It's not preachy, nor does in have an overt “message”, nor does it rely on tired old stereotypes for cheap laughs, but it does hold up a non-politically correct mirror in which South Africans from all backgrounds will recognise themselves. Imagine Third Rock from the Sun (with aliens masquerading as humans) meeting Freaky Friday (with people swapping bodies) and then put it into the suburban South African black/white paradigm.
Deliciously politically incorrect... The Coconuts starts on Wednesday, 9 January at 19.30 - only on M-Net!
So, why “coconuts”?
“Coconut” is an urban slang term used to describe black people who act “white” - it literally means black on the outside and white on the inside. However, the Coconuts, in the case of this sitcom, are not ‘white-acting' black people, but a family of white people - the Greenes - who become trapped in black bodies thanks to offending an old man and some ancestors of the little known Zulotho tribe of South Africa.
This happens after the patriarch of the family, Tom Greene, ignores the warnings of a mysterious old man not to park their holiday caravan in the tribe's old burial grounds. The old man leaves them with the ominous warning that there will be “consequences” for their disrespect. Then, during the night, the family turn black. It's a radical role reversal for a normal middle class white family who have to return to their home in Benoni and piece their lives together while they find a way to become white again. So this sitcom is about the ultimate coconut family who really are white people on the inside. How they got to be that way is where the series starts, but how they try to get back to their old lives is what the comedy is all about.
The story arc over the 13 episodes deals with how the Greenes have to walk a mile (or more) in the shoes of people they've hitherto known very little about and generally misunderstood. It's a crash course in culture but the Greenes are desperate to get back to who they were before so they throw themselves, sometimes begrudgingly, sometimes headlong, into trying to understand what it really is to be black. Fortunately for them they live next door to the Mlambos, a “real” black family, new in the suburbs, upwardly mobile and aspirant to western values. Up to now the Greenes have ignored the Mlambos but now they see them as their key to understanding black culture, so that they can hopefully pay their dues and become white again. But are the Mlambos the best role models? As the comedy unfolds the question arises - who are the real coconuts here?
So, in a nutshell, the Greenes are white folks, trapped in black bodies (played by black actors), having to experience a taste of ‘black life' (if there is such a simply defined thing) so they can become white again. And it is from this premise that the comedy of this situation will spring. Oh, and don't forget the family domestic, Patience, who had to accompany the Greenes on their ill-fated holiday (to do the dishes, of all things!) By some sort of overspill of the ‘spell', poor Patience, who was minding her own business sleeping on the back seat of the car, turns white over night. She's still Patience though, their Zulu-speaking helper, but she's now trapped in a white body.
