969. The couple has a daughter Bindhu who is married and settled in United States.[5] Ponnamma's husband Maniswami died in 2011.[8]