Saying that Apu is less problematic because he’s a nice character would be like protesting the images of violent African-Americans hellbent on abuse and sexual assault in The Birth of a Nation but saying the subsequent decades in which African-Americans were relegated to movie roles as good-hearted servants was progress, when those roles were problematic in a different way. “But when you’re part of an Indian immigrant community in the ‘80s and ‘90s, you’re not in power, so if Apu is the only image, who’s going to challenge it?” Kondabolu says, adding that his biggest feeling of guilt regarding Apu is that the character made him worry that school friends would make fun of his parents and the way they spoke. “Apu is part of the self-hate industrial complex in the US. Self-hate so you want to change yourself can be monetised – it can involve buying a product or clothes. There are even skin lightening ointments for South Asian women. Or the cost can be cultural, it can mean giving up your heritage so you can assimilate.”

New stories, new perspectives

Apu is not a stereotype of Kondabolu’s generation, of Indian-Americans born in the US, but of his parents’, of immigrants who came to the US in the ‘60s and ‘70s. “They didn’t have a voice as immigrants in a new country trying to get by. So as my generation got older we were able to be like, ‘This isn’t the way it is.’ But for a long time South Asian actors would have to take whatever roles were open because there were no options.”