Kaylin Soobramanian is a South African actor who plays ‘Thu Sheleni’, a streetwise Indian who speaks fluent Zulu, on etv’s Imbewu. His ability to speak Zulu is what endeared him to his producers and fans.
It took a single word for his life to change forever. “Sanibonani,” he said to a roomful of TV industry bigwigs – and that was it.
A poor teen with dreams of one day playing soccer to get his family out of poverty, he learnt isiZulu while living in the crime infested informal settlement of Bhambayi in Inanda near Durban.
“My family lived in [predominantly Indian] Phoenix in KZN but because we were poor my grandmother couldn’t afford to pay rates, we moved to Inanda because rent was cheaper there.”
Kaylin was a year old when he settled in an RDP house in the township with his unemployed mother, Vevina and brother, Junior.
“I used to go to a crèche with only black people,” Kaylin says. “So the other kids said if I wanted to be friends with them I should learn to speak isiZulu or else they would stop hanging out with me.”
So he did. By the time he reached primary school he was fluent.
Thu Sheleni and Imbewu
The opportunity to act came quite by chance for Kaylin Soobramanian and it has changed his life.
Imbewu’s director went to Inanda in search of an Indian boy who could speak isiZulu for the TV drama and bumped into Kaylin’s lifelong friends.
After meeting their requirements, he then went to live with Madoda in KwaMashu, Durban, for a month to learn about acting. Then it was time for the audition and after blowing everyone away he received a call the next day to say he’d got the part.
It’s been onwards and upwards ever since as Thu Sheleni steals the show on Imbewu!
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