Leela Patel is multi-talented – an actress, entertainer, singer and an entrepreneur. Instantly identified in New Zealand as Shobhana Kumari playing Shanti’s mom in the popular TV2 soap Shortland Street, Leela will be back on TV from October 17.
When I met with Leela at her modest Avondale home, I was expecting to see a lady clad in a blue sari but was taken aback by her youthful appearance and a very down to earth and positive personality. Being a single mum, Leela has effectively managed her acting career and her teenage kids (aged 20 and 21) along with caring for her grandmother until recently. Leela comes from a big family (sixth of eight siblings) all based in Auckland. She is the only one in showbiz.
Having taken a keen interest in singing, Leela sang at various shows in the early 1990s. She began in 1990 with a musical group called Bombay Fever managed by Jagdish Punja and has performed numerous shows around New Zealand. She toured Fiji in 1991 and again in 1995 and also performed karaoke shows in Melbourne, Sydney and Brisbane.
In 1994 she won the local Auckland Indian Idol Competition organised by Ashvin Anand of AA Promotions. Her biggest challenge in this competition, she says, was memorising Hindi lyrics as she is a “local Gujarati and barely speaks Hindi.”
Her singing eventually led to her acting, which eventually led to acting. With a few acting courses under her belt, Leela approached a few agents and one day she got a call to audition for Shortland Street for the role of Shanti’s aunty (Rani).
She was disappointed when she was not shortlisted. Little did she know that the director at Shortland Street had her in mind for a more important role. She was a huge fan of this soap and always wanted to be a part of it since its infancy 19 years ago. When asked what was challenging in the role Leela says she had to work hard at maintaining the Indian accent during her dialogues as in reality, she does not have an accent.
“That wasn’t as easy as it sounds. Also, what people don’t realise is that an actor or actress has to perform what they are asked to do; they can’t go about changing the storyline to suit themselves.” She points out that Shorty is a soap not a documentary – the story has to be juicy to keep the audience interested.
Before her stint with Shortland Street, Leela had only just completed her movie Apron Strings where she played the role of Tara. It is the first Indian feature film to be funded through official channels in New Zealand. Apron strings is a debut feature for Sima Urale, which raises social issues, examines the incredibly complex yet tender mother-child relationships that you and I can easily relate to.
“It was very inspiring to be working with Sima. She had a great working relationship with the entire team and brought the best out of us,” says Leela.
The film was funded under a unique low-budget initiative called Signature Film, supported by the New Zealand Film Commission, NZ on Air and Television New Zealand.
A few other movies that Leela has featured in are Dead Certs in 1996; a teleplay written by Rawiri Paratane, Vertical Limit by Martin Campbell in 2000 and her hour long TV movie Money for Jam in 1999 based on a true story.
She played a dead woman in the mountain climbing movie Vertical Limit but quickly added that it was not all sad as it was shot in Queenstown and over all they had a lot of fun too. But at the back of her mind, she was always hoping to get a better role than playing dead, she laughs.
She’s been to India a couple of times and intends to take her son and daughter to India sometime in the future.
After her much acclaimed performance in Apron Strings as Tara, Leela was invited to participate in the Dubai International film festival which in December 2008. “This was an amazing platform to meet and network with fantastic actors from around the world. I even met a few stars from Bollywood like Nandita Das,” she says. Her coffee table has rows of albums full of photos from Dubai and her photos with the cast and crew of Shortland Street.
Amid her hectic schedule, Leela also finds time to teach at pre-school and has plans to set up a home based childcare centre along with her entertainment services, and of course continue acting.
She has taken her acting career seriously and says her past experience has helped her in playing her roles effectively in both Apron Strings and at Shortland Street. Both the roles came easily to her as she has a daughter at home and knows the challenges a mum could have; playing the role of a neglected wife wasn’t too hard as it was something that happened to her.
A similarity in her role in Apron Strings was that she too has a sister who is married to a Kiwi and although it didn’t bring too much heartache to her personally, there was a lot of grief and the emotions ran high in the family.
Listening to soft music, singing, dancing and gardening is what relaxes Leela. Life’s been a struggle but her positive attitude has helped her be successful in what she’s been doing, she says. She believes in God, in being a good person and has been a role model for a lot of people in the community. When she meditates, she has a lot of positive affirmations with abundance of goodness in life. This has helped her achieve her goals.
Her message to the Indian community, especially to the women “is to follow your dream. Don’t ever think it is too late and don’t let negative people, negative thoughts or any other obstacles come in your way.” If you dream it, you can do it.
She hopes to appear on Shorty hopefully for a lot longer this time and is always open to new acting assignments. Talking about openness I asked her if she was open to meeting Mr Right in the future and amusedly she said she was certainly open to that.