Mumbai Calling
- TV sitcom
- ITV1
- 2007 - 2009
- 8 episodes (1 series)
ITV sitcom set in an Indian call centre. British-born Kenny is sent to India to run the business. He must work with Dev and Terri. Stars Sanjeev Bhaskar, Nitin Ganatra, Daisy Beaumont, Ratnabali Bhattacharjee, Naren Chandavarkar and more.
Episode menu
Pilot
Further details
Phillip Glass has acquired a failing call centre in a job lot purchase, and promptly dispatches the reluctant Kenny Gupta to take charge and attempt to turn its fortunes around.
Jetted to Mumbai from mundane middle-England suburbia, Gupta is thrown out of the frying pan and straight into the sizzling fire. He's not alone in his task, aided and abetted in equal measures, by Phillip's pampered offspring, Tiffany Glass and Anthony Harris.
As the trio arrive in Mumbai, the fragrant scent of a new life, packed with possibilities fills the air. However, the jubilant mood is immediately quashed upon arrival at the call centre's HQ.
Once there, Kenny encounters a centre run by Dev, a manager more interested in using the centre to help fund his own numerous profitable side lines rather than making profits for its English owners. Up until now, Dev's sole mission in life is to cut deals and make sure he gets the greater portion!
But now he faces competition from Kenny who has his own mission to complete. He must make this call centre a success not only for the sake of his job, but to win the affections of his bullying boss' daughter, the beautiful Tiffany; who he has admired from afar for years.
Tiffany has an axe to grind with her over-bearing father and like Kenny is desperate to make her mark. Intelligent and strong willed, Tiffany must prove to "daddy" she can make a real success of herself. At 31, she has never worked and is single, alone. Mumbai is her calling!
With her gormless, freeloading cousin Anthony in the tow, the unlikely trio launch an all out attack on Dev's management style but quickly find that local knowledge will (nearly) always win out.
Broadcast details
- Date
- Wednesday 30th May 2007
- Time
- 10pm
- Channel
- ITV1
- Length
- 30 minutes
Cast & crew
| Sanjeev Bhaskar | Kenny Gupta |
| Nitin Ganatra | Dev |
| Henry Goodman | Phillip Glass |
| Sophie Hunter | Tiffany Glass |
| Andres Williams | Anthony Harris |
| Sanjeev Bhaskar | Writer |
| Laurence Marks | Writer |
| Maurice Gran | Writer |
| Nick Wood | Director |
| Allan McKeown | Producer |
Press
Mumbai Calling was a pilot for a new sitcom. At this stage, the sit seems promising - but, if there is to be a series, it'll need to work a lot harder on the com part.
Sanjeev Bhaskar plays Kenny Gupta - who, at the start of last night's show, was working in the accounts department of a Jewish family firm in London. (The Jewish element is presumably where Bhaskar's co-writers, Laurence Marks and Maurice Gran, come in.) But then the firm's patriarch, who clearly knew a thing or two about how to set up a traditional comedy plot, decided that his dim nephew and his glamorous but spoilt daughter should join Kenny in running the company's new call centre in Mumbai.
So far, the inevitable cultural clashes have been disappointingly, even lazily familiar. The daughter was surprised to discover that Mumbai is a big messy city instead of the spiritual India of her romantic imaginings. As a special treat, the dim nephew tried to serve the workers a beef dinner.
Both Mumbai and the call centre itself could yet make for an interesting and unusual sitcom setting. If so, however, the script will have to get to grips with it in a much more coherent, as well as a funnier way. At the moment, the result just feels like a slightly plodding drama with a few little (and entirely detachable) gags sprinkled on top.
James Walton, The Telegraph, 1st June 2007This was a very promising start for this brand new ITV sitcom. Now there's a sentence we never envisaged writing in our lifetime. Based in a Mumbai call centre, it was an enjoyable half-an-hour, with much thanks to the wonderful Sanjeev Bhaskar. This man can do no wrong.
The Custard TV, 31st May 2007