character. K. B. Sundarambal was chosen to play Avvaiyar, reprising her role in the 1953 film of the same name. Nagesh was cast as Dharumi, and had a call sheet of one-and-a-half days to finish his portion. Besides directing, producing and writing, Nagarajan appeared as Nakkeerar. M. Balamuralikrishna initially wanted to portray Hemanatha Bhagavathar but Nagarajan refused, believing T. S. Balaiah would be able to emote the character better. Balamuralikrishna agreed, and remained on the film as a singer. Filming Thiruvilaiyadal was shot on a custom-built set at Vasu Studios in Madras (now Chennai). It was filmed in Eastmancolor, thereby making it Nagarajan's first picture to be shot in colour. Before he began filming, Nagesh learned that Ganesan's arrival was delayed because his make-up had not been completed; he asked Nagarajan whether they could film any solo sequences, which included a scene where Dharumi laments his misfortune in the Meenakshi Amman Temple. While filming, Nagesh spontaneously came up with the line "Varamaattan. Varamaattan. Avan nichchaiyam varamaattan. Enakku nalla theriyum. Varamaattan" (He won't come. He won't come. He will definitely not come. I know he won't come). According to the actor, two incidents inspired him. One involved two assistant directors discussing whether Ganesan would be ready before or after lunch; one said he would be ready, and the other said he would not. The other was when Nagesh overheard a passerby talking to himself about how the world had fallen on bad times. He also took inspiration from Mylapore Krishnasamy Iyer. Dubbing of the scenes with Nagesh and Ganesan was completed soon after the footage was shot. After watching the scenes twice, Ganesan asked Nagarajan not to remove even a single frame of Nagesh's portions from the final cut, because he believed that those scenes along with the ones involving Balaiah would be the highlights of the film. The conversations between Shiva and Dharumi were improvised by Ganesan and Nagesh, not scripted by Nagarajan. Thiruvilaiyadal was the first Tamil film since Jagathalapratapan (1944) in which the lead actor plays five roles in one scene. Ganesan does so during the song "Paattum Naane", where he sings and plays four instruments: the veena, mridangam, flute and jathi. Asked by his biographer, T. S. Narayanawami, about the Tandava he performed in the film, Ganesan replied that he simply learned the movements necessary for the dance and followed the choreographer's instructions. Thiruvilaiyadal was the last