NBC’s Grand Crew is changing the landscape for how Black characters, mainly Black men, are portrayed on television. The how hasn’t even reached ten episodes and is already being hailed as the next classic.
Grand Crew charts through the personal and professional lives at a local wine bar as they navigate through their experiences and offer one another support. The all-star cast includes Nicole Byer as Nicky, Carl Tart as Sherm, Grasie Mercedes as Fay, Justin Cunningham as Wyatt, Echo Kellum as Noah, and Aaron Jennings as Anthony. While many sitcoms have tried to tackle Black friendships, Grand Crew sets itself apart with a new formula. The show moves away from stereotypes and Black trauma and focuses on the characters’ everyday lives – drinking in local wine bars while supporting each other with dating and their careers.
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“We’re showing Black friendship as honest and cool,” Phil Augusta-Jackson, the creator of Grand Crew, told the Philadelphia Tribune. Augusta-Jackson based parts of the show on his life and experiences while bar-hopping with his friends in East LA. It not only connects with audiences, but critics point out how the men in the show are willing to be vulnerable while also offering witty humor. Whether you have watched every episode or you’re a newbie, this show has it all.
Here are a few reasons why the series is getting so much praise among fans and critics.
The Characters Feel Genuine
NBC
Grand Crew highlights the importance of having successful, healthy friendships. Augusta-Jackson centering the show around his real-life friends and experiences allowed audiences immediately to connect with the cast. Not only that, but he and a few of the cast members worked together previously, which translates very well on screen. The stories and laughs all come off as genuine.
We see the characters cry, laugh, and love together while trying to make sense of the world. According to Nicole Byer, the cast is so close that they even have matching tattoos. I mean, come on, who wouldn’t want to hang out with this group of friends?
Normalizing Mental Health Discussions in the Black Community
After going to therapy himself, Augusta-Jackson saw how to explore this idea with humor. Grand Crew normalizes mental health discussion in the Black community by allowing the men to be vulnerable with each other, something once taboo. Often dealing with the emotional pitfalls can weigh you down, and unfortunately, in communities of color, talking about this burden just isn’t allowed.
That is what makes Grand Crew so necessary. It shows Black folks speaking about struggling emotionally out in the open. In one episode, Wyatt encourages Noah to try therapy after admitting he was struggling. This group of friends is just that–friends who support one another, no matter what. More than the comedy, what sets this show apart is its focus on humanity.
Changing How Black Characters Are Portrayed on Screen
Historically, the Black experience isn’t always portrayed in the best light due to systematic injustice. For generations, Black people were stereotyped as angry and violent. Unfortunately for us, these labels have trickled down from our real lives onto the smaller screen, especially into sitcoms. Black people were often tokenized and used as the butt of a joke, usually in a predominantly white space. In contrast, white characters were given the full spectrum of the emotional rainbow, while Black characters were used as props only to hold up the main characters.
Fortunately, today, shows like Grand Crew are helping to change the narrative of what it means to be a Black man and Black woman in present-day society. Following behind hit shows like HBO’s Insecure and FX’s Atlanta, Grand Crew thrives by balancing writing authentic Black characters in genuine ways that resonate more with Black people tuning in and less with caring about the idea of white acceptance.
Black viewers now have many Black TV shows that are helping to reclaim Blackness and how it gets represented. What sets TV shows like this apart from their predecessors is usually at the helm. Black writers and creators can inject an authentic Black experience but make it relatable for everyone to enjoy. The cast is full of characters who are unapologetically Black complex human beings navigating relationships, friendships, careers with a nice glass of wine – how refreshing.
It also does not rely on playing up the historical trauma Black people have endured over the years. It focuses on the mundane parts of life, which you don’t often get to see with Black characters. Who knew that Black people navigating everyday life could be so entertaining?
