Sanjeev Bhaskar

Presenter0:00

Hello, I'm Kirsty Young, and this is a podcast from the Desert Island Discs archive. For rights reasons we've had to shorten the music. The programme was originally broadcast in two thousand eight.

Presenter0:26

My castaway this week is Sanjeev Bhaskar.

Presenter0:29

As a writer and performer he's become a star by making us laugh, and bringing the British Asian experience to big audiences with shows like Goodness Gracious Me and The Kumars at No. forty two.

Presenter0:40

He was a late starter in the fame game, aged thirty, unemployed, mired in debt and depression, and living at home with his parents. The idea of Emmy Awards, a Number One hit record, and the honour of an OBE must surely have seemed an impossibility. But in just fifteen years he's bagged them all.

Presenter0:58

And then some. Yet very recently he said, I had great difficulty in realizing I was successful. I had never seen myself as successful. Everything was about falling short, about not achieving, about unrealized potential. You've also said, Saint Jeevesev, that uh your initial success uh ultimately was founded on the toss of a coin. What what happened?

Sanjeev Bhaskar1:19

Yes, it was. Um during a period of time where uh I was out of work and uh living at my parents and being very depressed I got together with a friend of mine, Nitin Sorney, who's a composer who I'd been at um university with. We'd sort of done a double act thing at university and we thought well, you know, let's resurrect that you know we had time on our hands. We were called The Secret Asians, which was a pun and the comedy didn't really get a lot better than that. From what I can remember the show was called Pop a Dom Preach.

Presenter1:44

Yeah.

Presenter1:47

Right, I'm with you.

Sanjeev Bhaskar1:48

The flyers for the show had gone out and a couple of producers from the BBC had seen it. And apparently they said well look this'll probably be rubbish but um let's toss a coin and see whether we go straight to the pub or or go there and then to the pub. And fortunately for us the coin landed right, they came to see the show and came backstage and said this is the kind of material we're looking for for a new sketch show.

Presenter2:09

Does it seem to you that you've packed an enormous amount into fifteen years between being thirty and apparently having not much to look forward to, and being forty five and having everything you have now?

Sanjeev Bhaskar2:19

Yeah, at times it's felt like s living someone else's life, but I'm not going to give it back to whoever's owns it legitimately.

Presenter2:26

That's very interesting you say it's like living someone else's life,'cause I've been thinking about this and wondering that actually if it was almost the other way round, if if when you were having this life of of drudgery, if that felt like living somebody else's life, if you felt that you should be the successful person, but no, not that way round.

Sanjeev Bhaskar2:40

No, not

Sanjeev Bhaskar2:42

No, I mean in a way it's it's it's it may feel like a very strange uh dichotomy, but um even when I was quite young I thought that I was uh destined to achieve something. And I suppose the the most depressing aspect of that period of my life was that I just thought that the most that I could ever achieve would be mediocrity.

Presenter3:03

Was that where the depression came from, then?

Sanjeev Bhaskar3:05

I think a lot of it was to do with that, yeah. I just thought, do you know, I the best that I can ever end up as is a statistic.

Sanjeev Bhaskar3:11

as a number um of people unemployed or the number of people who work in you know blue-collar jobs or whatever. And that was yeah, that was depressing.

Presenter3:20

But it's a story with I was going to say a happy ending, you're not even close to the end yet, but um a happy outcome for now.

Sanjeev Bhaskar3:24

And having a

Presenter3:26

Tell me about your first piece of music.

Sanjeev Bhaskar3:27

Elvis Presley. I kind of first heard Elvis when I was probably about four years old and there was something that I really connected with with his voice. And at that point I didn't know what he looked like and later on I saw the films and thought, wow, what an incredibly good looking guy. And I think this particular song, If I Can Dream, I think he never looked better. It was the 1968 comeback special, wearing black leather, which I tried to wear once and is incredibly unforgiving. But I think this was his rebirth and what within the decade he was dead.

Speaker 44:01

There must be lights burning brighter.

Sanjeev Bhaskar4:02

Bye.

Speaker 44:05

Somewhere.

Speaker 44:09

Got to be birds flying higher

Sanjeev Bhaskar4:11

Hi, whoa.

Speaker 44:13

In the sky

Speaker 44:15

Yeah.

Speaker 44:16

If I can agree

Speaker 44:18

I've a better land

Speaker 44:21

All my brothers walk hand in hand. Tell me why.

Speaker 44:25

Oh my god.

Speaker 44:27

Oh why can't my d

Presenter4:31

Elvis Presley and If I Can Dream, So is Sandy Febascu were brought up in Hounslow, in Middlesex. What was home like?

Sanjeev Bhaskar4:35

It'll

Sanjeev Bhaskar4:38

Um it was a little bit of India that was uh existing in uh West London. You know, within the house my parents uh my my father came uh to Britain in nineteen fifty seven, uh my mum came here in nineteen sixty, I think.

Presenter4:50

And is it true your father had just three pounds and a little scrap of paper with an address on it when he arrived?

Sanjeev Bhaskar4:55

It was I think it was even less than three pounds actually. Yeah, he he came with uh with literally nothing and the immigrant story I think is an extraordinary one. Uh for those people who did come here with nothing to actually uh have built up to anything, let alone, you know, having uh achieved status and become part of the fabric of of uh this country, I think is an incredible achievement. And I think that I'm I'm never going to achieve anything greater than what my father did.

Presenter5:20

And the home for you was above you your dad owned, was it two laundrettes? He he built up a business as well as working he worked in the local Nestle factory as well. So he was a hard working man. Sounds like sort of twenty five hours a day.

Sanjeev Bhaskar5:24

Yeah.

Sanjeev Bhaskar5:28

That's what I'm saying.

Sanjeev Bhaskar5:32

They were workaholic, yeah. I mean that that was uh beyond uh a kind of work ethic. I mean one of the things that I only found out uh probably in the last probably five or six years was that my father's big dream when he came to Britain was to be a film director. And I remember as a child finding various um I found a prospectus for Pinewood Studios and another one I think for Twickenham Studios and and and as a kid I was just fascinated by these. I just you know it was all all back projection and huge lights and and all that kind of thing. And I never really questioned where they'd come from. But that's what my dad really wanted to do and I think that that all obviously ended as soon as duty called.

Presenter6:09

You said si only five or six years ago. How did you find out that that had been what he'd wanted to do?

Sanjeev Bhaskar6:14

I think he finally relented and told me. I you know, I then asked why he hadn't told me, you know, all those years before. And I think w what what I garnered from the conversation was that

Sanjeev Bhaskar6:25

The crushing nature of having to give up all your dreams or your biggest dreams he didn't want his children to go through the same thing. You know, it gave me an idea of how desperately he'd wanted to do it.

Presenter6:37

I know how close you are to your parents. We'll maybe talk about that a little later, but did that was that the key to understanding your father a bit better when you you understood that about him, that he'd given up something that was

Presenter6:46

was dear to him?

Sanjeev Bhaskar6:47

It certainly helped, yeah. And I think actually b becoming a parent myself, I think, prob probably opened a greater window on that because suddenly, you know, wanting to protect your children almost at any cost.

Presenter6:47

Uh

Presenter6:58

Tell me about your next choice, then.

Sanjeev Bhaskar7:00

There will never be a greater pop band than the Beatles. They first of all they kind of uh epitomized a kind of optimism in Britain in the sixties. You know, this was Britain taking over the world again. These are perfect pop songs, and they will be sung and they will be listened to in a thousand years' time. It's just amazing.

Speaker 47:25

The English Army had just won the war.

Speaker 47:31

A crowd of people turned away

Speaker 47:37

But I just have to look

Speaker 47:40

Having red the board

Presenter7:48

The Beatles and A Day in the Life. I I read in an interview you once gave, um you said the worst day of my life was when I was seven years old and I discovered there was such a thing as racism. What happened?

Sanjeev Bhaskar8:01

Uh

Presenter8:01

Uh

Sanjeev Bhaskar8:01

This may have been something to do with Kiss Chase. Yeah. Uh which is a shame. It hasn't become an Olympic sport. Maybe by twenty twelve it could. But uh when I was at school, uh Kiss Chase, you you ran after a girl and uh once you caught them you kissed them. And I was allowed to run after them and catch them, but I wasn't allowed to kiss them.

Presenter8:04

Yeah.

Sanjeev Bhaskar8:19

And I couldn't understand why. I just thought, well, there are guys over there who

Sanjeev Bhaskar8:23

certainly smell worse than I do, and they're allowed to join in. And then I it dawned on me, it dawned on me that this was about colour. And I joined in anyway. I joined in with the the running and the catching. As a kid you're desperate to be part of you know something bigger, part of a group or a club or a or a niche in some way. But that was the first inkling of kind of

Presenter8:42

Um

Sanjeev Bhaskar8:42

Oh, wait a minute, I am different.

Presenter8:44

And how does that make you feel when you're seven?

Sanjeev Bhaskar8:46

utterly confused, but the desperation to join in overpowered any um

Sanjeev Bhaskar8:53

you know, sentiment of of uh of being an outsider in some way.

Sanjeev Bhaskar8:58

And then I then I start I s started to see the world slightly differently. You know, suddenly then, you know, the way that uh my parents were talked to in public by people, not not insulting, but um patronizingly, that suddenly became more and more clear. And then the kind of the the funny looks and the the giggles and all that kind of stuff, they they took on a completely different hue.

Presenter9:21

And did you witness much of the cultural friction? I mean, did you ever was there a did you see a National Front march? Were you aware of bricks through the window?

Sanjeev Bhaskar9:30

Uh no well I was I I became uh aware this was slightly older older than seven but uh of you know NF being painted on our front door and things like that and and the school the secondary school I went to was on the borders with Southall and there was a major National Front march through Southall around nineteen seventy nine, nineteen eighty and uh it was very very frightening.

Presenter9:53

Tell me about your third piece of music.

Sanjeev Bhaskar9:55

This is a song from a film called Anand, which was a Bollywood film. Every weekend we would go to Southall where there were three cinemas that just showed Bollywood films. And thinking back on it now, the capacity of the cinemas, there may have been five or six hundred, maybe seven hundred, but about four and a half thousand people would turn up to each of these cinemas to watch them. And Bollywood films were traditionally three hours long, there'd be an interval in the middle. But at the intermission, you know, two and a half thousand people got up to go and get their samosas and their tea. And there would be one small kiosk with an asthmatic elderly lady who would be serving. And so the queue would be a mile and a half. It would stretch outside the cinema. And so finally you'd get there and you'd order 20 teas and 40 samosas to take back to the rest of your family that were waiting in the cinema. And you're coming back into a room full of 4,000 people in darkness. And, you know, and I don't obviously mean this in a racist way, that one Indian family looks exactly like another in the dark.

Presenter10:59

You can say that.

Sanjeev Bhaskar11:00

I believe I can, and I say it empirically. And also, this is pre-the days of kind of polystyrene cups. These were the thin plastic cups that would change shape as soon as the tea had hit them. So you would just hear in the darkness lots of people going, There are you? There are you, in a similar accent. And then a bit of the s the the screen would light up because it was a kind of sunny scene or whatever, and you'd catch sight of them going, You're not in my family. Give me the samosas back. It was just fantastic. It was like a fair, it was like a festival that was going on.

Speaker 411:33

Mede faiyalo queangan me koisapunke.

Speaker 411:42

Deepu Jalai Dipujala Kahi Duru Jalotinhar Jai Sanji Kiduran Badani Chura Chupukhid

Presenter11:59

See I see

Presenter12:03

From the Bollywood film Anan, that was Salil Chowdhury singing, Well you, Santiv will make a much better job of saying this than I will.

Sanjeev Bhaskar12:09

Well the only way that people are going to know that I've made a better job of it is that if we both have a go.

Presenter12:14

Uh there

Presenter12:15

That makes sense. That makes sense. Go on. That's not bad.

Sanjeev Bhaskar12:15

Well that makes sense. Go on.

Sanjeev Bhaskar12:21

Is it not? Oh, it's pretty good. How should I have said it? You went a million miles from it.

Presenter12:23

I

Presenter12:27

Um let's talk then about student life. Uh you started performing and acting and writing when you were a student.

Sanjeev Bhaskar12:34

Yeah, uh I yeah, I didn't do anything at school at all. And uh when I got to university to do m a marketing degree, I did um drama free choice drama, so it was weekends and evenings. I just thought, well, if I can't be any good here, then there's absolutely no point in me trying to pursue it. Then then I'd just kind of kill that off and and focus on marketing.

Presenter12:52

Is it true that your father used to whisper in your ear, I want to be a businessman?

Sanjeev Bhaskar12:56

Yeah, but yeah, I mean that's for me that's the the earliest indication of subliminal marketing. Uh except I said I want to be an actor, which my dad dad then said, uh we pronounce it doctor.

Sanjeev Bhaskar13:07

When did you say I

Presenter13:09

I want to be an actor.

Sanjeev Bhaskar13:11

Uh, according to my mum, when I was about three.

Sanjeev Bhaskar13:13

Uh rather frighteningly, my son's indicated something very similar and he's nearly at that age, so.

Presenter13:17

He's Liao.

Sanjeev Bhaskar13:19

So yeah, I'm gonna have to w work on the subliminal marketing a little harder.

Presenter13:23

And you mentioned a while ago Nitin Soni, who is a very well known composer now. But at the time the two of you became firm friends, and he was writing with you.

Sanjeev Bhaskar13:28

Cheers.

Sanjeev Bhaskar13:32

Yeah, well he w we just figured that there was nobody out there that reflected our experience of being both British and Asian. And I think coming through a period of time where you'd had programmes like Mind Your Language or Love Thy Neighbour or Till Death Hustle Part where you know the being foreign was the gag. You know in something like Till Death Hustle Part it wasn't. But to all intents and purposes, if you were a minority, what you got called the day after the show was on were the names. Nobody kind of deconstructing what Alf Garnet was like and his ridiculous bigoted position. You got called the names.

Presenter13:51

In Oxford

Presenter14:08

How do you ever wished in in those growing up years that you didn't have to be Asian?

Sanjeev Bhaskar14:13

Yes, I did, yeah. I was kind of embarrassed about being Asian. I remember kind of trying to I tried to toy with the idea. Somebody kind of said to me at the swimming pool once, and I must have been about nine or ten, and they said, What's your name? and I went

Sanjeev Bhaskar14:26

Devon? And it was just so utterly lacking in confidence. If I'd gone, It's Steve, they would have gone, Oh, Steve, do you want to come and play But it was kind of there was a question mark at the end of it as well. It was Stephen? Or maybe Samuel?

Presenter14:40

Yeah.

Sanjeev Bhaskar14:40

So, yeah, I'm uh very much uh embarrassed about the fact that, you know, my

Sanjeev Bhaskar14:45

Mother didn't wear skirts or that we had uh food that was very different. We didn't have boiled food at home. You know, what a godsend that was when I look back on it now. But it took me

Sanjeev Bhaskar14:56

Some time to appreciate that I had this kind of fabulous wealth of experience.

Presenter15:01

That's that's sort of what I'm getting to here, because I'm thinking about you having the nerve to get up on stage and talk about the funny things in your life, much of which was the Asian experience and your very Asian parents. That's quite a journey from the nine-year-old who's pretending he's having fish, fingers and peas.

Sanjeev Bhaskar15:11

Yeah.

Sanjeev Bhaskar15:18

It is, and I think part of that, what helps is that, is finding other people, finding other people that share that experience. I mean, one of the things, certainly with goodness gracious me, that bonded us all immediately was this kind of outpouring of shared experiences. It was very tentative. I remember the first couple of meetings, and someone would say, Does your mum keep a suitcase on top of the wardrobe? And someone would say, you know.

Presenter15:21

You know that just

Sanjeev Bhaskar15:39

Are your remote controls still covered in cling film? And they'd be oh my god, thank God for that Yes, they do and and so What was in the suitcase? I'm wondering It was clothes. And it's it's it was part of that mentality of we don't know when we're going to have to move and when the National Front were in power. There were there were times when you thought, Well, I really don't know which way this is going to go. I don't know where the mood of the nation is going.

Sanjeev Bhaskar16:03

You had the suitcase on top of the wardrobe, you grabbed that and you ran.

Presenter16:07

Tell me about your next piece of music.

Sanjeev Bhaskar16:09

Well, one of the great things I think about university is the broader education. One of the great joys of that was that classical music for me stopped becoming the thing that you marched into assembly to, and I got gained a greater appreciation of it. And Mozart I think is extraordinary anyway, but his requiems I think are phenomenal. And I thought it was just amazing to me that he could someone who could write something as complex as the Requiems could then have the confidence and clarity to write something so simple and so beautiful.

Presenter17:36

Part of the Andante from Mozart's Piano Concerto No. twenty one in C major, played by Radu Lupu with the English Chamber Orchestra. So, Sanjeev Bhaskar, we come to uh the desolate years. I'm going to force you to talk about moving back home and all of the debt. How much debt were you in?

Sanjeev Bhaskar17:52

Um I was I think it was about fifteen thousand pounds, which probably doesn't sound a lot now, but

Presenter17:57

Turns out quite a lot. How come you're influenced by the money?

Sanjeev Bhaskar17:59

Well I um again, looking back on it, a really interesting period but uh quite bleak. I got a series of marketing jobs and the last marketing job I had, I had to sue them. I took them to court, sued them for breach of contract. They ha they weren't paying me, they weren't paying me expenses and I was kind of using my credit card to kind of keep the company going. And during that two years I couldn't get any kind of job at all because my references were tied up with the court case.

Presenter18:25

And so you had to move back home.

Sanjeev Bhaskar18:27

So I had to move back in with my parents, which at the age of twenty-eight, particularly

Sanjeev Bhaskar18:33

judging from what my peers were doing was were doing at the time was particularly difficult. The one thing that I'm grateful for was the fact that culturally it wasn't seen by them as any kind of failure.

Sanjeev Bhaskar18:45

So yeah, for for about for about six months no, for about three months I was really depressed.

Presenter18:50

What form did that take?

Sanjeev Bhaskar18:51

I I would uh get up late, I'd have um a fried egg on toast and then I would go to the video shop, get three videos, sixty p each, come back, watch them back to back. My mum and dad would be back from work at that time, I'd have a cup of tea with them and I'd then go to my room for the rest of the evening, come down, have dinner, go back to my room. That was it, for about three months.

Presenter19:14

Were you doing any writing yet?

Sanjeev Bhaskar19:15

None at all, no.

Presenter19:16

Yeah.

Presenter19:17

You seemed very energetic and self-possessed. That ha that was not present at all, was it? You were just you'd

Sanjeev Bhaskar19:22

Do you know, it it wasn't, but also I I wouldn't have had a notion of where to direct it. I went down and picked up the doll money and and came back.

Sanjeev Bhaskar19:30

And that was kind of it. That was about as energetic as I could be. And did you think this will be my life? That was that was the bleakest aspect of it. Because at that point I thought I'd I've got no uh conviction that I'm gonna win this case. I may lose it.

Sanjeev Bhaskar19:45

And um I will work in a factory somewhere and will be paying back a debt for the rest of my life. And that's I was thirty at that point and I thought that's it, that's what it's going to be.

Presenter19:55

More to talk about. Tell me about your next choice.

Sanjeev Bhaskar19:57

Well, this is a song that's become important for lots of different reasons. I've always been a huge Monty Python fan. And Look on the Bright Side of Life, I think, is you know, if there's one song that epitomizes my journey so far, it's been that. And it there's a kind of poetic justice to the fact that I've ended up in the West End playing King Arthur in Monty Python's Holy Grail musical Spam a lot, and I get to sing this on stage. And every night when we get to this song, I have to pinch myself.

Speaker 420:28

Always look on the bright side of life.

Speaker 420:36

Always look on the light side of life.

Speaker 420:44

If life seems jolly rotten, there's something you've forgotten.

Speaker 420:48

And that's to laugh and smile and dance and sing.

Speaker 420:51

When you're feeling in the dumps, dumpy silly chums, just purse your lips and whistle, that's the thing.

Presenter20:59

Look on the bright side of life from Monty Python's Life of Brian. So, as we've discussed.

Sanjeev Bhaskar21:04

That is I have to say that is one of the great message songs.

Presenter21:07

Do you think so?

Sanjeev Bhaskar21:07

Yeah, there's a great political message within that.

Presenter21:11

I'll leave that. People can make of that what they will. Sandeev Baskar, we've talked I mean, much earlier we talked about this flip of the coin for the BBC producers who came to see you as you were doing

Sanjeev Bhaskar21:18

G said

Presenter21:21

these sort of exploratory stand up routines that you did and sketch, and you did a bit of singing in there, and there w there was a lot in it. It was it was a heady mix and quite an unusual mix that you were offering. But in that they saw a performer that could be part of a show that was to become goodness gracious me, you were part of the team, and that quickly became a success.

Sanjeev Bhaskar21:40

Yeah, it was strange, you know, because it it was uh the first reaction we got generally was uh uh Asian sketch show, are Asians funny? I've known them to be funny. And uh I had to kind of say, you know, in retrospectively I had to say we've always been funny, we just didn't feel the need to let you know about it.

Presenter21:56

Right. So do you think you think what do they call them? BBC bigwigs, I think? Do you think they were resist resistant to the idea?

Sanjeev Bhaskar22:02

I think yeah, I think they were, yeah. But I but I had the same thing when when it came to the Kamars as well. I mean, they I had sort of it was rejected for about four or five years before uh anyone took it up. And that was just a bunch of people saying I don't get it. But, you know, I'm I'm grateful that they at least gave us the opportunity to try. But yeah, well, I think we had to go through more than other people did.

Presenter22:21

It's understandably a very tricky and sensitive subject, this, but there will also be those people who say, Oh, you know, it's just the B B C ticking a diversity box. There we go. We'll give those those people with brown skin a sort of half an hour on the telly, and that that'll keep them quiet and it'll keep the governors happy.

Sanjeev Bhaskar22:35

Yeah.

Sanjeev Bhaskar22:36

Well, as long as I'm getting a job, I don't care.

Presenter22:36

What's on

Sanjeev Bhaskar22:39

Uh yeah, they do say that. I think, I mean, certainly with the stuff that I that I've done. Um

Sanjeev Bhaskar22:44

The criticism is without.

Sanjeev Bhaskar22:47

Basis simply, if you look at the audience figures, and I mean, there are probably one and a half million Asians in this country.

Presenter22:55

And you were getting figures three and a half million.

Sanjeev Bhaskar22:56

Yeah, exactly. So even if every single one of them was watching, we had uh more of an indigenous population than the British Asians being kind of particularly loyal.

Presenter23:05

But it wasn't I mean, goodness gracious me, certainly wasn't in the first couple of series. It w it wasn't political. Did you see it as having an a a sort of undertow?

Presenter23:13

Of importance in terms of its cultural significance? Or did you, as you say, were you just interested in the laughs and the paycheck?

Sanjeev Bhaskar23:20

Um we g not in that order obviously. We we knew that we were going to be politicised and that would happen whether we did it or not. And so we thought well let's let us not do it. Let's concentrate on it being funny. And I think the fact that you had British Asians on screen who were reflecting a confidence within the wider community, I think that was a far stronger political message than us doing overtly political subjects.

Presenter23:47

Tell me about your next piece of music.

Sanjeev Bhaskar23:50

The Clash and London Calling, I think this is a great record and punk at the time, again I was slightly too young for punk and it just scared me. And I kind of now get it. And one of the reasons I get it is that I met and became friends with, alas for a very short period of time before he died, Joe Strummer, who was lead singer of The Clash. And I think that we're in need of something like that. I think we're in need of a punk-like youth identity and revolution. And also I think that Joe Strummer, who was one of the most generous people I've ever met, has provided me with what I like to feel is my most celeb moment, which was when I first met him. I was backstage at some music awards. And basically he kind of said to me in the moment, he kind of came up, he introduced himself, and I was kind of like, oh my goodness, you're Joe Strummer. And he went, yeah, I know. I always have been. And he said, come and meet Johnny Depp. And that was just, I mean, I just thought, well, it's just not going to get any better than that. Joe Strummer introducing me to Johnny Depp.

Speaker 424:48

Calling to the faraway towns Now war is declared and battle come down London calling to the underworld Come out of the cupboard, yeah boys and girls London calling, now don't look to us Phony Beatlemania is burning the dust London calling, see we ain't got no swing Except for the ring Of the truncheon thing The ice is

Presenter25:17

The clash and London calling and memories of one of your ultimate celebrity moments there with Joe Strummer introducing you to Johnny Depp. Let's talk for a moment about the nature of fame and celebrity because, of course, you're married to Mira Syal. Together, you are this huge golden power couple in the entertainment industry. How do you deal with that?

Sanjeev Bhaskar25:38

Uh by letting her be uh you know the important one. Um because she is more talented than I am and uh I have to say that um for legal reasons. Um no, we've always said that we're rubbish uh celebrities, you know, we're not particularly good celebrities. We don't really do the party thing, we don't really do the premieres thing, we don't really do the uh spreads in the um lifestyle magazines and all that kind of stuff. There's a certain responsibility, I think, that comes with being in the public eye. And I do feel happily a sense of duty towards that because it's also, you know, allowed me the life I lead.

Presenter26:10

And so now you are a father of a young son who's almost three and also stepfather to a teenager.

Sanjeev Bhaskar26:15

Hmm.

Presenter26:16

A while back we were talking about the fact that at thirty, living at home, depressed, no money, no career, uh twelve years later, not just money and a career, but a wonderful wife who you love and these children who you take care of. Are you able to connect with the reality of that? Or sometimes do you feel as though it's all happened rather quickly?

Sanjeev Bhaskar26:28

Tilton

Sanjeev Bhaskar26:35

I think that for the first half of the career so far, I don't think I dealt with it particularly well at all. I just couldn't connect with this person who lived this lifestyle or met these people. I remember that the first time I was on Parkinson, I was living in this dingy one-bed flat in Islington, which had no natural light. I remember this lovely car picked me up, and you know, I was on a show and I met other famous people, and I got in this lovely car, and I got dropped back to this flat with no natural light. I thought, who the hell am I? Am I the guy who lives here? Am I the guy who.

Sanjeev Bhaskar27:10

does, you know, shows like Parkinson. So I d I found that really hard.

Presenter27:14

And how did you begin to to accept it and make peace with it? And even, of course, the most important bit, enjoy it for God's sake?

Sanjeev Bhaskar27:21

Um I think that again, i your friends and and your family are key in those kind of uh relationships are key. You know, we we're on this planet to to connect with other people. We're not here to kind of live in bubbles, you know. And through that a little bit of therapy, a little bit of counselling.

Sanjeev Bhaskar27:36

But I think after certainly getting together with Mira and I think getting married.

Sanjeev Bhaskar27:41

And becoming a parent, certainly. The one great thing about becoming a parent of the many, many great things, uh is that you are forced to live in the present. And it's the one thing that we're not socially taught to do. We read history, we look backwards, we have ambitions, so we project forwards and we forget about the present all the time. And I think that once you have a kid, then

Presenter27:57

Did we forget?

Sanjeev Bhaskar28:01

They live in the present. They don't they don't they're not saying, Listen, I might have a poo in about three weeks and I suggest you get some nappies in. It's coming, it's here, it's now you know, move quickly. So speaks a man in the middle of potty training.

Presenter28:14

I thought it

Sanjeev Bhaskar28:15

I'm not sure if I can do it.

Presenter28:16

Thank you very much.

Sanjeev Bhaskar28:16

Yep, thank you very much. Thank you for clarifying that. I'm not I'm not there are times when I'm not sure.

Presenter28:21

Tell me about your seventh piece of music then.

Sanjeev Bhaskar28:24

David Bowie, David Bowie, and Life on Mars. Life on Mars I think is a great song anyway, but Life on Mars kind of epitomizes that moment of me kind of going, actually, do you know, I am I am successful and that's okay. I may not be successful forever, but for now I am, and that's alright. You know, I don't need to be embarrassed about it.

Speaker 428:44

It's a god-awful small affair.

Speaker 428:48

To the girl with a mousy hand

Speaker 428:52

But your money is yelling no

Speaker 428:56

And her daddy has told her to go.

Speaker 429:00

But her friend is nowhere to be seen.

Speaker 429:04

Now she walks through her sunken dream.

Speaker 429:08

To the seat with the clearest view

Speaker 429:12

And she's hooked to the silver screen.

Presenter29:14

David Bowie and Life on Mars. Let's talk then not about your response to your fame, but your your parents' response. I imagine incredibly proud.

Sanjeev Bhaskar29:24

They're just jumping on a bandwagon.

Sanjeev Bhaskar29:27

What do you mean? I don't think they've understood anything I've ever done. And they've just they've done that thing that, you know everybody else is laughing. He's hilarious, you know. Um no, they are, they are proud. And I think that's if there's one thing that I'm I'm relieved and grateful for, it's the fact that, you know, while they're still around,

Presenter29:27

What do you mean?

Sanjeev Bhaskar29:45

They they've seen me go from the dim, dark days of my early thirties to the point that they can be proud of me.

Sanjeev Bhaskar29:53

And, you know, the fact that I'm, you know, uh, married and and got a family and all the all the things that they would have wanted to see, I've just about managed to achieve, you know, while they're still around.

Presenter30:04

You got them on the telly, didn't you?

Sanjeev Bhaskar30:05

I did, yeah. What did you do? I um I did an advert for some chocolates and I thought it just would be ga I know my dad, you know, he always would be you know, flirted with the idea of the media and th and I thought, well, let's just get them in. It was a two day shoot and they turned up on the first day, early, obviously, and somebody came up to them and said uh oh hello, you are

Presenter30:06

What did you do?

Sanjeev Bhaskar30:24

And my mum said, We are Sanjeev's parents. And this guy said, That's very good, that's very good. But you're playing Sanjeev's parents. And they said my dad said, No, no, we are Sanjeev's parents. And this guy said, That's very good, method acting.

Presenter30:41

I care.

Sanjeev Bhaskar30:42

So that was great. I think making your parents proud.

Sanjeev Bhaskar30:46

There shouldn't be any embarrassment about that. It's a nice thing to do.

Presenter30:49

Uh what about on the desert island then?'Cause that you're about to go there one more record and then you're off. Oh my goodness. On your own. No wife, no potty training toddler. No teenager to annoy you. How are you going to deal with it all?

Sanjeev Bhaskar31:02

Uh well, it's um uh I've I you know, I've been isolated before, so I know I can survive it. So that side of it doesn't bother me. But also I do know that uh change is inevitable, so no one can tell me.

Presenter31:09

So that

Sanjeev Bhaskar31:17

That I'm going to be marooned there forever. Something may change.

Sanjeev Bhaskar31:20

I'll probably cry a lot.

Presenter31:22

That's all right.

Sanjeev Bhaskar31:22

That's okay. That's okay.

Presenter31:23

Tell me about your final choice then.

Sanjeev Bhaskar31:25

Susannah McCorkle and The Waters of March and I think it's the most beautiful song I've ever heard. I find it incredibly moving. And it's also a song that instantly reminds me of Mira as well, and family, and friends, and those those that

Sanjeev Bhaskar31:41

That you love, because I think it's Mir and I, if we have a shared philosophy, is that life is made up of a series of moments. And

Sanjeev Bhaskar31:48

The broad spectrum that is life, that are these moments, that are captured in this song, I think certainly says to me how extraordinary life is and how important it is to live it.

Speaker 332:01

A flower that blooms, a fox in the brush, A nod in the wood, the song of a thrush, the mystery of life, the steps in the hall, the sound of the wind and the waterfall. It's the moon floating free, it's the curve of the slope, it's an N, it's a B, it's a reason for hope. And the riverbank sings of the waters of March. It's the promise of spring, it's the joy in your heart.

Presenter32:31

Susannah McCorkle and the Waters of March. So I'm going to give you the Bible.

Presenter32:35

The complete works of Shakespeare and you're allowed to take away.

Sanjeev Bhaskar32:39

But

Presenter32:39

You don't have to take it.

Sanjeev Bhaskar32:40

It's a good enough book. Do you want it? Yeah, you don't have to. Yeah, and I'll take it. I'll take it. I think there's some good stories in there.

Presenter32:44

Ring king

Presenter32:46

Complete Works of Shakespeare and You Can Choose another book.

Sanjeev Bhaskar32:49

Alright, it was a toss-up between Conversations with God, Book One, and Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. I'm gonna have to go with Hitchhiker's, because I think it's played such a huge part in my life. From the answer to Life, the Universe and Everything being 42 and thus using it in the title of the Kamars, to it being what we Brits do really well, which is absurd humour. And I think that book contains it. It's smart, it's clever, it's funny.

Presenter33:20

It's yours, and a luxury.

Sanjeev Bhaskar33:22

Uh a grand piano.

Presenter33:23

It's yours. And if you could take only one of the eight tracks, which one would you choose?

Sanjeev Bhaskar33:27

It would be without a doubt Susanna McCauley and The Waters of March. I think it's the one thing that tells you that life is in all the details, and don't miss them, because they're all fabulous.

Presenter33:38

Sandeep Basker, thank you very much for letting us hear your desert island this time.

Presenter33:48

You've been listening to a podcast from the Desert Islandists archive. For more podcasts, please visit bbc.co.uk slash radio four.