Dough

This cute but intermittently hard-edged comedy drama finds veteran Jewish baker Nat Dayan (Jonathan Pryce) feeling the pinch and facing pressure to sell the family business in London's East End to a ruthless supermarket magnate. That is, until he hires the son of his African Muslim cleaner as his apprentice, for his new employee Ayyash (Jerome Holder) is also a reluctant dealer for a local drugs baron (Ian Hart) so when he inadvertently bakes a batch of loaves containing cannabis, customers come flooding back to the bakery. The steady stream of laughs perfectly undercuts the serious message of religious tolerance and allows director John Goldschmidt to corral his seasoned cast (which includes Phil Davis and Pauline Collins) to keep it light and avoid things getting too preachy. The star of the show, however, is former child actor Holder, whose struggling black immigrant is a model of dignity in difficult circumstances.