Good TV: Queen Sugar

Let me be the first to say, THIS. SHOW. IS. GOOD. Ava Duvernay is truly a master of her craft. I’ll break it down.

4.5 out of 5 stars.

Let's give Queen Duvernay the credit she deserves. A tremendous part of what makes Queen Sugar so remarkable is her outstanding directorial skills. Visually, the show is gripping, in the same way, a beautiful feature film grabs you by sight alone. Each shot is set up in a way that, emotionally, brings us to our knees. This is beside the incredible acting, the perfection of the casting choices (save a few, we’ll touch on that later), the screenplay...the list goes on. If you want to skip the rest, just take my word for it now, watch Queen Sugar. It is television gold.

Set in rural Louisiana, Queen Sugar follows three siblings, Charlotte (Charley), Nova, and Ralph Angel have grown up, and grown apart, each path more different than the last. When their father passes away unexpectedly, their lives are suddenly thrown together as they grapple with their own personal struggles, in the midst of his burial, with the legacy of his now empty sugar cane farm looming over the entire circus. Based on a book of the same name by Natalie Baszile, Duvernay and Oprah’s made for television rendition make you want to lock yourself in the nearest Barnes & Nobles. The storyline is complex, but in the way that only families can be. The script feels familiar; you relate to the struggles the characters are having. At one point, Nova criticizes Charley for forgetting the culture in which they were brought up, and becoming someone unrecognizable. The scene takes a heated sibling argument to the screen. The barbs have an all too familiar sting; the kind you only understand if you have siblings who have lobbed an insult with the strength of a full faced slap.This story is deep. It FEELS deep. The history runs deep. I cannot stress how good this narrative is. Stop what you’re doing, right now, and watch it.

This is the only part of this show that doesn’t get top marks. And that’s really only because of one family group. Familiar faces like Bianca “Forever-a-Teenager” Lawson, and Rutina Wesley, of True Blood fame, shine through in their performances as Darla and Nova, respectively. Kofi Siriboe has been under the radar since 2008 but, he excels in his first lead role in a major television series. His performance as an embattled ex-convict trying to raise his son will make your heart cry. Even the supporting characters, (Omar Dorsey as Hollywood, Tina Lifford as Violet) aren’t just filler characters or glorified extras. The each has a personality and a purpose within the storyline. It’s the West family that’ll get under your skin. Something about them, as a whole, comes off as inauthentic. We’re too early in the series to know whether or not this move is intentional but damn, the West’s annoying. Charley is the sister too bougie for her britches, and every move she makes, from interrupting an NBA game to confront her husband on sex scandal allegations to ordering inhospitable catering for her father’s repast, comes off as ignorant and stuck up. Even the son, Micah, played by Nicholas Ashe, is a bit too fake teenage angsty. Between hating his dad, then revealing their location, then sneaking out to go see his estranged father, just to reiterate how much he hates him, we’re already hoping the West Circus packs up and leaves town.

That being said, it is a sad, harsh truth, that most often Black-Owned TV Networks, or shows with primarily Black casts, or Black directors, do not receive the support they need to survive. Why? Because, often enough for it to be a problem, Black people are skeptical of the quality of Black Owned productions. The problems facing the OWN network are a direct result of lack of support from the Black Community. We must save it. Queen Sugar, its network, and all that these things represent are far too precious to lose.

#queensugar #enetertainment #own #blackgirlmagic