Brown Nation

Brown Nation is an American comedy-drama series directed by Abi Varghese, written by Matt Grubb, George Kanatt and Varghese and produced by Atit Shah and Prakash Bare. The series is shot in New York City and the first season of the show consists of ten episodes that are 20-25 minutes long. Brown Nation released globally on Netflix, currently serving 190 countries, on November 15, 2016.^[1][2]

The show's sales agent is listed as Creative Artists Agency.^[3] Shenaz Treasury one of the leads told DNA India "The first ever all Indian show with an all Indian cast that is seeing an arrival in 190 countries where Netflix plays, Brown Nation is a comedy about an Indian family living in New York City. Confirms Shenaz, “This show is like Everyone Loves Raymond, but with Indian people"."^[4]

Synopsis

Hasmukh operates a small IT Consulting company "Shree Ganesh Computers Limited Inc" in Queens, NY. Staffed by a disinterested and lazy cast of characters, his business flounders. His home life is not much better. His wife Dimple, a frustrated and jobless artist, complains constantly about not having enough time to explore her creativity because of the demands of taking care of her dog, Bobby. Hasmukh tries desperately to balance his work and family, but neither seem to have his best interest at heart.^[5]

Cast and characters

• Shenaz Treasury as Dimple
• Omi Vaidya as Balan
• Remy Munasifi as Hyder
• Melanie Chandra as Roli
• Doug E. Doug as Lemont
• Rajeev Varma as Hasmukh
• Jaspal Binning as Gautam
• Kapil Bawa as Papaji
• Sana Serrai as Samantha
• Aakash Singh as Mookie

Production and Development

The show was in development for four years prior to taking the route of independent financing to produce the show. "The show is about the daily quirkiness that we have,” Varghese told India-West. “You know, issues like marriage, five-year anniversary, little things like slices of life. We have tried to incorporate a lot of that which will be relatable to the major audiences.”^[6]

Speaking to The News Minute Bare one of the producers said, "It is basically a sitcom taking a satirical look at the life of Indians and other brown-skinned communities in the backdrop of NYC. It's not a very serious or preachy depiction of the issues. The comedy really comes from the everyday activities of the characters who are into the rat race typical of city life. The cultural differences of the Indian, Middle Eastern, Chinese, Caucasian and African-American characters also helps." He added "It was widely felt that Outsourced had a local perspective of the things which didn't help in capturing the Indian situation that truthfully. We have a more balanced scripting department with talents from American as well as Indian backgrounds. That we believe has resulted in a programme which will be palatable to both the audiences."^[7]

Filming

Production of the film took place in 2014 over a four-week period, primarily in New York City with a majority of the scenes taking place in Brooklyn and Queens.^[8] The production was supervised by Create Entertainment.^[9]

Casting

Varghese cast the lead roles well before the filming of season one as he had created a trailer to pitch the show in 2012 with many of the same actors. Binning who plays Gautam said "I am incredibly proud of being a lead character in this series. The show truly showcases different parts of my Asian culture and has educated me about aspects I didn't know about before, always resulting in hilarity".^[5]

Episodes

The ten episode, first season of Brown Nation premiered on 15 November 2016 on Netflix worldwide in 190 countries.

References

External links

• Brown Nation at the Internet Movie Database