Fall TV Spotlight: Superstore
In anticipation of the 2016 fall television season, NHMC will be showcasing shows that excel in portraying and characterizing their Latino stars. Stay tuned these next few weeks as we feature some of this fall’s most diverse programming, and make sure to watch and support Latino talent on TV — we’ve compiled a list of some of this season’s best, available on the NHMC blog.
Because of its premise (a group of employees from all different corners of society work at a Wal-Mart-type big-box store), Superstore’s comedy primarily consists of blurring the line between the events onscreen and similar day-to-day situations. As such, the show immediately understood that its success was contingent on its ability to portray real life as realistically as possible. Disillusioned employees, played straight-facedly by America Ferrera, Ben Feldman, Colton Dunn, Mark McKinney and more, navigate everything from strange customers to class divides to teen pregnancy to racial tensions to undocumented citizens to union organizing and corporate management — and this is only in its first twelve episodes (the length of season 1, plus an extra special during Olympics season).
Along with a talented writers’ room, credit for this surreal-realism has to be given to Ferrera, a producer on the show as well as its top-billed talent. Playing floor manager Amy, Ferrera published an article on Deadline to talk about the role and the show’s take on diversity:
“It only occurred to me in retrospect, but when I signed on to play Amy in Justin Spitzer’s Superstore, it was the first part I’d ever been offered that hadn’t been written as Latina. I never think of myself as a Latino person; I’m simply a person. … It occurred to me: none of the roles in the script had specified ethnicities, they were simply casting all kinds of people.”
Here, Ferrera nails down what makes Superstore special. It’s a show that writes characters first, and those characters are further imbued with specific traits and identities once talented actors step in. Amy is Latina, Ferrera says, because she is played by a Latina actress — but that alone doesn’t define the character, just like Latinidad alone doesn’t define the thousands of Latinos in the United States today. Superstore is a testament to the importance of having Latino and other minority voices both on and off screen, and there’s absolutely no doubt that the show’s development has been informed by Ferrera as both producer and actress.
This is the biggest strength of Superstore, its secret, not-so-secret ace in the hole: it tells stories that are as complex as those found in real life with — and because of — a stellar cast of characters that actually reflect real life. This is not a perfect show, but it’s brimming with potential, the kind that stems from an earnest desire to genuinely depict the absurdity in mundanity, and to do so authentically. It feels real. Superstore is what you get when people stop talking about diversity in Hollywood and actually make it happen.
