Is there black representation on French Television?
Online alternatives for watching people that look like you.
When I moved to the U.S. ten years ago, I thought I would finally live the life I had watched on TV as a kid.
As a child growing up between Paris and the French Caribbean island of Guadeloupe, American sitcoms like The Cosby Show and Moesha were among my favorites. Despite being set in New York or Los Angeles, I could relate to these stories because they showcased people who looked like me.
I grew up dreaming that one day I would be a successful lawyer-yet-kind-mother like Claire Huxtable of “The Cosby Show”, that I would drink fancy drinks with fierce women like Joan and Toni from “Girlfriends” or that I would go to cool high-school parties with funny girls like Niecy and Kim from “Moesha”. For me, Moesha’s box braids were the highlight of the show: a bold and refreshing thing to see at a time when we only got monochromatic shows from France.
So when I moved to Atlanta, I wanted it all!
On the streets, I wanted to pass by people who looked like the characters of my favorite TV shows. I expected to be overwhelmed by the quality of American TV shows.
But to my surprise, American TV had become dull and annoying. The progressive families and strong Afro-American characters who made American TV shows unique, had disappeared. Goodbye the Cosby family, meet the Browns!
I turned to the internet to look for sitcoms that I could relate to. And then I discovered the magic of independent TV shows on YouTube channels like Black and Sexy TV.
“Afrostream was born from a simple observation, the African, Afro-Caribbean and Afro-American films and series deserve to have wider dissemination. A public in search of representation or discoveries does not always have easy and legal access to these aspirational contents . ”
OkCupid was my first Black and Sexy TV show and I have been hooked ever since I watched the first episode six years ago. I am the girl who watches every single episode, sends silly tweets about them, and harasses friends who won’t succumb to this online alternative.
Why am I that obsessed? Maybe because far from the fancy and ridiculous plots that pollute our TV screens now, these online shows have gone back to the basics. They showcase regular, relatable and funny characters. These characters come with twist-outs, afros, Senegalese twists and low-cuts… the kind of hairstyles that nearly disappeared from TV in the last decade.
These shows have also paved the way for more bold producers, like Issa Rae, who dared to expose the awkward experiences of contemporary African-Americans.
A lot has been said about the success of Numa Perrier and Dennis Dortch, the founders of Black and Sexy TV and the writers of The Couple, a show that landed an HBO deal. Their ability to create provocative and yet thoughtful content that sheds light on issues of the black community has earned them a global following. The productions were available on Afrostream, the French video-on-demand platform that featured shows about the African diaspora.
Afrostream creator Tonjé Bakang told French newspaper Le Monde, that he created the platform to bring more diversity of programs for viewers. He said that when he was a teenager, he used to watch American shows, and enjoyed seeing people who looked like him, and who made jokes like the ones African families would make. In France, at the time, the only one representing the diversity on stage was French-Moroccan actor Jamel Debbouze, said Bakang.
Launched in 2014, the now defunct Afrostream, had attracted more than 15,000 regular users in France, according to publication TéleObs. Afrostream’s streaming content has since been shuttered.
To go back to my own journey, when I decided to move back to Guadeloupe, I realized that the offerings of mainstream TV had significantly improved. I am still grateful to visionaries like Numa, Dennis, and, at the time, Tonjé, for giving us many more choices.
I am now waiting for a time when we won’t need these movements to see teenage girls rocking their cool box braids on screen.