Don Sirisena
Arandara Kankanamlage Don Sirisena, popuarly as Don Sirisena, was an actor in Sri Lankan cinema and theater. One of the most popular comedy artists ever in Sri Lankan film history, Sirisena had a career spanned about two decades acted more than 150 films.
Personal life
Don Sirisena was born on 1934 in Borella, British Ceylon as the youngest in a family of five. His father was a police officer and mother was a housewife. He had two elder brothers and two elder sisters.Sirisena was married to Enid Saluwadana, where the couple has one daughter, Sujeewā and one son, Sanjaya. Sirisena had no intention to introduce his children to acting, which resulted them to be business persons.
His wife Enid was the elder sister of popular actress Damitha Saluwadana. After a career more than four decades in cinema, theatre and television, Damitha died on 27 November 2015 at the age of 67. Sirisena's one of the nephews, Dunstan Nandalal is also an actor.
Sirisena died in 1986 at the age of 51 after suffering from prolong illness.
Career
Sirisena started acting in stage plays since childhood. After seeing his theatre performances, Ariyadasa Pieris came to meet him to invite his new film Sobana Sitha. With that, Sirisena started his cinema career in 1964 with the film Sobana Sitha. Since then, he continued act in more than 150 films particularly as the supporting comedian with other popular comedy actors of his era such as Freddie Silva, B. S. Perera and Wimal Kumara de Costa. His final cinema appearance came through 1991 film Ali Baba Saha Horu Hathaliha, five years after his death.He fell ill from time to time since film debut. In 1970s, he was seriously ill and spent almost a year in bed. During this time, he had slow down the cinema career. However, after some rest, he started to perform as a supportive comedian in number of films in golden 70s. Apart from comedy roles, he also performed in few dramatic roles in the films such as: Hadawath Naththo, Rail Paara and Kiwulegedara Mohottala. In the film Rail Paara, he played the role as a blind person, and in the film Kiwulegedara Mohottala, he played as a Vedda leader.
Apart from acting, Sirisena worked as a dolak and tabla player of the Music Association on Southern Road, Mount Lavinia, where singer Walter Fernando is one of his colleague. Although he was a regular member of the Association, he was soon forced to step away from music due to his involvement in films. He also sporadically appeared in threatre and performed in popular stage plays such as: Sivammā Dhanapāla and Kaḍavunu Poronduva.