Shaleen Surtie-Richards: getting old’s tough!
She’s sometimes lonely, suffers from ill health and worries about growing old – but Shaleen Surtie-Richards is indomitable
SHE’S one of South Africa’s best-known actresses, a veteran of stage and screen who’s dedicated her working life to the pursuit of the performing arts. Now that she’s in her sixties you might think it was time for Shaleen Surtie-Richards to start winding down a little and enjoying the fruits of all that hard work.
But money worries and health problems have taken centre stage recently. Retirement is an impossible dream and the events of the past year have taught her one thing: “Growing old isn’t for sissies!”
Jobs are scarce, she has a home loan to pay off and Shaleen, a diabetic, is still recovering from a stroke that landed her in intensive care for four days last October.
But she isn’t about to let it all get her down. Every bit as feisty and upbeat as when we got to know her as Nenna in M- Net soapie Egoli, Shaleen ( 63) welcomes us warmly into her home in Witpoortjie, Roodepoort.
She cuts a striking figure, dressed head to toe in black, her trademark long hair streaked with red and black highlights, gold jewellery adorning her neck and wrists and fire-engine red lipstick and smoky eye make-up in place.
Tristan and Tatiana, her Pekingese dogs, fuss around her feet. “They’re like my children,” she says as the pair of pooches lead the way to the large lapa in her lush garden.
She spends a lot of time here. “It’s where I have my morning coffee – my bedroom is just around the corner,” she says, gesturing towards a sliding door nearby.
But life isn’t always as peaceful and carefree as it seems in the tranquillity of her garden. In fact, she acknowledges, some days are downright hard.
LIFE was all go- go- go around the time she had the stroke last year. She was playing Fiela Komoetie in the stage production of Fiela se Kind, the same part that first brought her fame in the 1988 movie. At the same time she was working on the e.tv show Broken Vows
– and it suddenly all became too much for her.
“It felt as if everything in my body collapsed,” she says, recalling the Monday morning in October when she collapsed on the set of Broken Vows and was rushed to hospital.
Shaleen had an inkling something was up the previous day. That Sunday morning she felt her body was trying to tell her something when she found herself struggling for breath.
At that stage she didn’t think it was serious – but that all changed the next day when things spectacularly fell apart.
“I didn’t realise it but my body had spoken. My legs, my heart, my lungs – they all felt like they just gave in. I was completely overworked and hadn’t been getting enough sleep.”
Being in hospital was hard for her both physically and emotionally but, Shaleen says, she was too sick to see it as a challenge.
She had a big fright and came face to face with the brutal reality of growing older.
“I’m asking the Lord to please never let that happen to me again – it really wasn’t nice.”
Shaleen knows she has to make lifestyle changes but she’s finding it tough. Hardest of all is quitting smoking. “It’s the only thing I can’t seem to conquer,” she says.
She’s taking all her medication, and eight months after her scare she’s feeling pretty good.
“My legs give me a bit of trouble every now and again and my feet swell because of the diabetes,” she says, adding she doesn’t want to delve too deeply into her health issues as it’s a private matter.
She’s grateful to Broken Vows produc- tion company Clive Morris Productions for paying her salary for the two months she was off.
Being sick is something she simply can’t afford, especially since jobs are so scarce.
“I don’t talk about it much because it’s not good in my business. If you say you’ve been ill people think you’re too ill to work.”
Still, even if she could afford to go on pension, she probably wouldn’t. “I love what I do,” she says.
During the years she’s been in showbiz she’s received more than 50 awards, including a lifetime achievement award from the Suidooster festival for her contribution to the arts.
“I always say it’s actually a half-time achievement award because I’m nowhere near done,” she says with a laugh, adding that awards aren’t necessarily an indication of an actor’s success.
“This is South Africa and work is hard to come by. I’m sure if I’d collected all these awards in America, I’d be on top of the world now.”
She sometimes worries about money when parts are few and far between and often wonders whether it’s her age or whether there simply aren’t enough jobs for actors.
But she hasn’t been idle. She has a part in a short Afrikaans film, Draadloos, which will be screened on kykNET on DStv later this year, and there’s the possibility of a part in a TV show although she doesn’t want to say anything more until the paperwork has been completed.
“I believe in keeping your mouth shut until you’ve signed on the dotted line because talk is cheap.”
Meanwhile Shaleen is planning something entirely different.
“This year I’m going to write a book,” she says. She’s planning her memoir – 63 years of fun, the good and the bad – with writer, director and producer Hennie van Greunen.
“I was going to wait until a few people passed away but chances are I’m going to die before them, so I’m not going to wait!”
SHE has good friends but her days can sometimes be lonely, says Shaleen, who was once married but has no children.
Her beloved mother, Ellen, died in 2014 and she still finds it strange not to hear her voice in the house Shaleen bought for her.
“I miss her terribly – she was everything to me,” she says sadly.
But she doesn’t believe in wallowing in self-pity when she feels alone, worries about work or fears the day she can’t do anything for herself anymore.
“Thank God I get depressed only occasionally. When I feel that way, I take a conscious decision not to let it win.”
Shaleen says she can be quite a negative person sometimes but she’s not someone who lets life get her down without a fight.
“When things aren’t going well, what must I do? I have to carry on.”
And yes, she acknowledges with a small sad sigh, she’s afraid of growing old. “I have fears I’ve never had before. For instance, I won’t stand on a bench for whatever reason because I’m too scared of falling and getting hurt.”
But a moment later that wide, warm smile South Africans know so well is back and the sadness vanishes. “I take life as it comes,” she says.
“The Lord helps those who help themselves.”
‘It felt as if everything in my body collapsed: my legs, my heart, my lungs’