In
the new CW drama series “All American,” a promising African-American football star from an inner-city high school in Los Angeles is recruited by a coach in Beverly Hills to move on up and
play for him.
After a period of inner turmoil and indecision, the football star says yes. Basically, that's the show.
It is about his struggle to fit in among the rich kids at
fictional Beverly High School (it's supposed to be Beverly Hills High, but in this show, the word “Hills” is omitted from the school's name).
As well-meaning as this
up-from-the-ghetto football recruitment story seems to be, aspects of it feel a tad unsettling. What is this show trying to say? That the only way to succeed in life if you grow up in a neighborhood
that is not affluent is to somehow become "lucky" enough that someone in the rich neighborhood will ask you to live with him and play football at the rich kids' school?
advertisement
advertisement
And what of the team
this young star -- Spencer James (played by Daniel Ezra) -- leaves behind in the Crenshaw section of L.A.? In the series premiere of “All American,” the reactions of his Crenshaw teammates
and coaches is not shown.
Surely, he must have been friends with at least some of them. How do they feel when their friend and star player ditches them to go play with the rich kids? The
premiere provides no answer.
Clearly, “All American” is a drama about race, which is an ambitious topic to take up. Spencer encounters few, if any, other black students at Beverly
High.
His Beverly High coach (played by Taye Diggs) is just about the only African-American person at his new school. And the coach happens to be married to a white woman -- a successful
attorney.
The show draws parallels between the coach and Spencer, portraying Spencer as a younger version of the coach. This impression is given by the coach himself.
His own career in
the NFL was cut short by injuries, he tells Spencer. So he is hoping to guide Spencer toward a better NFL career than he had.
It just so happens that the coach's own son is the star
quarterback on the Beverly High team. And the son does not like all the attention the coach is paying to this outsider from the inner city.
This forms one of the show's central conflicts as
members of the Beverly High squad try and drive Spencer away by conspiring to undermine his efforts on the practice field.
Despite the show's mixed messages about race and privilege, it is not
a bad show at all. As the show's central character, Daniel Ezra gives a standout performance, and one of the best by a young actor in a new drama series seen so far this season.
“All
American” premieres Wednesday (October 10) at 9 p.m. Eastern on The CW.