Screenwriter Gary is enjoying his '15 minutes'

When Game of Thrones actor Anton Lesser read the script for Beshert, he called its producers from his Royal Shakespeare Company dressing room in Stratford-upon-Avon to utter the words writer Gary Enkin was desperate to hear - "When do we start?

- by Laura Reid

With that, Enkin's debut film-making project was under way at the age of 70.

"The film is set in a Jewish context but it's a universal theme," he explains. "It's about the relationship between the young and the old. Sometimes extraordinary things happen when the young and the old meet.

"The film explores the relationship between a grumpy old man and a young boy with no male role model in his life. At this particular moment in time, for whatever reason, beshert, they come together. They meet to the benefit of both, which has an impact on both of their lives."

Beshert is a Yiddish word that essentially means fate, destiny or something that's meant to be. For Leeds-based Enkin, the making of the film was exactly that.

The wheels were put in motion five years ago, during the Covid pandemic. At the time, Enkin had recently retired after a career that had been split between a partnership in a retail clothing business and undertaking various roles with an American oil company.