My Beautiful Laundrette: Soap Opera

When Hanif Kureishi’s script arrived through my letterbox, I wanted to shoot it right away. I’d made Walter, the film that was screened on the first night of Channel 4, and was all in favour of the fact that it was originally to be made for TV. Who in their right mind was going to go to the cinema to see a film about a gay Pakistani running a launderette? ...

Back then, if you’d asked me what was important about the film, I’d have said economics, since the homosexual element was really quite straightforward. It was the first time jokes about Mrs Thatcher had been made in the cinema and they got huge laughs [Really? In 1985! FB]. The film ended up being a big cinema hit and changed the lives of everyone involved. There was a reunion recently and the wonderful thing was that we were all there. Nobody had died.

Director Stephen Frears remembers making My Beautiful Laundrette in The Guardian.

The film is being shown at the BFI, London, on December 15th with a Q&A with Stephen Frears and Gordon Warnecke. Details of other UK screenings are here.