Netflix hit show Master of None breaks new comedic ground
Master of None is yet another feather in Netflix’s cap, earning critical and popular acclaim for its laid-back realism and heartfelt humour. Kavita Daswani goes behind the scenes. PLUS: five places to eat and drink that feature in the show
Typically, the makers of television comedy do not research to any great extent the subjects their programmes cover – connecting with grandparents, for instance, or learning how pasta is made. Then again, Master of None isn’t a typical television comedy.
The star, Aziz Ansari, is a 32-year-old American of Indian descent, his best friend is played by a Taiwanese-American actor and another character is a gay African-American woman. In the single-camera comedy, the actors play loose versions of themselves and Ansari’s real mother and father – Fatima and Shoukath – appear as his onscreen parents.
Set entirely in New York, the show features a lot of talking and walking along the streets (as in Sex and the City, the Big Apple itself is a character) and the friends clustered around tables in real bars and restaurants, ruminating on such commonplace subjects as finding love, impending parenthood and spending time with the parents they are neglecting. It is warm-hearted and authentic, and has found a global audience through its appearance on Netflix.
“In our second round of discussions with Netflix, this show was referred to as ‘comedic investigative journalism’,” says Michael Schur, executive producer of Master of None, when we meet at a Netflix shindig in Pasadena, California. “The idea was the episodes would have a certain theme about them, but that the characters wouldn’t be passive; they would be actively interested in that theme. The characters would seek out the answers to the questions they had. Once that working theory was put into place, everything became clear.”
That approach is paying dividends; along with drug cartel drama Narcos, Master of None is among the most popular of the streaming vehicle’s original programmes worldwide, according to Netflix executives. Ansari was recently nominated for a Golden Globe for his role and the show itself has been accumulating awards.
The storyline unfolds around the life of Dev Shah (Ansari), a semi-successful actor, and his friends Brian (Kelvin Yu), Rachel (Noel Wells), Arnold (Eric Wareheim) and Denise (Lena Waithe). Each episode is predicated on something fairly trivial yet thought provoking: a bedroom mishap leads Dev to consider having children; he is attracted to a married woman (Claire Danes); he spends time with the grandparents of his friends.