The Netflix Indian original series Leila will be out on June 14, the streaming platform announced on Friday. Netflix also released a teaser, in which Huma Qureshi can be seen as Shalini, a mother who embarks on a quest for her daughter in a dystopian future.
Based on Prayaag Akbar’s 2017 novel of the same name, Leila has been directed by Deepa Mehta, Shanker Raman and Pawan Kumar. Mehta is also the creative executive producer. The cast includes Siddharth, Rahul Khanna, Sanjay Suri and Arif Zakaria.
The six-episode series is set in the near future, in a digitised city obsessed with purity, whose inhabits live in segregated communities based on caste, class and religion. “In the forgotten spaces between, where garbage gathers and disease festers, Shalini must search for Leila, the daughter she lost one tragic summer two years ago,” the official synopsis stated. “Skirting surveillance systems and thuggish repeaters, Shalini – once wealthy, with perhaps a wayward past; now a misfit, pushed to the margins – is propelled only by her search.”
In a statement, Mehta said, “Leila is about awareness, about paying attention, about looking at the world around us and asking pertinent questions about our future.”
Qureshi described Shalini in the press release as a “unique mix of strength, grace and optimism”. She added, “It really has been an honour to portray a character that has not only pushed me as an artist but I believe will resonate with a lot of young women.”
Raman made his directorial debut in 2018 with Gurgaon, starring Pankaj Tripathi and Akshay Oberoi, and has worked as a cinematographer for over two decades. Kumar directed the acclaimed Kannada films Lucia (2014) and U-Turn (2016). Deepa Mehta’s credits include Fire (1996), Earth (1998), and Water (2005).
Leila joins Netflix’s slate of Indian originals, which includes Sacred Games, Ghoul and Selection Day.