Renu Setna - The Ageless Asian Everyman

Over the years, I have become accustomed to many actors seemingly being typecast on British television, especially in minor roles. I’ve already mentioned Andre Maranne but if a director wants an elderly Jewish man, he would have to cast Cyril Shaps. Chinese Scouser? Ozzie Yue. Working-class Yorkshireman? Paul Copley. Northern ‘tart with a heart’? Deidre Costello. Soft-voiced Irish professional? TP McKenna. Scottish ‘heavy’? James Cosmo. Generic Eastern European crook? Vladek Sheybal. The list goes on and on.

In the Seventies and Eighties, when the membership of Equity had a considerably less multi-ethnic look about it, reflecting the social and demographic profile of the UK, Asian actors must have been thin on the ground. For casting directors everywhere, prayers would be answered by Renu Setna.

Saeed Jaffrey and Art Malik may have bagged the roles of middle-class Asian businessmen but Setna was the quintessential ‘little man’. During the Seventies and Eighties he would turn up in anything from The Basil Brush Show and Doctor Who to Minder.  

He played Hindu everyman Mr Patel in Are You Being Served, The Bill and The Chinese Detective and predictably umpteen roles in ‘70s sitcom It Ain’t Half Hot, Mum, the ones for which Michael Bates didn’t black up. His beard became almost as familiar as Windsor Davies’ twirling ‘tache, Be it a clerk, tailor or maharajah, didn’t the British army concert party ever twig that it was the same man every time?!

There weren’t many programmes I can remember in which he had a recurring role. In Sickness and In Health was one example. In 1986 and ’87 he was local shop owner Mr Kittel opposite Warren Mitchell’s ageing racist Alf Garnett. There were some amusing scenes in which he challenged Alf’s pompous prejudices with an easy humility, a common theme in this often hilarious series. Slightly against type, Setna also portrayed a leather coat-wearing gangster Mr Ram in Only Fools and Horses, but of course ultimately he failed to get the better of Del Boy!

Nevertheless Renu Setna is about more than comedy. I was amused to discover that he appeared in the two nurse-based dramas, Angels and No Angels 30 years apart, both of which I used to watch regularly. To extend the coincidence, in each case he played the part of ‘Mr Khan’.  Since then I would have spotted his familiar features in programmes such as Hustle and Silent Witness and his TV credits continue right up to the present day.

These days British Asian actors portray characters which don’t have to be Asians. They are no longer restricted to the niche characters inhabiting corner shops and sitcom slaves. Lawyers, cops, teachers, estate agents, pathologists: apparently they aren’t all posh, white blokes in the twenty-first century, y‘ know. And in the realm of television, they are no longer the preserve of Mr Setna.

Britain boasts such a range of younger class acts with South Asian heritage. Dev Patel, Riz Ahmed, Raza Jaffrey and Parminder Nagra are in demand worldwide so these days are relatively rare on the UK small screen. The Goodness Gracious Me quartet are no longer youthful sketch comedy ground-breakers but Adil Ray (Citizen Khan) could be on the sitcom scene for decades to come. In drama on both sides of the Atlantic, Ace Bhatti (always the smart lawyer the viewer doesn’t know whether to trust), Archie Panjabi, Arsher Ali, Indira Varma, Amita Dhiri (once of This Life), Nabhaan Rizwan and many others are always worth watching, potential TV treasures of the future.

And yet, as long as he’s well enough to work, there’ll always be room for Renu Setna. Now in his silver-bearded dotage, the veteran actor’s appearance at a front door, shop counter or even maharajah’s palace will always elicit a knowing smile by this viewer.