{"id":558102,"date":"2026-03-24T19:16:07","date_gmt":"2026-03-24T19:16:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/558102\/"},"modified":"2026-03-24T19:16:07","modified_gmt":"2026-03-24T19:16:07","slug":"i-lost-every-good-acting-job-to-riz-ahmed-annoyingly-his-james-bond-comedy-is-a-jaw-dropping-hoot-television","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/558102\/","title":{"rendered":"I lost every good acting job to Riz Ahmed \u2013 annoyingly, his James Bond comedy is a jaw-dropping hoot | Television"},"content":{"rendered":"

Conflicted feelings for me this week, watching Bait, the new comedy created by Riz Ahmed<\/a>. I started a career in acting shortly after Ahmed, you see. For a decade, I lost every good job going to him. What made it worse was watching all of those projects and realising exactly how good he was. Anyway, I\u2019m going to try to write the rest of this while suppressing Salieri levels of malcontent. Wish me luck.<\/p>\n

Bait is the story of an Asian actor, Shah Latif, who finds himself lined up to be the next James Bond<\/a>. The series covers the internet\u2019s toxic response to the rumours, using it to dive deep into a conversation about racial palatability, Britishness, ambition and authenticity. It\u2019s funny, surreal, provocative and boasts an incredible array of hot young British-Asian actors. Which reminds me, I must rewatch Sliding Doors.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s an astute premise. In real life, the casting of the secret agent<\/a> has become a lightning rod. For many, Bond serves as a type of statue \u2013 demanding to be climbed, or pulled down. The Asian actor Nikhil Parmar wrote a very funny 2022 play, Invisible, exploring exactly this idea. In Bait, Shah\u2019s ex-girlfriend, forthright film-maker Yasmin, dismisses Shah\u2019s dream, describing the MI6 agent as a totem of white neocolonialism. \u201cIf I played him, he wouldn\u2019t be white!\u201d protests Shah. \u201cYeah, but you would be,\u201d she shoots back.<\/p>\n

Interestingly, we don\u2019t do this for other franchises. No one appears to clamour for a Filipino Harry Potter<\/a>, or a neurodivergent Paddington Bear. Although the marmalade fixation does suggest that call would be coming from inside the house.<\/p>\n

Bait doesn\u2019t forget to have fun. A lot of it. \u201cHow are you going to win hearts and minds with your horny meerkat face?\u201d prods Shah\u2019s cousin Zulfi, played by Guz Khan. Bait is best in these family scenes. Pass-agg Pakistani aunties snipe at each other\u2019s Eid celebrations. One of them dotes unreasonably on her Dubai-living son, who is introduced in an over-the-top Bollywood spoof, literally walking on water.<\/p>\n

When Shah is teased by his uncles for not making Pakistani films, his father steps in on his behalf. \u201cThis fanny speaks Urdu like a white boy\u201d is the defence he offers. Bait capitalises on jokes no one else is allowed to make, giving it a jaw-dropping freshness. It\u2019s the brownest thing on TV since that Hovis advert.<\/p>\n

The Oscar- and Emmy-winning Ahmed was educated at Oxford, so I\u2019m sure his family are proud of him \u2013 must be nice. And this is a clever show. Its smarts are apparent from the title screen, which makes use of steganography: a way of concealing a message within text. In this case, it\u2019s unlocked via colour theory, applied filters that reveal each episode\u2019s title. The series name itself, Bait, carries an Urban Dictionary-style translation \u2013 pointing up the idea of playing to a privileged audience, while also doing it.<\/p>\n

Riz Ahmed, in the Honey Monster costume, in Chris Morris\u2019s 2010 film Four Lions. Photograph: Everett Collection Inc\/Alamy<\/p>\n

Bait\u2019s credits thank Jesse Armstrong<\/a> and Chris Morris,<\/a> with whom Ahmed worked on the groundbreaking satire Four Lions <\/a>(and I did not). There is some of that film\u2019s appealing silliness here, playing off the show\u2019s harder themes and racial attacks. It\u2019s far warmer than, say, Atlanta<\/a>, the inventive FX comedy that deals with blackness and aspiration in the US. An early sequence, in which Shah attends an establishment, white-washing gala to unveil a \u201crestored Buddha of Bamiyan<\/a>\u201d, had me howling. It looked less Easter Island, more like a dropped Easter egg of Shrek.<\/p>\n

Ahmed\u2019s showbiz Rolodex rolls deep. This can lead to an embarrassment of riches. Himesh Patel feels underused as Shah\u2019s suave, politically savvy acting rival Raj Thakkar (shades of Ray Purchase, for any Toast of London fans). But these are champagne problems. A foul-mouthed voiceover by a Very Famous Actor, which runs through the series, is delightful \u2013 as are the many self-aware Dev Patel gags. Nabhaan Rizwan is almost too handsome, while Khan can steal any scene, even ones he\u2019s not in.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Ahmed himself as an increasingly fractured Shah is superb \u2013 balancing emotional intensity, physical comedy and self-mockery. He truly is the best of this country, and Bait is the latest proof of his licence to thrill. Goddamn you, Riz. Why are you so undeniable? I coulda been a contender!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Conflicted feelings for me this week, watching Bait, the new comedy created by Riz Ahmed. I started a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":558103,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[49,48,361,75],"class_list":["post-558102","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-celebrities","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-celebrities","tag-entertainment"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/558102","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=558102"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/558102\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/558103"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=558102"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=558102"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=558102"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}