More 'street' than the Cosby show (Everybody Hates Chris)

Member Name: bluerose81

Product:	Everybody Hates Chris
Date:	31/08/09 (307 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Good character observations as expected of Chrs Rock

Disadvantages: None

'Everybody Hates Chris' is maybe not what you would expect from the heavy-cussing comedian, Chris Rock, because essentially it is a warm, family, situation comedy. Nevertheless, the issue of racism is frequently touched upon, and Rock deals with this with the sharp intelligence and humour expected of him, and so the show does have a certain edge.

EHC is loosely based on experiences in Rock's own childhood, growing up with his family in 1980s Brooklyn, New York, with Rock himself providing the narration as though we are seeing his flashbacks. The young Chris is played by the young actor, Tyler James Williams), Chris's somewhat hen-pecked father, Julius (Terry Crews) is a proud, hard-working man who watches every penny, his sharp-witted, gobby mother, Rochelle (Tichina Arnold) is a strong, but loving mother, who keeps getting sacked because she doesn't like being told what to do. She is very funny. He has an older, good looking brother, Drew (Tequan Richmond) who takes all attention from the girls away from Chris, and a bratty but cute sister, Tonya (Imani Hakim).

Chris feels he unfairly gets blamed for what goes on around him, like when he watches the store owned by his friend, Doc (Antonio Fargas aka 'Huggy Bear' in Starsky & Hutch) and it gets robbed. If nothing else is happening to him, Tonya is constantly getting him into trouble and she gets away with it as their parents think of her as the baby of the family. He also has to cope with bullying from a tough, ginger kid, Joey Caruso (Travis T. Flory) at the all-white school his mother has sent him to across town.

On top of that, he has to deal with racism, intentional and unintentional. There is a running joke throughout which plays on the fact that Chris's family are not on welfare, are not crack dealers and the father is still living at home, but people will keep making this presumption of them, which exasperates Chris.

His siblings go to a local school but Chris has been sent by his well-meaning mother to an all-white school across town as she doesn't want him influenced by the rough local kids and thinks he will get a better education. Of course he gets bullying from Caruso but he has to deal with a different kind of racism from his well-meaning teacher, Ms Morello (Jacqueline Mazarella). She is always kind to him but that is mainly because she persists in assuming he is from a crack-addicted broken home, so in the end she is still an unwitting racist. In one episode, Chris is fed up with the bullying so he tries to get himself expelled in various ways. One morning, he refuses to pledge allegiance to the flag with the other kids, and stands with his head down, holding his fist in the air to symbolise 'black power'. Instead of getting annoyed, the white Ms Morello puts her fist in the air to show her support.

Sometimes included are fantasy sequences to illustrate what is going through the character's minds, such as when Rochelle says she will knock Chris into the middle of next week, we see his literal interpretation of what that might look like.

Other characters in the neighbourhood include Risky (Mike Estime) who sells dodgy goods from the back of a van, Jerome (Kevontay Jackson) who mugs him to the value of one dollar every time he sees him, and Mr Omar (Ernest Thomas), a funeral director who rents the apartment upstairs and likes the women. Chris's best friend at the school is another social misfit, a white kid called Greg (Vincent Martella).

On the whole, EHC is the witty result of Chris Rock's observations of the people he grew up with, with changes made for artistic reasons. This is even more enjoyable if you were young in the 80s and can remember what it was like when eg. Billy Ocean was the latest thing (Tonya insists he did the moonwalk BEFORE Michael Jackson) and OJ Simpson was a big star. I certainly enjoy it anyway.

'Everybody Hates Chris' has now ended after four seasons, but the fourth season is currently running in the UK on Fiver from 5.00 pm to 6.00 pm (two episodes) and old episodes are repeated on Sunday mornings at 10.30 am on Channel 5. (Co-written with Ali LeRoi)

Summary: A warm and orignal comedy show