Pop Culture Happy Hour - Bait and What’s Making Us Happy

Episode Date: March 27, 2026

In the whimsical Prime Video comedy series Bait, the great Riz Ahmed plays Shah, an actor in the middle of a career downturn who lands an audition to be the next James Bond. But when this leaks to the public, the social media reactions to the possibility of a brown 007 are unhinged. And one particularly disturbing response shakes Shah’s confidence and sends his personal life into a tailspin.See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

You're listening to Pop Culture Happy Hour, the podcast that keeps you plugged in about the latest and greatest in movies, TV, music, and more. And if you're a pop culture junkie who's not following the show yet, we're thinking you need to fix that right now by following Pop Culture Happy Hour on your favorite podcast app. And now, on to the show. The world's still waiting on the answer to a very pressing question, who will be the next James Bond? In the meantime, the great Riz Ahmed has thrown his hat in the ring. Well, fictionly speaking anyway, he created and stars in the whimsical comedy series Bait and plays an actor who's in the running for the role of 007. But the path toward donning the tucks and driving the Aston Martin is paved with hurdles, family drama, relationship issues, and most of all, his own insecurities. I'm Aisha Harris and joining me today on NPR's Pop Culture Happy Hour is Vulture TV critic, Roxana Hadati.

Hey, Roxanna, welcome back. Hey, hey, thank you so much for having me. Lovely to have you. And also with us as Jeff Yang. He's a cultural critic and author of The Golden Screen, The Movies That Made Asian America. Welcome back to you too, Jeff. Always great to be here. Yes. I'm very excited for this conversation with you both. So in Bate, Riz Ahmed plays Shah, an actor who's currently in the middle of a career downturn. Now, he lands in an audition to be the next James Bond. But when this leaks to the public, the social media reactions to the possibility of a Brown 007 are just about as normal as you would expect, which is to say they're unhinged. And one particularly disturbing response shakes Shah's confidence and sends his personal life into a tailspin. The cast includes Gus Khan as Zulfi, Shah's brother cousin, and right-hand man,

Shiba Chata as Tyra, Shah's supportive mother, and Patrick Stewart as himself slash a pig's head. I'm sure we'll get into that in a little bit. It's quite a bit there. is streaming now on Prime Video, and we should mention Amazon supports NPR and pays to distribute some of our content. It's also probably just worth noting that Amazon MGM Studios owns the Bond franchise as well. So that's some very interesting corporate synergy going on here. But it's probably not a soft launch or a hard launch of Riz Ahmed as Bon. Who knows?

But anyway, Jeff, I'm going to start with you. Did you take the bait? Hook, line, and sinker. You know, I went in pretty skeptical about the premise just because there's a whole sort of cottage industry now of Asians exploring their identity through popular culture on screen. You've got stuff like Master of None and everything everywhere all at once and shortcomings, interior Chinatown. And a lot of them have been really good. But sometimes it's hard to say, well, is this next one going to lend something more? Is it going to expand that horizon?

And the fact is the very thing that I was a little skeptical about ended up being not just the core of the premise of this, but the very fact that Amazon owns MGM now and as the caretaker of the James Bond franchise was something that I was worried about because I thought this was going to be either self-parody or an attempt at, I don't know, gatekeeping. And instead it was this hugely subversive moment that blended that question of Asian identity and self-party. reflection and mental health with this mythical avatar of whiteness for the British Empire. I loved it. I really enjoyed this much more than I thought I would. And if it was possible, I'd watch a season two of this. Interesting. Interesting.

Okay. Thank you, Jeff. Roxanna, did you take the bait? I did. I like that we're using this. That's crazy. I did. I did like it.

I mean, I hesitate to put this out there, but I do feel like Riz's work is particularly interesting because I think over like the 20 years that he has been acting and writing and creating, the question of representation is in everything, right? Like whether it matters, what is its impact now versus its impact like 10 years ago? How does that change? These are constant questions and everything from like Four Lions to the Knight of to Sound of Metal to all the stuff that he's been in really. Even the things, of course, that don't matter to his ethnicity at all, like Venom. It is a really interesting thing that he has been circling his entire career. And I think it is fascinating to Jeff's point to use Bond as like the filter to process all of that. So I think it's really heady and really meta and very self-aware in a way that is perpetually like tripping up the viewer because it's sort of like pointing at you and telling you to remember like remember when we wanted Idris Elba to do this role.

Like remember when the internet was fighting. Still want it. You know, I still want it. Sure. I don't think he wants it anymore. No. But I think we do. He's quite older, I think, at this point to just hop in.

He just got knighted. Like, Idris is actually fine. But I liked that the series is sort of like drawing us into those questions. I also really liked that it's very funny. Riz is very funny if you've seen any of his British satire stuff. And I think him and Gus Khan are an amazing comedic duo. And if you're strapped for Pesaw right now, I'll take you on as a driver. I don't mind.

Don't need any money from you, bro. Is it? Yeah, I got stuff cooking. There's no one I heard. I got stuff cooking. What you got cooking? I can't tell you because I'm this top secret, I signed an NDA. You ain't signed no NDA.

I didn't. To Jeff's point of wanting a sequel, I would just watch like a travel show with the two of them. I don't know. I mean, I would watch anything with the two of them. I think there's a lot to like. I think it is messy. I think it is a point that it's messy. It might test people a little bit in the middle of it.

But I am a pro. Yeah, yeah. I shared sort of your similar reservations about this just because it does feel, I do wonder how much representation as a theme in work, like how far that can go these days. I mean, Jeff, you mentioned, you know, some really great shows, including Interior Chinatown, Master of Nun, which are kind of dealing with these ideas of representation. And I feel, I mean, not to play the Olympics here, but like it feels like a similar path I've seen with black filmmaking and what are. the limitations of those types of stories that focus so heavily on like, can I play this role? And honestly, I got a lot of like Hollywood shuffle out of this in many ways, the Robert Townsend film, where it's kind of like, you know, you're auditioning for this role. I mean, it's not quite a one-to-one

comparison. But I feel as though that movie is also kind of zany. There's imaginative moments, fantastical moments, and there's things like that here. And the question of like, how much do I want to sell myself out to do these certain roles. And despite the fact that I had those reservations, I do think overall I became really taken by the story that is being told, especially when it's not so focused on representation. One of my favorite, actually, I think the best episode is the one that kind of just representation is there, but it's not the center. And that's during their Eid celebration in episode three. And so, you know, just a little bit of set up here. But like, Essentially, in the previous episode, Shah was at this museum event that he got in, like, last minute, and he wanted to give this speech or whatever.

And at one point, a museum protester, like, barges in, and Shah goes, he just goes a little overboard for the moment and injures this museum protester. And so in episode three, it's the next day and the family, his entire family is having their Iid celebration, while his agent, Felicia, who's played by Warrucce Opia, She keeps pressing shot over the phone to be like, you need to craft an apology video. Like, you need to do this because this is bad for you. This is not a good look. And so him trying to please his family as these celebrations are happening while also trying to make this video that he like doesn't even feel like he should be making. Like, that is fun. And I love seeing Riz play a character who is kind of annoying.

He does a lot of bad things. There's another word I would use, but I can't because it's NPR. But, like, he is... The fact that he has people who care for him, he's very lucky because I don't think I could be friends with this dude. He's so self-centered and also just doesn't really understand the social contract in some certain ways. And I love seeing that aspect of him.

You send a message, a heartfelt one. Instead of it going green, it goes gray. What does that mean to you? It means your blood? Really? Yeah. Let me just show you this. Okay, I'm going to ask you to leave now.

When it's really focused on him as a sort of self-involved actor who is also dealing with his own insecurities, that's for me when the show really, really shines. I do think that Riz Ahmed's performance is such an anchor for the show in so many ways. I mean, the whole cast is incredible, but it's just super hard to make hypocritical self-loathing, appealing, or even watchable. And somehow he really does it. And, yes, I love the Eid episode. I thought it was such a great center point kind of a pivot. for this very short series. But he kind of grabbed me

from the very first moment of his introduction. You come into the show and he's basically blaming himself for blowing this audition, which we kind of see him do. And then there's this moment where he's talked to a mirror and berating himself really horribly.

You should be ashamed of yourself. You are ashamed of yourself. Because you're ashamed to your family. Nobody. Nothing. Then the audio attack comes in to take off the mic. It turns is out the whole time he's like on this hot mic because he's not actually been demyiked this whole time. And as he sort of leans over to have the mic taken off, he just kind of like places his head on the guy's shoulder, like going in for a hug because he's so broken and sat. And I was like, man,

that is such a tiny detail, great choice. I was in. I was like, okay, let's see where this is going. Yeah. Yeah. I think there are lots of those little sort of physical moments where however Riz is carrying himself or the very slight changes he makes to his facial expressions are really strong. I am contractually obligated to mention Leonardo DiCaprio in every conversation I ever have, but it made me think a lot about Once Upon a Time in Hollywood and sort of Leo's performance of an actor who thinks that he has like peaked. He's not sure what could come next. I think Riz minds a lot of really compelling, pathos from someone who has sort of like lost faith in themselves, right?

Yeah. Has lost faith in the social contract too, because I know what it's like to have very demanding immigrant parents. I know that experience. Yeah. Same. I saw a lot of shared, yeah, like shared commonalities and how his family treats him. So I think all of that stuff is really great.

I also think maybe something that's worth talking about is the fact that this is six episodes. They are generally like 25 minutes. And I would say each episode is a different genre, right? Like he's doing a paranoid thriller in one, the Eid celebration, which is more of like a family drama. There's almost like a Richard Linklater style shot romance. Yes. So I like also that he and his collaborators are showing this fluidity with genre

and again sort of making this implicit look, someone who looks like Riz can do all of these things. This is not like model minority storytelling. Like he sucks. It is also just, I think, a really strong proof of concept to say, look, maybe Riz is not going to be bond, but you should be casting these people in your projects. Everybody in this show pulls their weight. Yeah.

Another thing that I really, really liked about this is that. Yes, it is also, you know, immigrant parent story, but the family overall is quite supportive of him, especially Tyra, his mother. During the celebrations, there's a moment where she's like, I need you to help me, like, don't leave my side. And you can tell they have this moment. It is my day. It belongs to all Muslims, mommy. It's mine. And she took it.

You know one thing she doesn't have? What? Her son. Mother's son, they are close. she's like proud of him. She's like, I'm so excited you're going to be bought. Like there's just, usually in these stories, we often see the parent and often the mother, really, like, who is very much like, you should be a doctor, you should be a lawyer, like the arts, whatever. And we don't see that. We see family that, yes, they have their issues and a lot of it really does stem from Shaw himself, not being able to balance both his own personal career goals with also being a family person. But I love seeing. seeing that connection between them. We mentioned Patrick Stewart, and I enjoy how kind of chaotic that turns into. He is playing sort of Shah's id, like all of those things.

You only have yourself to blame. I'm trying. Try harder. Do you understand? He's playing sort of like the inner self of Shah in a way that I find really fascinating. It's Ed. Oh, yes. is eating.

Yes. It's a fun voice role. We don't actually see him on screen, but it's a fun sort of voice role that also is weird. And that weirdness is what helps keep it, you know, fresh. I'm even seeing a little bit of Boots Riley in here, right? Like, just like. Yeah, oh, completely.

Zakes Boots Riley, Spike Joke joke. Like those types of filmmakers who are just kind of quirky, weird, but also providing that social commentary that feels kind of rich and meaty. I wanted to really go back to what you said about family members supporting him and so forth, and his mom especially. And I personally felt a little bit like both seen and exposed because I have a son. My elder son Hudson is an actor. And there's one line that the mom delivers when she said it made me just internally clench up and cringe. She says at one point, is work going well?

I haven't gotten a Google alert for a long time. I was like, oh my God, that's me. But the other series that's out right now that actually just got an unexpected second season that this definitely feels like it should be watched alongside is Marvel's Wonder Man, right? In which Yaya Abdul Matine 2, the protagonist and Ben Kingsley, they have like a really interesting and similar relationship in a lot of ways as like Riz Ahmed and Patrick Stewart. And the whole thing is also this treatise on what it's like to be an ad. actor and narcissistic and hating yourself and loving yourself too much. It's really fascinating. One thing I did kind of wonder is, did you all have a clear sense on what, like, how

famous Shah was before this Bond stuff? Because that was the one thing where I was just like, how famous is he? Because he's able to sort of like walk in the world. There's a joke at the beginning. It's, again, kind of familiar, but it's like he gets mistaken for another actor. What? He's not Dave Patil. Look how short he is.

Davis, tall, strong, handsome. I'm a Gujarati hero. And it's like, oh, yeah, this happens all the time. But I also wasn't sure, like, is he a Callum Turner type of famous, where it's, like, maybe famous in the UK, but not that. Like, was that confusing to you as well? Or did that bother you at all? Because I was just trying to wrap my head around, like, how famous is this dude?

Like, he has fans. He has, like, a bubble head. which they reference multiple times. But like, yeah. Yeah. I mean, I definitely don't think that he is. But again, this is sort of like a tricky thing, right? Because like Riz has an Oscar.

He's been nominated for an Oscar. But I don't know how many people on the street would be like, oh, that's Riz. Ahmed. Let me talk about his filmography with you. Yeah. So part of me almost thought like he's clearly not meant to be as famous as he is in real life. But I did wonder if he is meant to be as famous as some of the other actors in the show, like Hamesh Patel, who is here playing like his rival. And people might know Hamesh from like Station 11 or you might know him from Tenet.

But again, I don't know like walking through the street if people would recognize who he is. So that again sort of felt to me like a meta commentary on this show is probably full of brown dudes. that you might recognize, but it might like take you a second to place them. Yeah. Even someone like Guzz, like he is a well-known comedian in the UK. American people probably know him from Taskmaster, but I don't know what else they might know him from. So I don't know.

That's a good question. But I guess I just took it as, again, part of the show sort of like winking at us. I feel like, especially when you're talking about Bond, right, which I think historically, other than, you know, Pierce Brosnan, they've generally picked. actors who were a little bit unexpected, who come off as being like, oh, I've seen that guy before and other stuff that could be kind of similar,

but like, did anybody really know who Daniel Craig was, right? Sure. Before he was cast. And the thing is, when it's a white actor, people just give that elasticity, like, oh, they pick the right guy or they, you know, we'll watch to see what happens. But if it's somebody who is in that

slightly more obscure space and the person's not white or not male or maybe not straight, I'm sure the reaction much like in this show would be just hugely like what the hell do they think they're doing so I think the show

is definitely playing with that on purpose yeah yeah yeah also Callum is engaged to do a leap up so he has a certain level Oh that's true

I keep forgetting see this is the thing like I'm not a bond person I've seen all of the Daniel Craig ones and I've seen the earliest ones with Sean Connery

I've skipped all the other ones I don't really care I understand that this is a British thing that you know and I'm a also very curious to see how this show translates for audiences. I do want to preface for those who maybe are listening and haven't dug in yet or just haven't finished it yet. Bond is kind of in the

background. It's not the be-all and end-all of the show. And again, I think that's what makes another thing that makes this work is that it's there. It's a catalyst. It's not just about him being a brown person. It's also about like, am I actually meant to play this character? Like, can I, Am I a super, like the British version of the Super Euro? British Batman. Yeah. British Batman. Exactly.

Yeah. So I really dug this. I watched it all in one sitting. It goes down very, very easy. Right. Riz has the Riz, as they say. Well, tell us what you think about bait. Find us at Facebook.com slash PCH.

And up next, we're going to be talking about what's making us happy this week. Welcome back. A reminder, if you're not following our show yet, hit that follow button on your preferred podcast app and stay plugged in on all things pop culture happy hour adjacent, including what's making us happy every week, which brings me to what is making us happy. I'm going to start with you, Roxanna, what is making you happy this week? What is making me happy this week is the upcoming novel by Jordan Harper called A Violent Masterpiece, which comes out in late April. I think I've talked about Jordan's work before, and I think it's because it's what I want out of

television about LA, but I'm getting it in novel form. And these are just like really beautifully written horrendously violent neo-noir books that really take me back to like when I was in middle school watching The Shield and feeling like I was reading something or watching something super subversive and transgressive and maybe not what I should have been watching at that young of an age. But I would hardly recommend them. This one is sort of actually related to Riz Ahmed a little bit in that it is about like a live streaming sort of tabloid style videographer who travels around L.A., like chasing down crime scenes. So it's about this character and sort of his, I would say, discovery of a Jeffrey Epstein-like conspiracy. That is a violent masterpiece by Jordan Harper.

It's coming out at the end of next month. All right. Thank you so much, Roxanna. Jeff, what is making you happy? So I'm hardly alone in this, but I stayed up and very early watched the return of BTS. Oh. The boy band that ran the world and they are back and just seeing them together on stage. And I think very specifically, I'll just say my bias is RM, my favorite of the group. And he heard himself in rehearsal and was not able to actually do the complicated choreography and dance that BTS is so well known for.

And nevertheless, he and the rest of the boys, they just, there's such a breath of freshness and innocence in a world where it feels like we have so little of it. And I don't know, for that hour I was watching the reunion concert, I was definitely happy. Aw. Yes. I love that. That's sweet. And I love that it is thematically completely opposed.

what's making me happy. Takes all kinds. Well, thank you, Jeff. I love that. It sounds like it made you so happy. That is BTS, the comeback live, and that is streaming on Netflix. What is making me happy? So, Liza Minnelli has a new memoir out called Kids, Wait, to You Hear This. But that's not what's making me happy because I haven't read it yet. I'm sure it'll be great. What is making me happy is that it made me return to the great TV concert film from 1972, Liza with a Z. This is just about an hour of Liza being Liza in her prime. And it's directed and choreographed by Bob Fosse, written by Fred Ebb. And it's just her just being Liza. And if you know Liza Minnelli and if you enjoy that stuff, it is catnip, it is perfect. There are lots of great songs. She's singing. She's singing. She's singing

by herself. She's got dancers. But for me, the highlight has always been and will always be her performing Joe Texas song, I Gotcha. And the choreography is like peak, Fossi, like herky jerky. And it's Liza Vanelli doing it. It's both incredibly cool and not at all cool. And I love it. It is what she does best. And that's what's making me happy this week. You can find it streaming on To Be, Liza with a Z. That brings us to the end of our show, Raxana Haddadi and Jeff Yang. Thank you so much for being here. This was so much fun.

Always. Thank you. This episode was produced by Liz Metzger, Hufza, Fathema, and Mike Katsif, and edited by our showrunner, Jessica Reedy. Kalu Kamen provides our theme music, and thank you for listening to Pop Culture Happy Hour from NPR. I'm Ayesha Harris, and we'll see you all next week.