How Indian-Canadian actress Lisa Ray’s blood cancer battle helped her find strength and ‘clarity’
- Ray has worked as a top model, Bollywood actress and television host, but has also survived a battle with a rare blood cancer called multiple myeloma
- Through yoga and Buddhism she was able to find spiritual and mental strength to help her through her treatment
For acclaimed Indian-Canadian actress Lisa Ray, the International Toronto Film Festival in 2009 was not the glamorous homecoming that it had been in previous years.
There to promote her two newly released films, Ray chose to publicly reveal her ongoing battle with multiple myeloma – a rare, incurable form of blood cancer that causes cancer cells to accumulate in the bone marrow and crowd out healthy blood cells.
“A lot of people told me to skip the event as I had put on 40 pounds [18 kilograms] because of the steroids I had been prescribed. I could either hide or show up. I listened to my heart and decided to go public with my diagnosis,” recalls Ray, who was 37 years old at the time.
Born in Toronto to an Indian father and Polish mother, Ray was first “spotted” as a teenager and went on to become one of India’s most successful cover models. Named as one of the “10 most beautiful women of the millennium” in a Times of India poll, Ray has been the face of brands like L’Oreal, MasterCard, De Beers and Rado and was the host of Top Chef Canada for four seasons.
Ray made her film debut in Bollywood thriller Kasoor in 2001, followed by a lead role in the 2002 romantic comedy Bollywood/Hollywood. Ray had a seamless transition from modelling to acting, most notably starring in Deepa Mehta’s 2005 Oscar-nominated film Water .
Ray and her husband moved to Hong Kong in 2014, and she continues to pursue her career in film and television and her passions for philanthropy and championing social causes.