SARITA CHOUDHURY: 'I CAN'T BELIEVE I'M IN SUCH AN ICONIC SHOW'

After she stole the show as Seema in And Just Like That, Sarita Choudhury tells Hannah Marriott what it was really like to join

- Hannah Marriott

The internet being united is a rare thing. But when Seema Patel, Carrie Bradshaw's real estate agent, joined Sex And The City reboot And Just Like That, there was consensus.

A vision in taupe Fendi, Seema was a hoot from the moment she arrived outside Carrie's apartment in a sleek car with a personalised number plate ('SEEMA-NYC') and stamped out her cigarette under the toe of her Valentino rockstud sandals. Single and dating, it was Seema who flirted with hot nightclub owners, put Carrie on Tinder, and generally behaved like a true New York City alpha by making shit happen through her extensive network of contacts (She claimed to have had her Covid jab before the President; you can believe her). Redolent with the best kind of old school SATC energy, Twitter declared her the show's MVP; many demanded a spin-off.

The whole thing has pole-vaulted Sarita Choudhury, the English-Indian actor who plays Seema, to a new level of celebrity. Though the 56-year-old is accustomed to being recognised after 30 years of critically acclaimed work, from her 1991 breakout, Mississippi Masala, to her role as Mira Berensen in Homeland, "I've never had this, where it's from across the street," she says when we meet in a chic coffee shop near her apartment in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. "And really young people like a 20-year-old from Utah who knew my full name. And it is so specific about the character. Also, Seema's so different from me; they say things like: Oh, you wear sneakers!'