MEERA SYAL and her husband Sanjeev Bhaskar made their career out of breaking glass ceilings in the British entertainment industry and they continue to shatter stereotypes with their work. The couple, who has spent years on British screens, is redefining ageing with their challenging roles in critically acclaimed TV dramas Mrs Sidhu Investigates and Unforgotten, where they both played detectives. At 61, Syal landed the lead character ‘Mrs Sidhu’ who is a caterer with a taste for solving mysteries in the detective series, while 60-year-old Bhasker returned fit and fine to play the role of DI Sunil ‘Sunny’ Khan in the fifth season of ITV’s crime drama Unforgotten. One of the best-known British Asian couples, the pair was honoured with Sophiya Haque Award for Services to British Television, Film and Theatre Award at the 2023 Asian Media Awards. The award is named in tribute to the late Coronation Street and stage actress, who died of cancer aged 41 in 2013. Syal and Bhaskar first crossed paths on the set of the BBC sketch show Goodness Gracious Me, but they became closer during the promotion of The Kumars at Number 42, a spoof chat show they co-created in 2001.
The show ran for seven series totalling 53 episodes, winning an International Emmy in 2002 and 2003, as well as a Peabody Award in 2004. The couple also played husband and wife on-screen in the 2019 musical romantic comedy Yesterday. Syal is a multi-Emmy Award-winning British actress, comedian, and writer with numerous television and film credits, including Absolutely Fabulous, Paddington 2, Beautiful People, Doctor Who, The Sandman and Doctor Strange. She has authored Anita and Me (1996), Life Isn’t All Ha Ha Hee Hee (1999) and The House of Hidden Mothers (2015). Her semi-autobiographical novel Anita and Me was adapted for a stage play in 2015, and now it is on school syllabuses. Before she appeared on screens, she wrote the screenplay for Channel 4’s Bhaji on the Beach (1993), a film about a group of British Punjabi women on a trip to see the Blackpool Illuminations, and co-wrote the script for My Sister Wife, a three-part BBC Television series. Syal was awarded Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE) in 1997 and Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in 2015 for services to drama and literature. Last year, she was presented with a lifetime achievement award by the British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA) in recognition of “outstanding achievement” within TV. When she received the BAFTA Fellowship, Syal placed a glittering bindi on her award and said: “This represents change.”
Standing on stage at the Royal Festival Hall, she spoke of the need for diversity in the industry, reflecting on the challenges she faced growing up as a brown kid and the struggles of being an Asian on British screens. “We are all storytellers here, so we know how much it matters, what stories we get to tell but more importantly who gets to tell them,” she said. To pursue his passion in comedy, Bhaskar teamed up with the musician Nitin Swahney and started a musical comedy double act named The Secret Asians, performing a two week run at Ovalhouse theatre in south London in 1995.
It was there BBC producer Anil Gupta spotted him and then the Goodness Gracious Me happened, which made him a household name, followed by The Kumars at No 42, The Indian Doctor and Unforgotten. Bhaskar has appeared in many more sitcoms, dramas and films including The Guru, Notting Hill, Anita and Me, The Zero Theorem, BBC Radio 4 comedy show I’ve Never Seen Star Wars, and ITV sitcom Mumbai Calling. In 2005, Bhaskar was awarded OBE for his contributions to the arts and entertainment. Along with director Deep Sehgal, he filmed a documentary series called India with Sanjeev Bhaskar and later wrote his first book of the same name, which became a Sunday Times bestseller in 2007. Unforgotten is returning for a sixth season this year, with Sanjeev Bhaskar reprising his role as DI Sunil ‘Sunny’ Khan, as per reports.
WHILE Syal is paving the way for diversity in the British entertainment industry, her daughter Milli Bhatia (from her first marriage with award-winning journalist Shekhar Bhatia) is championing the representation of south Asian stories on the British stage. Milli is an internationally acclaimed theatre, film and radio director and dramaturg. She is currently an associate artist at Synergy. Until December 2023, Milli served as the associate director of the Royal Court Theatre before deciding to step down from the position to explore freelance opportunities. Previously, she was trainee director and literary associate at The Royal Court, associate artist at The Bush Theatre, resident assistant director at Birmingham Rep and creative associate at The Gate Theatre. Her direction of “Seven Methods of Killing Kylie Jenner” earned a nomination for the Olivier Award for outstanding achievement in an affiliate theatre. She has received nominations for Visionary Arts Awards, EE Actas, and Asian Media Awards for her other notable works. Her other work as a director includes Blue Mist, Chasing Hares, Maryland, My White Best Friend and other letters left unsaid, Dismantle This Room by Nina Segal, Half Full, This Liquid Earth, The Hijabi Monologues, and The Magic Finger. Milli has extensive experience in new writing and dramaturgy, and has read for several theatres including The Bush, The Royal Court and Birmingham Rep. She has developed and directed plays internationally with theatres including Santiago A Mil (Chile), Ajoka Theatre (Pakistan) and Riksteatern (Sweden). Through her work, Milli tells the stories of people who don’t often have a voice on stage, fights against injustice, addresses violence again.