A somewhat subdued Britcom more interested in exploring Indian and British post-colonial race relations in eighties England than sight gags and one-liners, TANDOORI NIGHTS showcases Merchant-Ivory import Saeed Jaffrey (THE CHESS PLAYERS) as Jimmy Sharma, owner of the London restaurant "The Jewel in the Crown" (capitalizing on the 1966 Paul Scott novel and the then-recent 1984 British TV miniseries) who feels the tug between tradition and notions of success. Running a traditional restaurant while courting the gourmet society, networking at the golf club, Jimmy has a past as a revolutionary that does not always gel with his capitalist present, his sensible eldest daughter Bubbly (CORONATION STREET's Shelley King) works for the Asian Advice Center (sometimes untangling the web of deceptive documentation some of Jimmy's workers use to enter the country), younger daughter Asha (Rita Wolf, MY BEAUTIFUL LAUNDRETTE) is a thoroughly British college student, and grandmother (Zohra Segal, BEND IT LIKE BECKHAM) is glued to the television and bets on the horses. Jimmy feels disrespected by his Bangladeshi staff when waiter Rashid (Badi Uzzaman, EASTERN PROMISES) practices a little free enterprise of his own and opens a competing restaurant down the street (while still treating Jimmy with some sense of reverence) - which figures more into the second series - and waiter Noor (Andrew Johnston) lusts after Asha while continually underestimating the talent and ingenuity of his head chef Alaudin (Tariq Yunus, THE DECEIVERS). A sense of documentary realism is presented with visits to real Indian-British cultural hubs, shops, and back alley factories. While the second series still lacks a laugh track, it does appear to favor more punchline jokes, far-fetched schemes, and more dramatics from the daughters for comic effect.