Leela Chitnis (9 September 1909 – 14 July 2003) was an early actress in the Indian film industry.
Early life
She was born in
Dharwar,
Karnataka to an English professor. She was one of the first educated film actresses. Her father was part of a
Marathi theatre company called Natyamanwantar.
Career
Chitnis' early stage work included comedy
Usna Navra (1934) and with her own film group
Udyacha Sansar. She started acting to support her four children. She started as an extra and went on to stunt films.
She was publicized in the
Times of India as the first graduate society-lady from
Maharashtra. By then she had already made her first major mark as an actress on the silver screen. Chitnis worked at
Prabhat Pictures,
Pune and
Ranjit Movietone before going on to be the leading lady in
Bombay Talkies which saw her overtake and outshine
Devika Rani. Her association with
Bombay Talkies shot her to stardom and she made a particularly good partner with
Devika Rani's leading man
Ashok Kumar. Ashok Kumar was so impressed by her acting abilities that he admitted to having learnt how to speak with his eyes from her. By the mid 1940s her career went downhill as the new leading ladies came in. For 22 years, Chitnis played the mother of the later leading men including
Dilip Kumar, often playing an ailing mother or a mother going...
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