Meera Syal (born Feroza Syal), a well-known Asian personality in the UK, began her acting career with theater performances. Her first screen appearance was in drama-film ‘Majdhar’ (1984). She played various roles in crime-drama series ‘The Bill’ (1984-1995).
Syal was writer for 1985 TV-series ‘Tandoori Nights’ and ‘Black Silk,’ and appeared in TV-series ‘The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole, Aged 13 ¾’ (1985). She was part of miniseries ‘A Little Princess’ (1986), Stephen Frears’ ‘Sammy and Rosy Get Laid’ (1987), TV-film ‘Bureaucracy of Love’ (1987), and writer-performer for sketch-comedy ‘The Real McCoy’ (1991).
Further, Syal appeared in TV-series ‘Kinsey’ (1991-1992), ‘Taggart’ (1992), ‘Sean’s Show’ (1993), ‘Absolutely Fabulous’ (1994), TV-film ‘Gummed Labels’ (1992), and panel-show ‘The Brain Drain’ (1993). She wrote screenplay for Gurinder Chadha’s comedy-drama film ‘Bhaji on the Beach’ (1993).
After appearing in TV-film ‘Flight’ (1995) and TV-series ‘Screen Two’ (1992-1996), ‘Degrees of Error’, ‘Soldier Soldier’ (both 1995), Syal played ‘Sports-coach Ms. Chauhan’ in romantic-comedy film ‘Beautiful Thing’ (1996). She appeared in drama-film ‘Sixth Happiness’ (1997), ‘Ruby’ (1997), quiz-show ‘The Book Quiz’ (1998) and ‘Legal Affairs’ (1998).
Syal was writer-performer for the sketch-comedy show ‘Goodness Gracious Me’ (1998-2001, 2014, 2015) which brought her fame. She played ‘Tina’ in TV-series ‘Keeping Mum’ (1997-1998), ‘Carmen’ in romantic-comedy drama-film ‘Girls Night’ (1998), and appeared in TV-series ‘The Strangerers’ (2000), ‘Fat Friends’ (2000), ‘In Deep’ & ‘Bedtime’ (both 2001) and TV-films ‘Aladdin’ (2000) and ‘Forgive & Forget’ (2000).
Syal’s role as ‘Granny Ummi/Sushila’ in the Emmy Awards-winning TV-series ‘The Kumars at No. 42’ (2001-2006) earned her wide-spread popularity. Based on her own semi-autobiographical novel, she wrote screenplay and starred in comedy-drama film ‘Anita and Me’ (2002). She wrote screenplay of musical ‘Bombay Dreams’ (2002) while her novel ‘Life Isn’t All Ha Ha hee Hee’ was adapted into TV-miniseries of same name (2005).
Syal’s further appearances include TV’s ‘All About Me’ (2002), ‘Murder Investigation Team’ (2005), ‘The Amazing Mrs. Pritchard’ (2006), ‘Jekyll’ (2007) and others. After playing ‘Mother’ in Hindi-language romantic-comedy ‘Jhoom Barabar Jhoom’ (2007), she appeared TV-series ‘Beautiful People’ (2008-2009), ‘Holby City’ (2009), ‘Horrible Histories ‘ (2003-2009) amongst others.
Syal’s notable film appearances include biographical-film ‘Desert Flower’ (2009), ‘You’ll meet a Tall Dark Stanger’ (2010), ‘Amar Akbar & Tony’ (2015), ‘Absolutely Anything’ (2015), ‘Doctor Strange’ (2016), ‘Nativity Rocks!’ (2018), ‘Yesterday’ (2019), ‘Spin’ (2021), and also TV-series ‘The Brink’ (2015), ‘Broadchurch’ (2015), ‘The Sandman’ (2022) and many more.
A wealthy and arrogant neurosurgeon becomes victim of a terrible car crash, which leaves him unable to operate. In his effort to heal himself, he realizes that he knows nothing about the universe, and soon he learns about a hidden world of magic and alternate dimensions.
Desert Flower is a biographical film which follows the journey of Waris Dirie, who manages to escape from the horrors of her life in Somalia. She eventually finds work in London, and eventually with the help of two new acquaintances, she becomes a top supermodel.
Jack is a struggling musician, who meets with an accident during a blackout. When he wakes up, it seems that he is in an alternate universe where the Beatles never existed. Meanwhile, he is the only person who remembers all their songs. He starts singing their songs in his attempt to gain fame.
Even after death investigative reporter, Joe Strombel, decides to communicate with an awkward journalism student Sondra Pranksy, to expose a serial killer known as the Tarot Card Killer. Unfortunately, the prime suspect, British aristocrat, Lyman, proves to be more than a match for Sondra and her ally magician Sid Waterman.
After forty years of married life, Helena finds herself abandoned by her husband, Alfie, who divorces her to marry a prostitute. In desperation, she starts consulting a psychic. Their daughter Sally, married to an unsuccessful author, falls for her boss while her husband begins to admire an already engaged woman, leading to more heartburn.
After three years of traveling across the seas, Alice slips through the mirror to return to the Wonderland, where she meets all her old friends except Mad Hatter and learns that he is in a state of great shock because of his missing family. To save her loved ones, she must now travel into the past and to do that she must steal Chronosphere, an object that controls all of time in Wonderland.
Children in Need was a BBC television program meant to raise charity for needy children. Every BBC local and national radio and TV station was involved in this.
The alien galactic council debates whether the Earth should be destroyed, or to make humanity a member of their council. They eventually come up with a plan of bestowing limitless power to a schoolteacher, to see if the powers would be used for good or for evil. Thus, his actions would determine the fate of humanity.
Clara, a young girl is in search of a one-of-a-kind key, a magical key that will help her unlock a priceless gift, a box, from her late mother. She reaches the coveted key, but soon the key disappears in a parallel world leaving Clara perplexed. In that world, she meets an army of mice and a soldier named Phillip. Clara along with Phillip need to get hold of the key in order to reinstate harmony to the unstable world.
After three years of traveling across the seas, Alice slips through the mirror to return to the Wonderland, where she meets all her old friends except Mad Hatter and learns that he is in a state of great shock because of his missing family. To save her loved ones, she must now travel into the past and to do that she must steal Chronosphere, an object that controls all of time in Wonderland.
In order to buy the perfect present for his aunt for her 100th birthday, Paddington takes up a job. However, unfortunately the gift ends up being stolen.
