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The Bollywood opening of Horace Ové's Play for Today 'The Garland' (BBC, tx.
10/3/1981) is unexpected but shapes the rest of this play, which, with its
unconventional plotting, tears, comedy and tragedy, unfolds like standard
Bollywood fare.
Engineering professional Raji (Tariq Yunus) has taken his middle-class
English wife, Leela (Patricia Garwwood), to see the film in question. She hates
such films but tolerates them because of her love for Raji - in much the same
way as she tolerates his culture. He hates the genteel English suburb they have
moved to, which he tolerates because of his love for her. She thinks he is
oversensitive about racism, he can't understand why she doesn't see the
obvious.
A burglary at their house finally puts paid to their evasions, forcing both
to confront the issues of institutional racism. Against Raji's wishes, Leela
involves the police. She is shocked when they treat Raji as thief, not victim,
and racially abuse their 17 year-old son, Roy (Lyndam Gregory), also suspected
of being the thief.
Leela's growing confusion and Raji's anger create tension at home, which
impacts on Roy, who is already experiencing nightmares and questioning his own
mixed identity.
Into this brew comes Mohammed Huq (Albert Moses), an old Handsworth friend of
Raji's. Following a Muslim divorce of his first wife, Huq is expecting his new
bride from Bangladesh. To sort out Huq's immigration problems, Raji connects him
with an unscrupulous but rising Asian bigwig. At Huq's wedding,
Roy falls for Amina (Shreela Ghosh), the daughter of a Muslim notable. Roy
begins to live a dangerous life - dodging Amina's strict parents and a group of
skinheads who have already attacked his mother. With his life becoming
unbearable, Roy lashes out at his parents for marrying across the colour line,
and creating a life-long crisis of identity for him.
The catalyst for a family reconciliation is the arrest of Huq's newly
pregnant wife by immigration officials. Raji and Leela join forces in a futile
campaign against her deportation. The tears of Huq and his wife, as they are
separated at the airport, bring Leela to a deeper understanding of her country.
Made at a time Britain's inner-cities were exploding in anger, Horace Ové's
warm and engaging film, and his use of the humane Leela as a way of allowing
middle-class England to directly experience the horrors of racism, could hardly
have been bettered.
Onyekachi Wambu
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1. Burgled (6:53)
