Don’t mention Bollywood

Niraj Kapur explains how he has fought expectations about the subjects a British Asian writer should choose.

The biggest misconception producers have about Asians is that we are only capable of writing Asian projects around the ethnic clichés of curry houses, corner shops, Bollywood, arranged marriages, terrorism and racism.

I was born and educated in Northern Ireland. Sixteen challenging years in England followed, including drama school, two years on Income Support, marriage, fatherhood, being a regular game show contestant, joining the Chocolate Tasting Society, collecting rock music and doing unique office jobs. My experiences have been wonderful and varied. Why would I want to limit myself to writing stories about depressing racism or clichéd arranged marriages?

Don’t get me wrong, I’m proud of being Indian. The Hindu culture is richly steeped in history with fascinating stories that have not been told on a commercial scale. The delicious food, loyalty among friends and warmth among families gives me a sense of security in an insecure world. However, imagination is not limited to skin colour.

I wrote numerous Asian projects early in my career. My second sitcom, Living in Sin, had two episodes developed (with money) by comedy guru, Humphrey Barclay. But broadcasters hesitated, worried that nobody would want to watch an Asian show. It’s a shame they didn’t see the quality of the work instead. Isn’t that more important? Once Goodness Gracious Me became a hit I re-submitted Living In Sin, only to be informed there’s already an Asian comedy on TV. We don’t need another.

Another route

The quickest way to make a decent living is to become a produced writer for other shows. I tried writing for a BBC afternoon soap, Doctors. But since my strengths are comedy and children writing, the melodrama on Doctors wasn’t my cup of tea, so my writing was unsuccessful. I had no interest in Radio 4 afternoon plays and didn’t know what do to.

After ten years of incredibly hard work, constant sacrifices and zero success, I was becoming deeply disheartened by the business.

Once my daughter was born, I took some time off and became very familiar with the plethora of animation and puppet programmes on offer. I thought it would be fun attempting to write for these shows. Kids’ shows look simple but it was much more challenging than I ever imagined. After several months of knocking on doors I was hired as a writer on BBC’s The Story Makers.

Now that I was able to tell producers I’d had work transmitted, they took me more seriously. My first prime-time offering was shown on 2003 on Anglia TV, which I co-wrote – a project about farmers in Norfolk. People were surprised than I had written such an English topic, but welcomed that I wrote something different.

The time had come to write my own show. My first all-English sitcom was for Steve Coogan’s production company, Baby Cow. They’re great to work for. Everybody thought I would make it. So did I after writing a pilot of Jack’s Life and twelve storylines but unfortunately, every broadcaster turned down my male version of Bridget Jones.

The thought of spending yet another four months of my life writing a new sitcom with future storylines was appealing, but to spend another year being rejected by every broadcaster was not. 

The easiest way to get work produced was to keep writing for other shows, which I didn’t want to do anymore, so I thought about having a book or play produced.

Sitcoms, screenplays, novels, they make no difference to me. Writing is writing, all you need to do is learn the different rules for each format.

All my acting friends warned me that most fringe plays are lucky if they break even, so I choose the more cost effective options of a novel, combining my favourite genres – romantic-comedy and fantasy.

Heaven’s Delight

It took almost eighteen months to get Heaven’s Delight into perfect shape. Luckily, I had the female clients at my wife’s salon giving feedback and some mothers at my daughter’s school, who are voracious readers, gave constructive criticism. You don’t receive feedback from TV or movie audiences until after the work is produced. At least with a novel you can make cost-effective improvements. 

The book is aimed at women because I enjoy female fiction. Plus, my best friends are women and the publishing offices I’ve worked in for fifteen years mainly employed women. My life revolves around my daughter, wife, mother and sister and producers have told me that I write strong female characters

A limited run of 1,500 books has been produced. If they sell-out, I will have a run of 5,000 books. So far 600 copies of the book at £7.99 have been pre-sold, so it has broken even before even hitting the market. That gives me confidence. I’m finally on the right path. It’s not the journey I ever thought I’d make, but at least my writing has finally achieved some kind of recognition.

Heaven’s Delight will be released on 30 October, 2006. To read the first chapter free of charge, go to www.heavensdelight.co.uk