I know Single Ladies presents a rare opportunity for storytelling as it pertains to black women. I appreciate the effort that Queen Latifah’s production company, Flavor Unit Entertainment, has made to help bring this show to fruition; undoubtedly, this opportunity evolved as a result of her bankability and commitment to infusin’ a healthy dose of flava into the realm of television programming. I don’t yet have the full IMDB breakdown on the writers, director(s), additional producers, etc., but given the Queen’s propensity for U-N-I-T-Y I’m sensing there’s a colorful collective at work here, and I want to acknowledge my appreciation for that as well. It is also always a good thing to see some fabulous, familiar faces in the form of the cast; and it’s a great thing to see these faces in leading roles on a network that consistently caters to a (seemingly) broader-than-BET audience.
I spent a few minutes earlier tonight on Twitter living out the electronic version of my double dutch destiny by awkwardly jumping into a couple of conversations about the show. I love how the rapid-fire commentary enhances my viewing experience (and I’d be lying if I did not also admit I’m quite distracted by it). And not to play too heavily to the stereotype, but it was a pretty fun atmosphere when my timeline became engulfed by a sea of black women talking about what was going on in the moment—it felt like being in a big ol’ beauty shop.
Initially I chuckled and mmmhmm’d along with plenty of folk who were underwhelmed and determined to get comical about it mainly because I loves me some snark. I mean, the lighting was awfully soft—like soap opera dream-within-a-dream sequence soft—and a heavy dose of overt primpin’ and posin’ did occur during and in-between the dialogue. Of course the weaves looked magical and the clothes were on trend and skinsationally sewn. I mean, you couldn’t cast Stacey Dash and have her lookin’ all raggedy. As if. And yes, many of us were having a who, what, when, where, why and how moment about the white girl in the show and why her man/men just had to be black. (Sure, the character and the actress have assumed and actual names, but you know that’s what you called her, too.) The show’s premiere received enough credible hype to excite many of us who miss Girlfriends or subbed out of The Game. We love watching LisaRaye dole out some sass; thank goodness somebody finally found and called Ms. Dash; and yay for Lauren London flippin’ the script on breezy independent of Li’l Weezy.
One wonderful thing Twitter provides is instant and continuous feedback. It serves as a terrific barometer in terms of gauging how viewers react to the dialogue, the plot and the set/costume/makeup design. Of course the feedback can also be confounding, which I soon discovered when I picked up on @WrittenbyBene’s timeline (You can read more exceptional insights from her here: http://www.writingwhileblack.com). Her initial tweets demonstrated excitement about the opportunity that Single Ladies presented. Watching the show after its initial airing time, I suspect she was a bit taken aback by the ferocity and rapidity of the criticisms followers tweeted upon her timeline.
She immediately began to make a series of valid points about how quick we as black folk are to criticize something … anything. There is a revolving debate/whining session (nearly every year post-season premieres/pre-awards show circuits) about the paucity of black actors, leading black characters, black directors, black key grips, etc., and yet there Single Ladies was offering us a chance to silence those complaints and we couldn’t even stifle our fingertips on some keyboards. I took a moment to imagine how I’d feel were I one of the writers trackin’ Twitter throughout the show’s premiere and found myself agreeing with one of @WrittenbyBene’s tweets: “If I was a Black scriptwriter, director or producer I wouldn't make ish for y'all. We're never happy. *sigh*”
I admit that I’d forgotten to hold my applause (and/or wrath) until the end of the show. It’s an interesting thing about Twitter—it forces you to get current and then the current forces you away. No one wants to be left behind in the conversation, everyone’s got something to say and too many of us are simply too damn funny. Yet we must be careful about the stones we cast. The reality is that all too often we as black women don’t turn on the television and see any semblance of our everyday, every-woman selves. We see some neck-rolling NeNe leakin’ know-it-alls, some baby mamas mauling each other with Maury’s sofa cushions and too many of our admittedly bodacious behinds droppin’ down and wobblin’ wid it, but it’s pretty rare when we gain access to the platform that shapes the reflection on how we mingle and how we love.
Hopefully, the powers-that-be aren’t easily dismayed by the commentary. I ain’t met a person yet with a Nielsen box, so I’ve always been a bit wary about how those viewer numbers are generated. However, I think it’d be helpful if neither the viewers nor the executives judge the show’s potential prematurely. Single Ladies is just beginning, and while the start seemed a bit too heavy on flounce and fluff, I certainly believe the characters have enough stories, allure and moxie to warrant more than a season’s worth of middle and end. I believe that all the people involved can adapt to deliver entertainment that is as beguiling as it is just plain better. After all, Twitter’s hashtags alone should reveal the thing the execs most want to discover—people are talking and more importantly, they’re watching.