A beauty with brains

V. GANGADHAR

Leela Naidu, who passed away recently, never joined the Bollywood rat race but did act in films with intelligent scripts.

VERSATILE: Leela Naidu and (right) with Sunil Dutt

People close to Leela Naidu remember that she was least conscious of her beauty, she was well informed and could talk brilliantly on any topic. Rather slow to make friends, she remained committed once the ice was broken.

Beauty Queen, movie star, lover of art and culture, a person who surrounded herself with beautiful objects… How does one describe Leela Naidu? The 69-year old actor who died in Mumbai recently , was all these and more. “You thought you knew her,” explained one of her friends , “but she was a deep one who did not encourage intimacy. Perhaps, it was due to the trauma in her personal life. Both her marriages failed and she was the victim of abuse.”

Leela Naidu was an unwilling movie star of mixed parentage (Indian father, French mother). She was chosen by Vogue magazine as one among the 10 most beautiful women in the world of the 1950s and was voted ‘Femina Miss India’ in 1954. Her beauty was not the striking, flamboyant type. It was ethereal and full of grace.

Leading role

It was only a sensitive filmmaker such as Hrishikesh Mukherjee who could think of offering her the leading role opposite another sensitive actor, Balraj Sahni. ‘Anuradha’, released in 1960, was a film on two cultures, where she was a rich urban girl, devoted to music, and he, a rural doctor, with his heart set on healing the poor. The wife felt neglected as her musical instruments gathered dust and the couple began to feel estranged. The film was ahead of its time, had very little to offer to the masses and therefore flopped. But it won the national award in the Best Film category and earned a nomination for the Golden Bear at the 1961 Berlin Film Festival.

Leela Naidu enjoyed the experience of working with Hrishikesh Mukherjee and Balraj Sahni, but was not keen to join the Bollywood rat race.

Later in the decade, she played the lead opposite Shashi Kapoor in the first Merchant-Ivory production, ‘The Householder,’ which won critical acclaim both at home and abroad. This was followed by ‘The Guru’ and producer-director R.K.Nayar’s film on marital infidelity, ‘Yeh Raaste Hain Pyar Ke’ opposite Sunil Dutt, which was based on the real life murder trial involving Naval commander, Nanavati, his beautiful wife Sylvia and her rich seducer, Prem Ahuja. After a long break, came Shyam Benegal’s ‘Trikkal,’ where she played a Goan matriarch. Leela Naidu preferred intelligent scripts which made sense and handled by directors who really understood cinema. Quality was important to her, not quantity. While Leela Naidu’s attitude towards film making was philosophical, both her marriages were turbulent.

Stormy marriage

The first one to Tiki Oberoi was stormy, she was a victim of physical violence, and lost custody of her twin daughters.

When she married poet-writer Dom Moraes and settled down in Bombay, its society gushed, “Oh, they are made for each other.” The couple’s home in Colaba was a hub of cultural activity, writers, poets and theatre people, dropping in for chat and tea.

“She was a wonderful hostess and learnt to cook different delicious dishes to serve her guests,” explained writer-poet John Mathew. “More important was the stimulating discussions on so many topics.”

No one knows what began to go wrong with the marriage which lasted for 10 years. Moraes in his memoirs ‘Never at Home’, admitted that his frequent absences from home, addiction to booze and short temper must have made life miserable for the wife. So did his growing friendship with another woman with whom he was collaborating on a book on Bombay. Finally he left her and media reported she was also left with huge unpaid bills, including staggering amounts spent on international telephone calls.

Even while remaining a recluse, Leela did some work – such as a documentary film for director Kumar Shahani. Her isolation was self-imposed, she was not interested in meeting people. Co-stars from ‘Trikkal’ such as Neena Gupta and Soni Razdan fondly recollected Leela Naidu’s sparkle and vivacity, regretting that her life had to end in loneliness.

(The Hindu, 07:08:2009)

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