Veteran actor Sarath Babu ‘versatile and creative’

Veteran actor Sarath Babu breathed his last on Monday afternoon at a city hospital in Hyderabad.

The 71-year-old was suffering from kidney and liver-related issues leading to many speculations over his health in the past few weeks.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi said on Twitter: “Shri Sarath Babu Ji was versatile and creative. He will be remembered for several popular works in several languages during his long film career. Pained by his passing away. Condolences to his family and admirers. Om Shanti.”

A regular in the Telugu and Tamil film industries, Sarath Babu had acted with almost all the leading heroes and heroines of the industry.

To say that Sarath Babu was a ‘character artist’ would be grossly undermining his versatility and space in the film industry.

His ubiquitous presence in Tamil, Telugu and some Kannada and Malayalam films made him a household name from the 70s, owing to his seemingly effortless portrayal of a wide range of characters.

Though he started with aspirations to become a hero, Sarath was wise enough to accept roles from directors like K Balachander, Vamsi and Dasari Narayan Rao where he was depicted in a few lead roles, strong supporting characters and villainous portrayals.

His repertoire spelt versatility across acting with generations of actors.

One cannot imagine anybody else in the role of Raghupathi (Kamal Hasan’s friend) in K Viswanath’s Sagara Sangamam and also as the helpless poverty-stricken brother of Radhika in Swati Mutyam.

Similarly in Vamsy’s Sitara as a bankrupt landlord and as a forest ranger with a hidden weakness in Anveshana — his portrayals were convincing.