Jennifer Lim on standing up for fellow British Asian actors, her role in the first series written for phone viewing, and learning Cantonese to fit in in London

Born and raised in the British capital, Lim, an advocate for Asians in the entertainment industry, has a full work diary. She will soon be seen in feature film The Monster Beneath Us, which she calls “a period horror movie set in Yorkshire”.

“Quite fun! It takes place in 1898,” says Lim. “I play a governess with a Yorkshire accent. I like a bit of variety.”

She has just begun work on British independent film Say His Name (further details restricted); and last year found her starring in the London stage production of Worth.

“That’s a dark comedy,” says Lim, “revolving around a British-Chinese family, with Hong Kong roots, in the aftermath of the matriarch’s death. It’s very much in the vein of Succession.”

But featuring smaller amounts of money? “The mother leaves £44 [HK$440] to her four children,” she adds – children who then scramble to find their missing inheritance.

Concurrently, Lim has established a personal niche on the London theatre scene. “I’m also running my little theatre company, Moongate, currently company-in-residence at the Omnibus Theatre, in Clapham,” she says.

“For the last year or so I’ve been curating salon sessions called Moongate Mix. The idea of a salon, where you invite people round and talk about the arts, came because I was really in love with Russian literature.

“So when we were offered company-in-residence I started curating these monthly events for up to 70 people. They range from a symposium to a panel event to a screening to stand-up comedy, live music, other live performances – and there’s always a pop-up kitchen.

“It’s a place for people to connect and be creative and events are always sold out.”

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Lim’s own family roots are in Singapore and although Britain is her home, Asia plays a significant role in her life and work.

Last November, she was heard in the BBC Radio 4 adaptation of Han Suyin’s 1952 novel A Many-Splendoured Thing. Hong Kong has informed her work in other ways, too.

“Hong Kong, I love the place,” she says, “and in the last few years I’ve been involved in a couple of projects about it.” The first was 2020’s Freedom Hi!

Dreamers, similarly, was “a highly creative exploration [of] the loss of democratic freedom in Hong Kong” as one review put it.

Again, mobile phones were essential: messages sent via social media between cast and audience were central to both productions and even influenced dialogue.

Meanwhile, should Lim ever write an autobiography it might conceivably be called Speaking in Tongues. “I grew up speaking English to my mum, Mandarin to my dad and Teochew to my grandmother,” she says. “And growing up in London, you’re surrounded by Cantonese speakers.

“I’ve done a few things in Mandarin, although I’d love to act in Mandarin more. A short film I was in recently, Our Child, written and directed by [British-Chinese Londoner] Anatole Sloan, won an award and that was all in Mandarin. On stage I speak Mandarin and Cantonese when required. I do enjoy it.”

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Such a facility no doubt helps with yet another of Lim’s roles: co-founder of non-profit organisation Beats, formed in 2017 to represent British East and South East Asians Working in Theatre and Screen.

It does this by aiming “to humanise” their “representation in arts and culture” and secure equal employment opportunities.

“We’ve highlighted dubious casting, stereotypes or harmful portrayals,” says Lim. “For example, in 2019 we protested against the BBC’s commissioning of a pilot episode of a comedy called Living with the Lams.” The series was subsequently cancelled.

“It wasn’t funny at all, it was for propagating stereotypes. It was about a Chinese takeaway, written by white writers. One character played in a band called Wok and Roll and they had the grandmother spitting all the time – really cheap, racist shots.”

Lim, indefatigable, sees the impact that Beats can have, but is the wider industry taking note? “Things are changing,” she says. “But not fast enough for my liking.”