Leleti Khumalo tells of her craft

While most know her as “Sarafina” because of the role she played in the internationally recognised movie Sarafina, Leleti Khumalo says there is more to her that people still don’t know, despite her starting her acting journey at the tender age of 16.

The Uzalo actress says being in one production for a long time, like she was with Sarafina, allowed her to slowly learn the challenges that come with being in the entertainment industry at an appropriate pace. She however says that though the industry is somewhat different and focuses on talent a lot less, she regardless feels that it is still striving to improve.

“We are moving in the right direction, but shouldn’t rush. We need to have more woman producers and I want to be one of those women one day,” she pointed out. “The announcement made by the SABC COO is also phenomenal and will open a lot of doors for talented people as a whole. We need more people like him,” she further said.

Khumalo says because it is a hard task to stay motivated and true to oneself in the entertainment industry, she regards herself as her own inspiration, so that she can hold herself accountable, should she be in the wrong. “I inspire myself. I want to feed the animal inside me. If I do wrong, I only have one person to blame, and that is me,” she said.

Manzuzu, as her Uzalo fans call her, is a character Khumalo says couldn’t be further from who she truly is, but a role she says she has learned a lot from. “When I created my character in Uzalo, I thought of three different women I know, and took a bit from all of them,”  she explained.

Read more on this Durbanite talent tomorrow in The Citizen newspaper.