'All Rounder' is the best suited for this multi talented woman. She is a singer, actress, director, music director, producer, and studio owner. She is the reigning queen of Telugu Cinema for the past 60 years. Bhanumati is born to Saraswatamma and Bommaraju Venkata Subbaiah as their third kid on 7th September 1925.
Bhanmati picked up singing when she was a kid. She used to watch lot of stage 
plays as her father used to don roles in them. At that time she did not have any inkling of acting. But her father used to urge her to act. In those days, acting is a taboo for the upper cast people. Fortunately a lady called Tanguturi Surya Kumari entered cinema field. That gave inspiration for Bhanumati's father to make Bhanumati as an actress.
Suddenly she is given an offer for 'Kalindi' role in 'Vara Vikrayam'(1939) film. She acted reluctantly in that movie and she got rave reviews as an actress with that film. Her next film was 'Malathi Madhavam'. She has done a little bit of schooling. So she tried to finesse her education while acting. She used to read lot of literary works and then became a writer herself.
Though she did good acting in 'Vara Vikrayam', 'Malathi Madhavam', 'Dharma Patni' and 'Bhaktimala', it was 'Krishna Prema' that turned her career around. During the shooting of the film, she was introduced to Rama Krishna, an assistant director for that film. Their introduction led to love and finally ended up in marriage. So, it all started with 'Krishna Prema' and ended as 'Rama Krishna Prema'. Bhanumati has a very strong and unyielding will. Her parents did not want her to marry Rama Krishna. But she went ahead with her decision to marry Rama Krishna. This celebrity couple is one of the most stable couple from cinema industry.
She quitted films after marriage, as she preferred the role of housewife. But Rama Krishna wanted her to act. She reentered films with 'Swarga Seema'. She did a vamp kind of role in that film. Interesting that film turned out to be a milestone in Bhanumati career. She acted as 'Subbu' in that film, who comes to the city and changes her name as Sujatha to become a big person. During that process, she disturbs the family life of a newspaper editor, who helped her grow big. Her song in that film 'Ohoho Pavurama' made waves in the music industry. After that she acted in all hit films.
She established a banner called 'Bharani Pictures' on her son's name and produced films like 'Ratnamala', Prema, Chakrapani, Laila Majnu, Batasari, Vipra Narayana. All these films were aesthetically made and commercially became successful. Two of the most powelful films by Bhanumati are 'Malliswari' and 'Vipra Narayana'. She also acted in Tamil and Hindi films. She acted with Ashok Kumar in Tamil, MGR, Sivaji Ganesan and Gemini Ganesan in Tamil and NTR, ANR and Jaggayya in Telugu.
She wrote a series of stories in the name of 'Athagari Kathalu'. She had noble fans too. Dr. Sarvepalli Radha Krishnan is a great fan of her. Incidentally, he is the one who conferred the award of Padmasri to her. Other noted fans of her include Bejawada Gopal Reddy, PV Rajamannar, Kodavaganti Kutumba Rao and Chakrapani.
In her film 'Vipranarayana', she utters a dialogue that 'KonevaDu ratnanne vetukkunToo vastaaDu'. Like that she never craved for any awards. She got a string of awards. In 1956, she is conferred with 'Padmasri'. Later on Andhra University and SV University have given her honorary doctorate. She is also received 'Raghupathi Venkayya Award' by AP Government. Tamil Nadu Government has appointed Bhanumati as the principal of the Music Institute. She got lot of awards for her biographical film 'Naalo Nenu'.
She is of 75 years old now. She is still going strong like a woman of steel. She is recently signed up for a historical mythological film to be produced by Bhargav Arts as the mother of Hero. Idlebrain.com wishes her a 75 more years of Golden period in Telugu Cinema.
