For Sherman's Showcase creators, "It's almost like the world caught up to us" with their Black History Month Spectacular's premiere

The Daily Beast

“We could have never known that this was gonna happen the way that it happened,” co-creator Diallo Riddle says of the timing of the special, which was initially written to air during Black History Month in February but was moved to June because IFC lacked time on its schedule. The special premiering on Juneteenth, at a time when many Americans are finally discovering that the day even exists, makes it even more relevant. “It's almost like the world caught up to us,” adds fellow co-creator Bashir Salahuddin. “We had initially intended to put this humor out in February, and it's actually going to have more power and more impact coming out now. I think that's something that the universe is granting us and we're very grateful for.” Salahuddin notes that they used The Muppets Show as a touchstone to get their show on the air. “I think one of the things that in some ways made it difficult for us to get Sherman's Showcase on the air is that so many TV executives had this idea of what a Black show was supposed to look like, and about people like me and Diallo who come from where we come from,” Salahuddin says. “We loved all the sort of off-beat, oddball comedy stuff that nobody would ever think that folks like us were watching. And so Sherman's Showcase is a testament to that.”

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• Diallo Riddle on the difference between writing for Season 1 and for the Black History Month Spectacular: "For the first season, we literally spent the first two weeks just writing anything that made us laugh and really taking a sketch comedy approach to it," he says, adding: "With the Spectacular we were just like, look, they’re giving us an hour of time, that we actually thought was going to be in February during actual Black History Month. we had a whole hour of time. So let’s make sure that every single second of this special pops. Like, we’re not SNL. We don’t have to have every sketch last for eight minutes. We’re going to make sure that every single sketch, whether it’s 30 seconds or five minutes, is going to be great. That was the approach we took with the special."
• Black History Month Spectacular tests whether it's okay to laugh in our current moment: "It’s clever, sometimes stinging and encyclopedically well-informed (and was just renewed for a second season), but at the end of the day it wants you to smile, however ruefully," says Mike Hale. "That’s not the current tone of the national conversation about race, a fact evident in Dave Chappelle’s 8:46 on the Netflix Is a Joke comedy channel on YouTube, which begins with Chappelle repeatedly apologizing for the weirdness of doing something resembling stand-up in the wake of Floyd’s killing. Diallo Riddle, who created and stars in Sherman’s Showcase with Bashir Salahuddin, addressed the possible dissonance at a panel last week, asking: 'Is it OK to be silly? Is it OK to laugh?' His conclusion: 'I just always come back to the fact that what’s gotten our people through the past and the present has always been our culture. That’s the music, that’s the comedy, and the black boy joy, to use the nomenclature of the current day. We have to keep that going.' If you agree, Black History Month Spectacular is a full serving of, if not always joy, at least consistently sly amusement."
• Sketches about police raids and kente cloth are more relevant than they were even a month ago: "The special does hold true to its name, too," says Steve Greene. "In addition to the usual energy guiding the time-hopping controlled chaos of Sherman’s Showcase, this Black History Month Spectacular isn’t a gimmick title. In its own way, the show has always been a celebration of Black history, whether in coming up with an alternate-history version of Prince or reimagining a real series of Frederick Douglass-centered ads from the 1970s."
• Black History Month Spectacular goes as far back as the 1920s Harlem Renaissance: "While I found Sherman’s Showcase Black History Month Spectacular as hilarious as a pile of dusty Laff Records comedy albums in the corner of Fred Sanford’s junk shop, many younger viewers may be at a loss of what’s so funny unless they’ve been listening to their parent’s old cassette tapes, watching blaxploitation flicks on VHS, or peeping at vintage Soul Train episodes on YouTube," says Michael A. Gonzales. "Nevertheless, as present-day activists are quick to advise, do the work."