The Split Up's creator on "responsibility" of representation and joy of creating "deliciously messy" British Asian characters

The Split Up is BBC's newest glossy series offering, centring on the cut-throat world of divorce law and the Kishan family, who helm their own successful law firm in Manchester.

A spin-off of the already successful The Split, the new series not only centres on an entirely new family and has Ursula Rani Sarma at its helm, but is proudly boasting an entirely South Asian lead cast, something unfortunately rarely seen in today's TV.

The impact of such a drama, in terms of primetime representation, can't be understated – but it's also something that came with a lot of responsibility, Sarma shared with Radio Times.

Having previously spoken to Pass the Mic, writer Kaamil Shah had teased that the series was both "really sexy" and boasted "British Asians being messy".

On whether she shares the same sentiment and had actively tried to formulate characters that were different to what depictions we have seen on TV previously, Sarma shared: "I have felt the responsibility of being one of the first prime time drama shows that will have been on the BBC which will feature a purely British Asian family. So, we have felt that a lot, I have felt that a lot as we have gone through the development of it."

Sarma continued: "Where we got to with that was what our real responsibility is. What I felt my responsibility was – to just show how alike we all are. I don't think our characters are any messier than any of the characters in The Split.

"But it was because we haven't seen it within a British Asian family drama show and I think that's what suddenly makes it feel special for all of us, as writers, because we got to write them as if we were writing any other characters."

Sarma went on: "It's almost like while their cultural background was massively important to who they were, it didn't mean there were spaces and places we couldn't take them to. That's when it really became fun for all of us in the writer’s room.

"The [characters] are sexy and messy and Aria is deliciously flawed, I think. I mean, we've all really enjoyed writing her and spending time watching bring her to life because she makes all of these quite large mistakes in her personal life, but you love her for it anyway because you understand always why she's doing it and even, if they are coming from a place of where her flaws are buried."

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"We just wanted everyone to feel recognisable, and we wanted to bring as broad an audience to this show and to this family as we can," Sarma said. "We don't want people to think when watching it, ‘I don't look like that. I'm not from that community. I won't get what their lives are. I won't be able to engage with it.’ We wanted just to show how we're all living in this world together and we're all experiencing the same highs and lows, grief, love, loss, betrayal, success, failure and how universal that is.

"It was fun because often as writers, in your average TV show, you may have one – there's like a token brown character that you get to try and write for. As a result I suppose you don't have the range to explore the full orchestra of delicious messiness. So we really had fun with it."

The six-part legal drama blends plenty of drama, twists and family dynamics as we follow the Kishan's as they navigate all kinds of life problems, woes and dilemmas.

The synopsis reads: "Brilliant divorce lawyer Aria Kishan (Ritu Arya) stands on the brink of inheriting her family firm, but the recent death of her mother has left her father, Dhruv (Sanjeev Bhaskar), questioning whether she is ready to lead.

"As Aria uses her razor-sharp, empathetic legal mind to represent Manchester’s most elite clients, her private world fractures. A surprise engagement, the arrival of a former flame, and a series of revelations that expose long-buried family truths threaten to dismantle everything Aria and her family have worked to build."

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The Split Up will premiere on Sunday 20 and Monday 21 September at 9pm on BBC One.

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