Tuning in…
Tuning in…
Castaway
1 appearance
Double BAFTA-winning actor, first person of colour to win Best Actor; known for roles in Four Lions, Killing Eve, Sherwood, and Murdered by My Father.
On the island
Eight records
This is a cheeky one because I love covers. But also I was out of work for a few years and when work started happening for me I got a job in LA and I was with my wife and my little babies in the back of this car driving through LA and it was actually The Wait by the Band. The original track that we would listen to a lot, and it just reminds me of a slight upturn in my career driving with my family through LA. But this is Aretha Franklin's favorite.
I remember singing this song with my mum in the car. And it's only recently I've realised the way of what this song represents and Harry Belafonte and him, like what he represents as a person and an artist. Just the thought now in my 45-year-old brain, thinking back to me and my mum singing this song in the car. I don't know, it's very, it's a very moving thought.
I'm taking this song to the island, Daniel Dilco by the Idols, and I managed to get my hands on some tickets to see the Idols. I phoned up a mate of mine and I said, look, I've got some tickets. Can you come and see The Idols with me? They cancelled. Phone up another mate. They cancelled. Found up another mate. They cancelled. And then I hadn't been in touch with Kay Tempest for a very long time. I was in one of their videos years ago. So we're like friends. But then we hadn't seen each other for a long time. And I asked Kay if they wanted to join me. And 100% in. Let's go. So we went. And I remember being in the crowd, Joe Talbot on stage, and I remember Joe saying to people,'cause it's Punt Gigs has lots of beers flying about the place. And I remember Joe going, All right, let's calm down and let all the people on the walls come to the front of the stage and Kay bought me a T shirt. I mean, I'm just saying buzzwords now, but it was just a beautiful it was and I sometimes wear that T shirt underneath all my clothes sometimes just'cause it reminds me of what a beautiful night that was. And um I think it's about kindness. I think this is what I'm trying to say. And this track in particular. This track in particular because it's about showing love to immigrants. And it's a really thrashy song, but it it sometimes can make me cry because I think about this outpouring of love to immigrants.
I went to a boarding school and they would have strict lights out but I used to take a sort of little radio into my room and out of this radio would be John Peel would come through and so this was one of the songs that he put on and actually when we did the homecoming we took the lights out and we put blue lights in the in the theatre and we played this song. I don't know, it's a weird one because I was just a tiny little Asian kid at posh school and I just fell in love with this song.
This track is when I was studying in New York and I had got there and I lost all my music on my iPod and then a mate of mine said that he could put loads of music on my iPod and he did. So I started, and it was his dad's music library. So I started like learning about music that came from New York at that time. So you got like Velvet Underground, television, Patty Smith. But anyway, this Mo Tucker, who was the drummer of Velvet Underground, sang this song and it just made me think it doesn't matter how rock and roll anyone is or this is kind of what underpins most people just like wanting to find that person that you can be with and close the door and make worlds with.
I listened to this song just recently, obviously, because we were doing this. And I was like, I remember it being like this really sort of full-on, exuberant, throw caution to the wind type song. And now I'm 45, 40. There's some really sad bits in it. It's about childhood, isn't it, really? It's about childhood, and then there's like the decline of. I mean, right at the end, it gets a bit sad, and I'm like, oh, go easy on yourself. Be kind to yourself.
This is a song that I put on I think maybe because it now I'm getting a bit older I sort of feel that any work or creative work that's underpinned by kindness and a feeling of trying to bring people together is something that I really really value and this song epitomizes that feeling for me.
Do You Realize??Favourite
This was our first dance when we got married. But we realized as we were holding each other, we had a really sort of like low-key eight-grand wedding. We just got our mates in and like a little bit of street food, and some people playing some songs and stuff like this. So, really, when you do a first dance, you've got to practice, don't you? You've got to know what the song is. All these days have routines, don't we? It's beautiful. I love it. I love it. We didn't have the bandwidth or the time to do it. And we just said, That's a really good song. Let's make that our first dance. And we love this song so much. And so, we're in the middle of the dance, we're holding each other, and the song comes on, and we're like, We can't dance to it. So, what did we do? We were just kind of like holding each other, staring at each other, no movement, but just sort of staring at each other's faces.
In conversation
Presenter asks
2:07What happens once you've said yes to the scary part? When does the fear start to subside?
Yeah, I'm not sure if it ever does. With age, I've been able to sort of temper it a little bit so the fear doesn't feel too overwhelming that I can't do what I need to do.
Presenter asks
6:57How did your parents meet?
They met in an airport, Heathrow. My dad was an immigration officer and my mum was a passenger handler, because back in the sixties used to greet people off the the plane and um my dad would sit stamping passports and he would make excuse he would like stop my mum's passengers so we could talk to her. Take massive cues for me. Absolutely. Massive cues just to have a little chat with somebody we fancied, and my mum got really angry about it. She's like, This fellow keeps stopping me, and I'm really annoyed. And that's how they met.
Presenter asks
12:47You once said that the process of acting has parallels with the journey someone takes when they emigrate. Tell me a bit more about that.
I think it's like this idea that there's nothing on the horizon to fix your gaze. So all you have is this sort of desire to push forward. And when I think about, I'm doing a spot of writing at the moment, and when I think about the creative act, it sort of feels. All it is is blank horizon. The blank page. The blank page, right. And but this is kind of higher stakes. And it seems like the most purest form of love actually this is sort of promise to the future because I am the sort of product of what that I should apologise for if I'm the product of it, but you know what I mean? But my kids as well, you know, this kind of they're sort of a product of Me and my wife, and these beautiful mixed-race kids that are product of this story of immigration, which I find like a wild thing to think about.
The keepsakes
The book
George Saunders
an expression of kindness is just paying attention, I think is all he's trying to say
Presenter asks
18:58You became a boarder at Cheltenham College at 11. Did you enjoy it?
I think at the time you sort of normalized lots of things and I made some friends there. A little bit homesick at the start and then it was more the idea of like I was a sort of a minority there a little bit. And it's only with age and stuff like that you can sort of see how that might affect a kid's development or their sense of who they are. I mean, well recently, you know, I was got an award there recently, and about that, and at the run-up to the ceremony, we all got in a room together, a lot of British Asian actors and directors and people who work in radio and T V. And it was there to honour Mira, Mira Sayal. And it was the first time I had been in a room with predominantly British Asian people. And I don't know, there was an unspoken sort of feeling amongst all of us of a sense of achievement and pride almost. And when you're a minority, that's quite a important feeling to foster. But you need to have the feeling to recognize it, you know. And I sw and I think when I was at boarding school, What I didn't realise was that I didn't really understand what that feeling was.
Presenter asks
26:25In 2002, just before your finals, you went to New York. Your arrival did not get off to a good start. What happened?
Just before I got on the plane, some security people took my passport off me and said that I'll get it back once I arrived at JFK. Once we landed at JFK, the plane sort of taxied off into a sort of secluded part of the runway and then we see this convoy of cars coming through. These fellas come onto the uh plane and they said that they were gonna handcuff me but um for their own protection and then took me into the airport and then questioned me. And that was the sort of scary bit because that went on a bit longer than it felt comfortable. Four or five hours of like not solid questioning but a lot of waiting. Just if I had any sort of affiliations to terrorist organizations and um whether I was a practicing Muslim or not. And this was during the time of sort of Guatanamo and things like that. So I was aw I was aware of what they were trying to get at and yeah, just sort of held my nerve and just answered the questions as honestly as I could and then got out of there.
Presenter asks
38:14You won your first BAFTA in 2017, the first non-white actor to win Best Actor, and you've said you had mixed feelings. Why was that?
I mean, it's bittersweet. I love winning prizes. So let's get that out of the way. I do love it. By the way, BAFTA, I love a BAFTA. But I knew that being an actor didn't a British Asian actor didn't start with me, you know. Even if I think about it, like one of the movies I really, really love was my beautiful Laundrette with Rush and Seth and say, Joffrey, and all these sort of old school British Asian actors that I knew were doing really, really amazing work. So it was a sweet moment in the sense that um I mean, just winning a BATTA's brilliant, isn't it? It can't never not be the the most amazing feeling in the world. And a bitter moment in the sense that that's strange that happened in twenty seventeen. Yeah.
“I think it's about kindness. I think this is what I'm trying to say. And this track in particular. This track in particular because it's about showing love to immigrants. And it's a really thrashy song, but it it sometimes can make me cry because I think about this outpouring of love to immigrants.”
“I don't know, it's a weird one because I was just a tiny little Asian kid at posh school and I just fell in love with this song.”
“It doesn't matter how rock and roll anyone is or this is kind of what underpins most people just like wanting to find that person that you can be with and close the door and make worlds with.”
“I think we're just moving into a world where we're just a soupy mess of experiences.”
“I love winning prizes. So let's get that out of the way. I do love it. By the way, BAFTA, I love a BAFTA.”