Lankan police recover world renowned director’s prized first international trophy

Sri Lankan police on Saturday recovered the stolen replica of the Golden Peacock trophy which the late Sri Lankan film maker Lester James Peries had won at the New Delhi International Film Festival in 1965.

The gold-plated replica, which was stolen from his house on Wednesday, the day of his funeral, was recovered from the overhead luggage rack of public bus No:177 operating between Kollupitiya and Kaduwela in Colombo.

It was apparently spotted by the cleaner and the driver of the bus and handed over to the police.

The wide media coverage that the theft received enabled its recovery.

The thieves had used the short span of time when the attention of Peries’s mourners was diverted to his coffin as it was being closed at the end of the Roman Catholic funeral service. But they may have panicked when the theft was reported by radio, television and the print media that evening and the next day, dropping it off in a public bus.

THE GOLDEN PEACOCK’S IMPORTANCE

The Golden Peacock trophy was close to Lester James Peries’ heart as it was the first ever international award he got in his 50-year career as a filmmaker. He received it at the New Delhi International Film Festival in 1965 for his 1964 production Gamperaliya (Change in the Village), based on a story by the renowned Sinhalese writer Martin Wickramasinghe.

After the loss of the replica was discovered it was speculated that attempts would be made to sell it to private collectors overseas, who would pay huge sums to get the trophy, the first ever international award given to a Sri Lankan film.

THE ORIGINAL’S DISAPPEARANCE

The original Golden Peacock made of 18 carat gold has also disappeared. It was with the producer of Gamperaliya, Anton Wickramasinghe, of Cine Lanka when it went missing. The mystery of its disappearance has not been solved.

The original was made of 18 carat gold because that was the maximum purity of gold that could be taken out of India at that time.

A screenshot from Lester James Peries's 1964 film Gamperaliya

Later, at the 31st India International Film Festival in New Delhi in 2000, the Government of India compensated Peries for the loss of the original by giving him a gold plated replica. He received it as part of his Lifetime Achievement Award.

It was this replica which was kept in a glass casket in his house on Dickman’s Road (now Dr Lester James Peries Mawatha) in Colombo.

The theft of the replica had caused concern about the safety of other memorabilia in this house.

Peries had won many international awards, though he made only 20 feature films over his half century in the film business.

MANY AWARDS, LITTLE MONEY

Peries has never received significant material compensation from the film world or even the governments for his achievements.

His films had made money for their producers and distributors but he struggled to find financiers to raise the Rs 150,000, the average cost of a production in the 1950s and 1960s.

Peries was thought to be a ‘commercial risk’ given his penchant for making unostentatious and realistic cinema. Even though most of his producers made money on his films, they were reluctant to make a second one with him.

“They would do one film with me, make money and disappear into the woodwork,” Peries told his biographer Kumar de Silva.

Even the Golden Peacock awarded to him as the creator of Gamperaliya was kept by the film’s producer before it was lost.

Peries died on April 29 at the age of 99 after an illness. He was cremated with state honours at the Independence Square on Wednesday in the midst of a gathering of thousands of fans, colleagues in the film world and distinguished people, including Adoor Gopalakrishnan, the renowned film maker from Kerala.

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Lester

Gamperaliya (inside)