People assume, based on my clickbait title My Mum Told Me Not To Marry An Atheist, that I am normalising atheist relationships. When in reality, they are the joke of the show
Through the protagonist, Pakistani radio host and DJ Dadi, atheists are teased for their “lack of hygiene” and for being “confused.com” and halfway to being Muslim with their mindfulness and yoga, but still unable to make up their “bloody minds”. Dadi’s sharp wit challenges the audience’s misconceptions by using humour to dismantle their assumptions, revealing her to be a modern woman from Karachi, where “young people in pre-marital relations” regularly call her for advice.
In my play My Mum Told Me Not to Marry an Atheist Dadi is navigating her relationship with her grand-daughter Kamal (Arabic for perfection). The show explores family dynamics, secrecy within relationships, love, marriage and being intergenerational trouble-makers. Kamal attempts to come out to Dadi both about her relationship with THE BOY and about her queer identity (throwing it all at once, because you might as well), yet Kamal still hides parts herself fearing Dadi won’t be accepting. Throughout the show, Dadi’s constant audience interaction shreds the assumption that she is a traditional or closed-off, in truth she is more open minded than Kamal expects, she jokes that Kamal believes that queerness only exists in Europe, “when the hijra have existed thousand years before in India”. The show ridicules our pre-existing judgements, turning them on their head.
A lot of my comedy comes from the women in my family: I have one auntie who is a radio host Humera Haqqani MBE who talks about social issues within her community on Crescent Radio every Friday; I have aunties who cook up insults with love and a chicken curry within ten minutes; and cousins who have flow and cadence whenever they deliver a story from their everyday life (I’m talking about you, Ana Khan). While my writing is rooted in real people, parts of the show are fictional, relationships I wanted to believe that could have existed with my own grandmother, Mehar Jehan Beg, who passed away in February 2023. Her sharp tongue, 365 party girl sunglasses and her Paris fashion week hijab somehow live in this show. I find it really cathartic bringing people you know on-stage but I’m also drawn by a lot of shows on-screen.
There are so many shows that I love and can rewatch and writers who have influenced me especially Nida Manzoor’s We Are Lady Parts on Channel 4. Seeing a Muslim punk band exist unapologetically challenges this trauma porn narrative that we are oppressed or forms of oppressors. The way Manzoor fuses comedy, female friendships and faith is so liberating and beautiful. When I was devising Dadi’s character, I kept coming back to Goodness Gracious Me and seeing the sketches they wrote thirty years ago, remain timeless, in their exploration of faith, belonging and identity. I was particularly invested by the two auntie sketches performed by Meera Syal and Nina Wadia who deliver crude, snide comments. I wanted to reverse that energy in Dadi, making her refreshing and emotionally intelligent. I love TV so much, I feel that TV is the most accessible form of art. Shows like Derry Girls or Big Boys are tender, loud and opinionated. Especially with Big Boys, the fact that Jack Rooke could make a “comedy on suicide” (obviously he couldn’t pitch it that way to Channel 4). The way Rooke makes you laugh in order to cry, that balance is so rare and necessary. In fact, the show addresses men’s mental health, male friendships and queer identities. What all these shows share is their ability to build empathy by humanising these lives that we don’t often see on-screen. I believe comedy does that, it quietly dismantles your assumptions.
In terms of my role as Dadi, I feel that her performance can be both healing and liberating. After my run at the Edinburgh Fringe last year, I’ve had people tell me that they’ve felt seen with Dadi’s character and that their grandparents could be more accepting than their parents. When Dadi breaks away her banter with the audience and shares an intimate moment with Kamal, the audience has already built a relationship with her. This leads into an emotional scene of what it means to be the “perfect girl” and how South Asian women are often expected to prioritise pleasing people, even when it hurts you in the long term. By threading humour throughout the show, Dadi dismantles the audience's assumptions, opens them to empathy and reveals herself as a modern, nuanced and perceptive woman.
My Mum Told Me Not To Marry An Atheist (WIP) will perform on Thurs 19 and Tues 24th Mar at 9pm.
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