What were you thinking, Mr The Mayor of London? Yes, Sadiq Khan makes an appearance in the opening episode of the fifth (!) series of Citizen Khan (BBC1). He doesn’t say a lot. “Yes, that’s me, Citizen Khan at your service,” he tells a police officer who’s looking for the other Citizen Khan. And then, when the cop starts to escort him out of Edgbaston cricket ground: “But hang on, I’m the mayor of London!” A little wooden, Sadiq: don’t give up the day job.
But the point is he’s in the show. He must approve, and he’s by no means the first British Pakistani – second generation, first, third – to give CK the thumbs up. That means something, as do the ratings and the awards, including Asian Media awards, for the show and its creator and star Adil Ray.
But then so do all the other voices – for example Labour MP Rupa Huq’s – who say it’s backward and Islamophobic.
My view is that it certainly plays to stereotypes, but not necessarily harmfully; more affectionate than hateful. Mr Khan is a caricature but a recognisable one, as are the rest of the family. Younger daughter Alia (Bhavna Limbachia) is most interesting and most believable – one person with her parents, a very different one away from them. But then you might say my view on this counts for diddly.
I am more qualified to talk about the comedy, though. And, God, it’s awful. Painful, even. “Turn around,” Kahn tells his son-in-law as he gets changed, and Amjad turns all the way round – 360 degrees. Even the studio audience struggles to raise a titter at that one. But they like Khan falling through the window, and some of the light innuendo and punnery – including the inevitable googly misunderstanding. And the line: “Don’t forget to wash into my underbody, it hasn’t been done for a while” (no not that one, the car!). It really is like watching telly in the 70s.
Maybe that’s OK. For it is – Ray has said – influenced by sitcoms from that time. It just seems a shame that the most popular TV programme about and featuring British Asians is so lame.
