Farah Ashraf and Aiyana Bartlett Talk Essential South Asian Representation and Life On Tour

Aiyana Bartlett and Farah Ashraf in Santi & Naz

As you start thinking about applying to Drama School, it can feel like training is all that matters. Finding your place and getting accepted can be all consuming. We think it’s important to remember that the function of training is to prepare you for life as a professional actor. Our graduates come out of our training with a tenacity and drive that means many of them are successful in pursuing and building a profile of work early on in their careers. Farah Ashraf and Aiyana Bartlett are two such graduates.

Farah and Aiyana both graduated from OSD in 2023, having completed our Foundation and Three Year Courses. They are currently starring in the two-hander Santi & Naz, which toured the UK earlier in the year and is coming to the Soho Theatre London, in January. The show explores the friendship between Santi, a young Sikh girl, and Naz, a young Muslim girl in pre-partition India.

We caught up with them to chat about the slow hustle, South Asian representation, making their own work, and the challenges of going on tour.

By Sophie Thornton

Congrats on Santi & Naz guys! How was the tour?

Farah: Thank you! Tour, well, it was my first professional stage job. Anything I’ve done before this has been a very short run or a profit share. So, to me, this was my proper actual first job. I felt a real sense that there was this strength in the opportunity; I loved that it was a two-hander; I loved the character. Naz, she’s feisty, she’s fun, and she’s just such a joy to play. So I was like, wow, I get to explore all these parts of my identity that I relate to, so I was so excited. The fact it was touring was, at times, a challenge. You know we’re travelling, and I had to keep my day job! I had to work while I was on tour.

Aiyana: Yeah, we’d be away for five or six days of the week, and Farah would come back [to London] and work Saturday night. I’d be dying on my sofa, so tired, and Farah’s there travelling across London… I don’t know how you did it!

A real test of juggling priorities! What surprised you most about tour life? Any insights you’d like to share?

Farah: It was an experience. I’ve learnt a lot. I would love to tour my own work in the future. That’s something I really wanna do.

Aiyana: It was funny because the places that we were like, ‘Oh, that’s random, I’ve never really been there or heard much about that place,’ were the places that really were amazing. Bedford was the one, that probably was my favourite.

Farah: Ugh they were so nice, so so nice there – one of my favourites.

Aiyana: Because the show is very intimate, it’s just us two, it reaches people in a different way. A lot of our audiences were South Asian, so like when we got to go and meet them afterwards it was amazing. There’s something about, especially when you’re feeling low or tired or whatever, going out and meeting people that you’ve touched you go ‘okay, this is why I do this’. It was the same with the first show I did in Sweden. It was called A Hundred Words For Snow, and it was about grief. I struggled out there, away from my family. It’s the same with touring, but the thing that keeps you alive is human interaction and human connection. The people who come and live this emotional journey of the show with you kind of become your family in a weird way. It’s what makes it worth it. People.

A Hundred Words for Snow photo by Lina Ikse
Aiyana in A Hundred Words for Snow. Photo by Lina Ikse

Would you say it was the people that made Bedford so special?

Farah: They were amazing. So cute.

Aiyana: I was so gutted we were only there for one night

Farah: It was sold out as well. Some of them are gonna come to Soho! We got their numbers. I loved the travel. Like, sitting in a van for 10 hours, not so fun, but getting to go to new cities was so fun. I experienced so much. I’ve grown up and, like, London is the England that I know. I don’t know England that well. So, getting to go and explore new places was a real breather. Loved it.

Aiyana: Yeah, when we were in Newcastle, I looked on Instagram and Farah’s like, on the beach. I was like ‘WHAT!’, she went to South Shields.

Farah: It was like, an hour out of the city.

Aiyana: You’re crazy, but I love it.

Farah: It was beautiful! I woke up early. I knew I wanted to go to the beach, and it was just…so lovely. And Bedford, as well; it was so quaint and quiet. So different to London. It can be so easy to think that London’s like the theatrical hub, but it’s not. There are so many regional venues, and they really care about theatre.

Aiyana: I think what’s so beautiful about our story, about Santi & Naz, is that it got people to the theatre who have never been to the theatre before. When you’re living in a town like Bedford, unless something really speaks to you, you might never go to the theatre. Like, there were people coming to the show who had never been to the theatre before. People were bringing their kids because we don’t get taught about colonialism and the British Raj in school. One of the women we spoke to was like, ‘I’ve been trying to teach my son about this [Partition], and this show was such a great way for him to understand it’. There’s a lot of racism and weird stuff between Pakistanis and Indians because of that [Partition], but once upon a time, before that, everyone was the same. Nobody cared.

Yeah, it’s such a powerful show for that. To be on stage and be part of telling that story and providing that representation.

Farah and Aiyana in Santi & Naz. Photo by Paul Blakemore
Farah and Aiyana in Santi & Naz. Photo by Paul Blakemore

How are you feeling about the London run?

Farah: So Excited! So nice to be in the same place for three weeks.

Aiyana: Yeah, so nice to be at home, in my own bed, so nice. I have chronic migraines. When you have something that’s chronic, it can be really tolling on your mental health. When my chronic thing is my head, and my brain can’t focus, so I get stressed, and yeah, it’s all a cycle. It’s hard to shake yourself out of it. I’m still learning that. We actually had to cancel a show on the tour because of my migraines. We re-scheduled everyone’s tickets but yeah. It’s tricky. Every job, you learn something new. But yeah, being in my own bed will help!

You both trained together at OSD, in the same year no less! And you both did the Foundation Course together. Do you feel that having that shared training helped you in rehearsal?

Aiyana: For sure. There were a few moments in the rehearsal room that needed to be held and looked after, and I think because we trained together we knew how those moments were handled at school, and so we could navigate those moments together. Also, especially with movement stuff, if someone was giving Farah notes I could kind of translate them into ‘Farah language’, and the other way round as well you know? We could do that for each other.

Farah: Yeah 100%. We blocked the show really quickly because of that. I felt a lot of trust I just felt like I know this show, and I know it’s gonna be so good. Even when we had rehearsals or shows where the energy started to dip, one of us would instinctively know how to bring it back up. You just know the other person’s gonna bring it.

How was the audition process for Santi & Naz? When did you realise that you might be working together again?

Aiyana: So we both found out we’d booked it the morning after the audition. But they said in the room that there were gonna be recalls, so when my agent called me, I was like, ‘What..?!’

Farah: I was so shocked. I was like ‘It doesn’t make sense, they haven’t done a chemistry read…I haven’t had a recall?’

Aiyana: then what happened was Farah put on her Instagram story, ‘Does anyone have anywhere to stay between these dates in Bristol?’ and I thought, that’s when I’m gonna be in Bristol. So I replied and was like ‘haha, is this for Santi & Naz?’ and you replied like ‘yeah, girl, just getting ahead of the game’ and I was like ‘I’M SANTI!’. I remember we FaceTimed each other and were just screaming down the phone at each other, I was in a restaurant; my partner was like, ‘Shhhh’. But yeah, we were just like screaming at each other; it was so funny. 

Farah: I did think, coming out of my audition, like, imagine if it’s someone I know…imagine if it’s Aiyana. But then I thought, nah. But the universe had other ideas.

Aiyana: Yeah, when I came out of the audition room, another OSD grad was going in so I was thinking how fun it would be to have another OSD person with me. Actually, two of the girls I was in Testmatch with also auditioned for it. So like, between OSD and them, I think we probably knew everyone who went up for the roles in one way or another! You know, the other people working who are at this level, we all go up for the same stuff, so you do get to know each other.

Farah: I convinced myself that this is why we’d got the roles, that they’d seen we trained together, so they didn’t need to get us in together. But they didn’t, they didn’t know that we trained together!

Oh my goodness, it really was meant to be.

Farah: Totally. 

Santi & Naz - Aiyana and Farah
Santi & Naz

Aiyana, you were in Testmatch at The Orange Tree Theatre earlier this year; how was it to originate a role for the debut of a play? Have you seen your name in the playtext?

Aiyana: Yeah! It’s in the National Theatre Bookshop! I was there the other day to see Tupperware of Ashes – which was amazing – but yeah, literally, I was in the bookshop holding the script for everyone like, ‘Look, it’s me!’. I’m sure people were rolling their eyes but like, I’m an actor, let me have this! But yeah, it was great. And what was so nice about that experience was it was all women, most of the crew were women as well, and like all of us who were in it are all in the first 5-6 years of our career. So, we’re all at the same level. The Orange Tree was so great to have a show like that on, showcasing young women in our industry. Usually, with the shows there, they have like a celebrity in it, and we just weren’t that. So that support was great. We also had the writer in the room during rehearsal, so we were changing the script as we went, and there were lots of discussions. It was very collaborative. It was such a beautiful room to be in, like very supported. Dynamics can be tricky with girls, but we were all just there living our best lives. I had a great time, and the Orange Tree is amazing. I really wanna work there again.

And Farah, you were at Theatre503 earlier this year with your one-woman show Pink Rabbit.

Farah: I was!

Pink Rabbit came out of a piece of work you did during training. What has the development of that piece been like from training to now?

Farah: We did this project in the third year with Kirsty McFarland [Head of Movement at OSD], where we had to make a five-minute solo piece. Throughout my entire training journey, I really struggled with casting and identity and being my identity, and how I was worried I would be perceived in the industry. So my gut was just saying poetry, spoken word, something about my identity. Being Pakistani and Muslim, but then also sexuality is something I find interesting. So yeah, this thing just came into my head. It got a really good reception at Drama School.

Aiyana: It was so good.

Farah: I was like, okay, I’ve always wanted to do a one-woman show. Ever since I was a kid. Then this ad came up on Instagram for the Etcetera Theatre for their Indie Summer Fest box office split, so it was free to put on. I don’t know why, I was just like, let’s do this. So between May and June 2023, I had to get it from 5 to 45 minutes. That was a really…I wouldn’t say that every single person in their final year of training, doing their London season, should also try to develop a show concurrently. I was so stressed out.

Aiyana: You were so stressed. She told me about the rehearsals, and I was like you’re crazy for doing this, but slay, wish you the best. I gave her my two cents and was like, ‘Good luck’!

Farah: Still appreciated that though. And Beth [Taylor] came on board, and Jake [Mavis] also helped me with sound. It was nice to feel supported. Like obviously, when it’s a one-woman show, no one is going to be on stage with you, but it’s about being held throughout the process. And yeah, it got a really great reception at Etcetera. I was like, I wanna put this on again. Theatre503 do open submissions for short runs and long runs. I was self-producing, so I sent off a submission for a short run. I was accepted. Jake came on board again to help me with sound, and I worked with Alessandro Babalola, Artist in Residence at Soho Theatre. I’d done a lot of commercials and screen work since graduation; I remember when we were rehearsing, Alessandro was like talking about how I went back into screen acting. He was like, ‘Farah, you’re on stage, own the stage. Don’t be worried about being too big; if you’re on stage and you’re being truthful, then it’s okay.’ It was a process. But yeah, when I went into my audition for Santi & Naz, I was like just own it. Own every single line. In theatre, you can’t brush over a single word. But yeah, we sold out at Theatre503; it went really well. The tour has been such a great experience because I want to tour Pink Rabbit one day. These stories are so important. People see South Asian women; people see Muslim women as very…well, there’s a stereotypical view of us. And these plays are important to humanise these characters. Coming of age, puberty, maybe I fancy X Y Z; this is just human experience. A girl living in India in 1947 goes through that, and a girl living in modern-day London, like in Pink Rabbit, also goes through that.

The Oxford School of Drama
Farah's one-women show, Pink Rabbit

Any challenges with developing your own work?

Farah: I guess one thing that has been harder is that, yeah, I feel very supported, but right now, I’m self-producing it. I need funding, and it’s all of that.

Aiyana: Knowing where to start with that is really tricky. It’s like, okay, I need a producer to help point me in the right direction.

Farah: I have friends who want to help me out of their own kindness. That’s amazing, but it gets to the point where you, as a creative say, ‘I want to pay my friends’, and also, I wanna work with people outside of my circle because there are certain skills that I can’t get without expanding beyond that bubble.

Aiyana: That’s so true. We’re actors who have other skills. Like I can sit there and help you fill in a form, but in reality, I don’t know more than you do.

Farah: If anyone is interested in putting on their own work, one part is creativity. Hard work. The dedication. Like Theatre503 wasn’t paid, it was a box office split. Knowing that you’re doing it because you’re passionate. But it’s also about belief. I believe, and you have to believe, that at one point down the line, it’ll become profitable. 

Aiyana: It’s not even about success really. People say about actors, ‘This person’s come out of nowhere!’ and it’s like, no, they’ve been working for 8 years consistently. Smaller stuff, growing, growing, and now they’re on Sex Education. I really wanna romanticise the slow hustle. I love it. Like I’ve been looking a lot at people like Anjana Vasan. She was in Black Mirror, and she was in A Streetcar Named Desire with Paul Mescal.

Farah: And in A Doll’s House at Lyric Hammersmith

Aiyana: Yeah! She’s done the slow hustle. She wasn’t winning newcomer awards until like 7 years into her career. She wasn’t a newcomer. When I look at someone like her I’m like YES. It’s like pizza dough. You know, you slowly stretch it out, but it always comes back in a little bit each time. You stretch one bit, and another bit comes back in. You might do some TV work, so then you lose a little bit of that comfort on stage, but then you do a stage show, and that skill becomes stronger than before. The more you stretch it out, the stronger those skills will become. But it’s a slow hustle. 

Farah: Polly, who cast Santi & Naz, had me in for quite a few things before where I’d like got to the final round and not got it. And I was so hungry for a theatre job. And then it was like, okay, right time. They do come back; trust that it’s gonna happen. Enjoy the journey. But yeah, the industry is looking good at the moment. There’s so much South Asian stuff out there, Tupperware of Ashes, Expendable at the Royal Court

Aiyana: Santi & Naz!

Farah: Exactly! One girl we met on the tour was talking about applying to Drama School and this fear of what’s on the other side of the training. I remember before I got in, one of the things I worried about was what will be out there when I leave? Will there be the roles for me? But then, a few stories get told, and people respond to them. It’s like so many shows have to happen on a smaller scale before a big shift happens. Like, for instance, the success of shows like For Black Boys, Shifters, Red Pitch, like the West End right now when it comes to Black Theatre is incredible. I can see that happening in a couple of years for South Asian stories. All these shows will build up and I just know we’re gonna see so much Brown Theatre in the future.

And you’ve played a role in that. You guys have been a part of this moment in theatre where we’re telling these South Asian stories more and more. That must feel amazing?

Farah: It’s so true. It feels really great.

Aiyana: It’s weird as well because growing up, like, obviously, I knew I was half Indian. I was connected to that side of me; we celebrate Diwali, um, but like…So, I didn’t grow up in the UK; I never really grew up feeling that racism that we feel here, not until I came back. I hadn’t felt that kind of thing in the UAE where I grew up. I came here, and I came to Drama School, and all the people in my year who were people of colour were angry, you know. They were angry about growing up in communities where they were perceived to be a certain way. But yeah, acting has made me become more in touch with my heritage. It’s so beautiful. I visit my mum’s parents a lot, on my Indian side, and any time I tell them I have an Indian role they’re just so happy. I mean, they’re happy whenever I do anything, but I can tell when it’s an Indian role, you know, it’s different. They wanna come and see me, they travel so far to come and watch me, and I’m up there with an Indian accent. They can see it’s me, but it’s a lot for them.

Farah: I hear that. I’m so excited for the London shows. For my dad to watch. My sister came to watch us in Bolton, but she’s seen me act all the time; she helps with self-tapes. But my Dad has never seen me. Like he watched one thing I did at Drama School, and that’s it. Like my dad, he’s so traditional. Growing up, he didn’t want me to be an actor. He was like, ‘You’re gonna be a doctor or a pharmacist,’ and then obviously, I wanted it, and he couldn’t really stop me. But yeah, I can’t wait for him to watch this. So obviously he’s from Pakistan, he’s lived there, we lived there together when I was a teenager. I would love to see an elderly Pakistani man watch the show, and like his notions of what Partition is and watching this and seeing how he thinks about it. And just watching me wearing traditional Shalwar Kameez. It will just, I think, be really…I don’t know, I’m excited—his generation, like he thinks theatre’s just Shakespeare. So yeah, I’m excited for that.

Farah, we know you’ve been busy filming a confidential Netflix series. How was it to be involved in a bigger production like that?

Farah: I loved it. My favourite thing about screen actually is sitting in hair and make up. Oh and the costumes. The longest I’ve been in the chair is probably three hours but it’s so nice you get to chat and build relationships with people. It’s great. But yeah, I think what I’ve realised is that I’m a different actor for screen and a different actor for stage. I’m still playing truth. It’s just on a stage, and I have to acknowledge that I’m there with an audience. On screen, in some ways, I just have to breathe.

How do you manage that change in pitch from filling a room to engaging on a smaller, more intimate scale? Was it hard to shift between those different methodologies?

Farah: Yeah. I had done a lot of auditioning for screen so I think I had become quite used to being more intimate. And something in my brain convinced me that that’s what acting really is. So it took me a minute to find that stage craft again. It’s taken me like a year out of drama school to realise that I have these different methodologies and toolkits for each job. What I think is quite nice about screen though is all the work that goes on behind the scenes is so visible. You’re so reminded of how much it isn’t about you. With stage it can feel a bit isolated in rehearsal so you don’t always remember the bigger picture. But yeah, I’m excited to get this project out. And yeah, I feel ready for the next step. Series regular role, I feel it.

Aiyana, you’re developing a play at the moment, could you tell us a little about it?

Aiyana: Yeah! I’ve been thinking a lot about movement recently. I did a residency with Temper Theatre this Summer, as well as the Summer Movement Intensive with the Ferus Animi//Terra Nova Collective with Tomislav Afiyan-English, [OSD Tutor and Alumni]. So yeah, getting more into Movement, which I’m so scared of because I have a bit of a weird relationship with my body and my body image but yeah, I’ve realised that I do actually use a lot of movement in my practice. I’ve been talking a lot about undiagnosed neurodivergence and undiagnosed mental health. I’ve become very interested in how trauma develops. I’ve been journalling a lot, and the journal entries were coming out as monologues. Then, on tour, I started writing scenes. And yeah, in December, I’m meeting with a few people from my year at OSD, and the year below, and we’re going to do some work on it. I need to see some ideas in play before I write it all out. Very excited about it, though!

When you were kids, did you dream about being actors?

Farah: Yeah. I mean, I was super shy as a little girl. But then, in Primary school, I did a drama class and the school play, and I just fell in love. I went on a bit of a journey because when I was 10, I went to a very traditional faith school, so I couldn’t really act there; then, at 13, I moved to Pakistan to a little village, so yeah, not a lot of acting happening there. Acting seemed like a very faraway possibility. Because of the culture I was in, some of my family found the idea of acting super shameful. When I came back to do A-levels, I was like, ‘I wanna do this’ because it was the one thing that kept me going when I was living in Pakistan. There was a beauty to living out there, but for me, I knew the life I wanted to live was not there. I was questioning if it was England that I wanted or if, actually, it was Acting. And yeah, Acting was the thing. I got back here, applied to Drama Schools, and experienced a lot of backlash from home. I don’t know. When I got in, I was like, okay, this is tangible. This is possible. Oxford was the place where I realised it was possible. It represents the start of this dream. So yeah, I’ve always wanted it; I just never thought it would be possible.

Aiyana: Well, yeah, for me, it was always one of those things where I was like, ‘I’m gonna be on the X-factor’, and then yeah, I ended up doing lots of musical theatre. I wasn’t a great dancer; I was an okay singer. And so yeah, one of those things I didn’t grow out of. I always thrived in acting when I did musical theatre. Even in my late teens, the Saturday school I went to had me teaching the younger kids acting, so yeah it was always there for me. I’ve never wanted anything else. It’s funny because I could do something else. I was super academic at school, and I love maths even now, but yeah, I’m not that academic when I’m on stage. It’s freeing.

When you think back on your training at OSD – is there any particular element of the training that stands out to you?

Farah: I learnt so much. Most of it, I didn’t realise I had learnt until I left. Then, all of a sudden, I was applying things that maybe I was a little resistant to at Drama School. My relationship with work has really changed since leaving, and a lot of the tools we learnt I’ve used a lot more. One of our tutors, Joanna [Weir-Ouston, now retired], we had a tutorial one time and she was talking to me about how sometimes I can get up and think that I’m winging it when I’m up there but I’m not. You aren’t going on instinct. You are good, but you also need to work.

Aiyana: I mean for me it’s not necessarily a lesson or element of the training but it’s our year group. Like, they’re my family. When I was in Sweden [doing A Hundred Words for Snow], I was really nervous. I was alone; it was my first job, and I was really scared. But I used to listen to this recording of a song we did for Three Sisters in the Second Year. I’d listen to that song before every single show in Sweden. I just, like, when I was on stage by myself, I was so scared, but I had this thing where I would think about how my classmates would respond to things. Thinking like, the Farah in me can do that, and the Hari [Kang] in me can do this. Whenever I feel like I can’t do this or I’m not good enough, I always go back to them. Obviously the tutors are all amazing but they’re not amazing because they tell you what to do, they’re amazing because they prompt you to discover things from each other. It’s the people that I learnt the most from. So, yeah, that’s what I keep.

Farah: That’s beautiful

It is, it’s really indicative of OSD as a school. The community is what makes it so special.

Aiyana: It is that yeah, everyone knows each other. Anyone who’s going to OSD and is nervous, when you’re there, everyone is just people. Everyone is on the same level. Embrace it. 

You both have so many exciting projects coming up, and you’ve got the London shows of Santi & Naz to look forward to. Good luck with the run and thank you so much for chatting with us!!

Interview was edited for length and clarity.

The Oxford School of Drama
Farah and Aiyana, with the Class of 2023

Santi & Naz will be at the Soho Theatre from the 21st January to the 8th February 2025. Some dates have limited availability, so book your tickets today!

Quick Fire Questions

Farah: TV

Aiyana: TV

Farah: Film

Aiyana: Theatre

Farah: Contemporary

Aiyana: contemporary

Farah: Voice…oh, actually, I don’t know

Aiyana: Everything’s connected, I can’t separate them like that

Farah: Movement

Aiyana: Acting

The Oxford School of Drama
Richard III - Annual Shakespeare production from Second Year