Actress Seela Sella has been diagnosed with cancer: “Don’t be unnecessarily depressed”

Seela Sella at the National Theater in April 2025. Picture: Juha Salminen / HS

Actor Seela Sella89, says that he has been diagnosed with cancer.

Be the first to report on it Ilta-Sanomat.

Sella confirms to HS that pharyngeal cancer was found a few weeks ago. The symptoms had already started earlier.

“For a couple of months, I thought that everything wasn’t quite right. It didn’t come like a bolt out of the blue,” says Sella.

“It started to be difficult to swallow. That’s when it started to investigate and see what happens to grandma.”

After the diagnosis, the treatments started quickly. Sella says that she is currently undergoing daily radiation therapy. According to him, they last seven weeks. He currently receives his nutrition through a PEG tube that goes directly into his stomach.

“I’m in outdoor catering,” he says with a laugh.

Disease inevitably also affects Sella’s work patterns. The works have been canceled at least from April and May. There are plans, but they depend on how the treatments go.

“It has been agreed that if I survive the summer, quite a lot can be moved to autumn. There are also new plans, but it all depends on whether I can endure this.”

Sella takes a realistic but hopeful approach to the situation. He says that he will know more about the state of the disease, probably around Midsummer.

“It’s not time to dream unnecessarily and not be needlessly depressed. Let’s go one moment at a time. But let’s hope. Let’s hope.”

An acting legend career has already lasted more than 60 years.

Sella graduated from the Finnish Theater School in 1959. During her career, Sella has acted in, among others, the National Theater and the city theaters of Turku and Hämeenlinna and in dozens of films and television series. Sella has also read several audiobooks.

Sella was awarded the Pro Finlandia medal in 1993, the recognition award of the Alfred Kordelin Foundation in 2000, and the state award for stage art in 2009. In 2007, Sella received a Jussi statue for his supporting role in the movie The Leaning Tower.

In April, Sella was supposed to act as narrator at the Pori Sinfonietta’s Summer Night’s Dream concert, but apparently due to cancer, Sella canceled her participation, reports People of Satakunta on Wednesday.