Unicorns star Jason Patel: ‘If you don’t toot your own

In queer love story Unicorns, the young British actor plays a dazzling drag queen living two lives. He talks about his road to performing, family pride, and the need for a thick skin

When Jason Patel was young – a self-described “sassy teen” growing up in Manchester – he was told by a family friend to drop his dream of being a performer. Instead, she advised, Brits of Asian heritage should embrace the stereotype. “She was like: ‘You shouldn’t be an actor. You need to be a mathematician or a doctor or a scientist.’”

This never looked likely. Before his parents finally bought him a keyboard, Patel drew piano keys on a window sill to practise. He told his mother he needed acting lessons because he was “destined to be a star”. The family friend was duly corrected. “I literally went to her, ‘Watch me!’ and laughed,” says Patel. “Who were they to tell me what to do?” Although, he admits, he did always have an alternate path in mind, should showbiz not work out: “I always said if I wasn’t a performer I would have been an astronaut.”