Lekha Washington

Lekha Washington
Lekha Washington at the JK Tyre National Racing Championship in 2008
Born	Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India
Nationality	Indian
Occupation	Actor, model, video jockey, designer
Years active	2007 – present

Lekha Washington is an Indian film actress and product designer, who has appeared in Tamil, Hindi, Telugu and Kannada language films. She was first recognised for her work as a sculptor in 2002 and then as a theatre actress in Chennai based stage plays. After appearing as a video jockey with SS Music, Lekha's breakthrough film role was as an independent estranged sister in Jayamkondaan (2008), whilst she has gone on to portray roles in the multi-starrer Vedam and the comedy Va.

Lekha Washington was born in Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India to a father of mixed Burmese, Italian and Punjabi ancestry, Kenneth, and a Maharashtrian mother, Geeta. Despite the mixed heritage, Lekha has stated she considers herself South Indian due to her upbringing and speaks English and Marathi at home.

Lekha pursued a degree in Fine Arts at Stella Maris College, Chennai and went on to attend the National Institute of Design taking courses, first in Lifestyle Product Design, and then re-applying to enrol in the Film and Video Communication course. During her time studying film-making, she opted for a career in "front of the camera, rather than from behind". During her time on the course, she made three short films called Spoonerism, Catch 22 and Sunn with locations ranging from Myanmar to Mauritius.

While pursuing her education, she decided to appear in Chetan Shah's experimental English film, Framed, and subsequently received offers to be a music video jockey from SS Music. Lekha was signed on to play the lead role of an orthodox Tamil Brahmin girl alongside Silambarasan in his project Kettavan, however despite completing a schedule the film was shelved and later cancelled. She had earlier made an uncredited appearance in a song from the 1999 romance film Kadhalar Dhinam and also made a guest appearance in director Jeeva's 2007 film Unnale Unnale as a bride at a wedding. In November 2007, Lekha signed on to play a supporting role in R. Kannan's directorial debut Jayamkondaan alongside Vinay Rai and Bhavana Menon. Appearing as Vinay Rai's estranged stepsister, Brindha, in the film, Lekha won critical acclaim for her role with a reviewer citing that she "sparkles as the half sister in a well etched role" and is "the surprise packet and has the credentials to make it big". Another critics cited that Lekha "pulls off with élan" and "her costume spells class and character as does her performance", and subsequently the film went on to become a critical and commercial success.