Camden People’s Theatre’s SPRINT Festival returns with a packed programme throughout March. London’s “best-established carnival of new and unusual theatre” features artists with bold ideas, artists who don’t play by the rules, and artists, in many instances, making their first professional work.
This is the eleventh of a series of interviews highlighting artists and work within the Festival, as I chat with Amina Aaliya Beg about her show, My Mum Told Me Not To Marry An Atheist.
My Mum Told Me Not To Marry An Atheist is a one-woman comedy-drama about Dadi, a sharp-tongued Pakistani radio host and DJ who navigates love, marriage, and a lifetime of being intergenerational trouble-makers with her granddaughter Kamal. When Kamal sends her ‘friend,” known only as The Boy, to Pakistan to impress Dadi by pretending to be ‘the perfect girl,’ chaos quickly follows. Through jokes, jingles, and relentless interrogations, Dadi begins to uncover what’s truly at stake: her relationship with Kamal, the secrecy that has grown between them, and the simple truth that perfection is impossible.
Blending theatrical storytelling with DJing, radio, and audience interaction, this is a heartfelt and playful exploration of family, relationships, and the roles we’re asked to perform.
Where: Camden People’s Theatre, Basement.
When: 19 Mar and 24 Mar, 9pm.
Ticket link: https://cptheatre.co.uk/whatson/My-Mum-Told-Me-Not-To-Marry-An-Atheist-WIP
Your comedy play, My Mum Told Me Not To Marry An Atheist, is coming to SPRINT this year. What gave you the idea for it?
I invited my husband’s family to dinner at my parents’ house. This was before we got married, my husband and I drafted a Google Doc of our relationship timeline, combined with a script of potential topics of what/not to talk about to his parents.
We were planning how to pitch my soon-to-be husband to my Dadi (grandmother) and mother, making sure he was the ideal suitor, so we could win them over with his A* in RE, self-taught in the home, architect-in-training….it almost felt like Nathan Fielder’s The Rehearsal planning potential conversations on what to talk about with your potential spouse’s family.
It’s stressful (the potential possibilities of various timelines getting mixed up). James and I always joked about potential plot developments/inciting incidents that we found in that document.
We always thought that performing this play in a meta-type way would be the best way to come out to our parents on how mixed marriages can give dawah (spread Islam), changing the social and political discourse framed around Muslim representation
(and that we also wanted to be together).
This show has taken 6 renditions, starting in Contact Theatre in September 2023 in Manchester, exploring the commercialisation of religion in Saudi Arabia and my relationship with faith (deen) and consumption (dunya) and how we balance it in a world driven by capitalism, whilst Saudi Arabia builds The Makkah Line.
The initial show used projection, animation and architecture. This was performed by James and I, followed by Safia Bibi (who played the role of Dadi -grandmother). I think the role of Dadi was underdeveloped in the first rendition of My Mum Told Me Not To Marry An Atheist; she mostly appears towards the end, singing in the wedding scene.
I wanted Dadi to be more central in this next rendition of My Mum Told Me Not To Marry An Atheist. I’m really curious about intergenerational relationships and how sometimes our grandparents can be more accepting than our own parents.
I’m really interested in bringing other art forms into theatre, making it nuanced by bringing in my love for DJing. DJing is an art form that curates people into ease, directing the atmosphere whilst introducing people to new ideas.
Some people see DJing as a ‘low art form’, I wanted to bring it to theatre, because theatre like art galleries can feel inaccessible, maybe it’s the awkward tension of us versus them when we’re watching performers or it’s the dialogue, honestly I struggle to understand what’s happening on-stage (even though this is was my degree at uni).
Sometimes you can feel that you’re not smart enough to understand ‘it’, which is a mindset I wish we could unlearn, especially for young people or people from Global Majority backgrounds.
I think intersecting multiple art forms, like DJing or stand-up, breaks these traditional formats of theatre, by playing a character, distorting dialogue and revealing truth, which is what I wanted for this show.
I wanted to make a show where aunties could bring their daughters, vice versa. This show is for the ladies because they’re genuinely the funniest people with sharp wit, flow and cadence.
How did you make your start in the business?
I started writing properly when I was 14/15: I started from GCSE drama, I struggled with academia when I was in high school, I struggled understanding exam questions and felt that drama was my only avenue really.
It was the only subject that didn’t feel like work, where the possibilities were endless and scientific logic didn’t apply – you had the freedom to distort reality.
I devised my first play at 15 using physical theatre, focusing on the Syrian refugee crisis, exploring a relationship between two sisters. I continued writing as this was the only cathartic art form, and sketching fashion designs after school.
I studied Drama and Film Studies at the University of Manchester, where I joined the Royal Exchange Theatre Writers Programme. I met Afshan D’Souza Lodhi, who has been a great mentor to me. She’s like an older sister to me in this industry. We worked together on my short TV pilot film Daytimers, and she’s my dramaturg for My Mum Told Me Not To Marry An Atheist and The Perfect Girl (2025).
I’ve always been influenced by comedy, with family, aunties, grandmothers, and TV. I started writing spoken word poetry during university and COVID (I think everyone goes through the diaspora poetry phase at some point).
I’m trying to write a little less depressing things now, but I think that’s the beauty of comedy, you can build up intimate moments after you set up the jokes.
I’ve had a complicated relationship with theatre; I always loved the feeling but didn’t necessarily understand it. I’ve recently fallen back in love with it. This was the business I knew I always wanted to be a part of from a young age.
It’s the way it intersects all these disciplines from sound, projection, to costume. It’s the only art form that does it all (even if your old art tutor disagrees and says that “theatre is not art”).
This is probably one of the driving forces for why I made a start in this scene. Unfortunately, with a lot of doubt from people, you end up having to prove yourself.
I think the way I was able to write and perform was by testing work at open mics, scratch nights, and R&Ds like Hope New Mill (2024), West (Cow)lder (2026), and The Perfect Girl (2025).
I feel that joining writing programmes has really given me an insight into the industry and has grown my confidence as a writer. I have been fortunate enough to be part of the Scottish Youth Theatre Trajectories Programme, BFI Film Hub North Writers Programme and Kali Theatres Discovery Writers Programme.
These led to performance sharings, which are the best way to share work, get feedback from people and document your proof of concept. You get to test out that idea you’ve been hoarding.
I really recommend performing at the PBH Edinburgh Fringe Festival. This has helped me test out performance ideas like my first Fringe show, Sohni (2021), which used a spoken word open mic to explore cultural appropriation, media misinformation
and authentic storytelling.
Out of all these experiences, I’ve learnt that if you don’t ask, you don’t get. You have to keep emailing people, applying for funding pots/grants, ask for support/guidance (don’t be shy about it) and renew your intention.
You have a DJ set as part of your show – was that planned from the start or has it become more integral through the development of the show?
The DJ set wasn’t planned initially in the first run of the show, as we focused more on threading architecture and projection in the first rendition. Since I started DJing in 2023, I’ve always been drawn to fusing several art forms. The DJ set has been more integral throughout the development of the show, especially with the last few renditions.
The show has evolved over the past 3 years, including more stand-up and semi-autobiographical stories. In the Edinburgh Fringe Festival last year, I brought DJing for the first time in this show using Dadi (grandmother’s) character, who is the radio host
and DJ.
I’m really curious about how we dismantle this uncomfortable atmosphere in theatre, and this feeling of not ‘getting it’ or ‘feeling misunderstood’ by conventional theatrical models.
I feel DJing disrupts this, it breaks this uncomfortable mould of us versus them (the space between the audience and performer).
What might audiences expect from the show?
Expect to get bullied (but that’s okay because I’m playing a grandmother, so don’t take it personally, it’s called acting). But there are plenty of chances for you to join in.
I might ask you some questions. I might get confused and think you’re my granddaughter’s companion, The Boy. So there are plenty of chances for you to be part of the show.
What’s next after Sprint?
I’m actually developing My Mum Told Me Not To Marry An Atheist as an R&D tour around Scotland and Manchester from May to September. I will be taking it to community centres and theatres, teaching women of colour a crash course in DJing and bringing South Asian women into the theatres.
They can give me feedback on how to better develop the show, seeing how nuanced the representation of Dadi is and how to better the relationship with her granddaughter Kamal and The Boy. My final sharing of the R&D will be on 29 Sep at The Studio Theatre in Edinburgh.