Fans have gotten to know and love her as the very shy and naive Glenda Mogosi on the award-winning telenovela, Skeem Saam.
She's had the role for almost a decade and has enjoyed every minute of it.
Now Nozi Langa has landed herself a lead role on the much anticipated and star-studded telenovela, Umbuso on Dstv’s Mzansi Magic.
She's stepping out of her comfort zone with this role, she tells Drum. But she loves the fact that it's all about growth. Nozi will be playing a very strong young woman, Bassie Matlala, on the new show.
“She is young married woman, hardworking, wealthy but she is… as much she has been married into a wealthy family, she has her core values like on working hard and working towards your dreams, and making those dreams come true.”
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She doesn't want to give too much away, but says the role has given her a chance to showcase a side to her talent that they haven't seen yet. “There are scenes where in one of the challenges Bassie faces she gets so angry, and we see this other side of her and I, in my personal capacity, I am not able to get angry and raise my voice but in her character capacity she does raise her voice. It was the first time for me that I was challenged to be this person who is angry and I do not know anger like that.
“It will get tricky throughout the story because then we start to see her out her workspace, we do not really see someone with emotions, she seems hard, like a workaholic, but as time goes, we see the story, her love life, challenges from the families.”
Nozi is very fond of her first ever television character on Skeem Saam because they share some similarities. However, she plans to do things differently when playing Bassie on Umbuso.
“Glenda is very close to me, and also I think it was because it was my first character that I ever played professionally on TV, but it was very close to me and very similar to me, until she started to make some stupid decisions. But I mean, with Bassie I try my best not to attach her to me, I have tried my best not to attach herself to me and just play her for who she is, so they are very different… just to think of it, personality wise, Glenda is very naïve, while Bassie is hard, she knows what she is doing… she is almost like a bad girl,” she says.
The actress says she knew it was such a blessing in disguise when she got the role on Umbuso, a show that is set to replace The Republic. It is about a mysterious murder that shatters the lives of two families and will air on Sundays at 8pm. It will be a story about two comrades who were besties in prison.
“It was such a blessing… It was an amazing feeling and felt like it is possible, I am doing it again. You have to remember I have been on Skeem Saam since 2016, and now it is 2022 and the only other project that I was able to do throughout that time, it was Muvhango. Being on a soapie for that long makes you feel like perhaps it is not possible to step out and do other things because I see my peers and they constantly do new projects.
"So, when I bagged Umbuso it was reassurance that, you know what, it is possible if I keep trying. Like, it is possible to get new projects. So I was excited because it has given me assurance that I am moving in the right direction.”
