A Kwanzaa Holiday Special
The Independent Television Service (ITVS) presents HARAMBEE!, starring Howard Rollins (TV's "In the Heat of the Night," Ragtime), Aaron Beener (TV's "The Bill Cosby Show"), Brenda Pressley (TV's "Brewster Place," Broadway's original "Dreamgirls"), and Novella Nelson (Broadway's "Having Our Say"). Written and directed by Fracaswell Hyman, with Executive Producer Liz Nealon, HARAMBEE! - Swahili for unity - is an absorbing and humorous family drama set in a Brooklyn housing project during the Kwanzaa holiday period. The one-hour program, which was funded by ITVS, will air nationwide on public television stations in December.
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The realities of random violence confront the Barnes family when a stray bullet enters their apartment on Christmas night. Eleven-year-old JoJo Barnes (Aaron Beener), his sister, and cousin are then forced to stay inside because of their mother's real concerns for her family's safety. In frustration, JoJo writes a school composition on the injustice of violence, and how it has made him a prisoner in his own community, even within his own home. |
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That evening JoJo's family attends their first Kwanzaa celebration at their housing project's community center where Chimbuko (Howard Rollins), an activist and former drug addict who has walked the road of recovery for five years, sees Kwanzaa as a way to help the community come together to meet the changes in their neighborhood. When JoJo's grandmother Queenesther (Novella Nelson) is chosen as the community elder to begin the Umoja (Swahili for "mutual well-being") ceremony, she proudly asks her grandson to share his school essay with the gathering. A popular newspaper columnist, attending with JoJo's journalist aunt, is so moved by the boy's plea for a safer neighborhood that he features the essay in his column the next morning. Sparked by the temporary attention from City Hall and the police department following the publication of JoJo's essay, the housing project residents use Kwanzaa as a catalyst for action. But change is never easy or without risk. JoJo's older sister must make a choice between her family and her gangbanger boyfriend, Flex. JoJo's mother must decide whether to trust again, and JoJo must come to terms with information that his police officer father was a substance abuser at the time of his death. Finally, it is the fiery and determined family matriarch Queenesther who embraces the Kwanzaa philosophy, demonstrating how each person must take a stand to stop the violence that plagues our communities. |
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HARAMBEE! effectively dramatizes the vulnerability we all share in a world where the fragile veneer separating us from violence can be shattered without warning. And where a young man's anger and sense of hopelessness can quickly lead him to violence as a way of trying to control the world around him. With the help of an exceptionally talented cast, director/writer Cas Hyman and executive producer Liz Nealon craft a powerful family drama that entertains and educates, weaving the seven nights of Kwanzaa into a spiritual journey. Together, JoJo's community realizes they can make a better world for themselves and their children using the Kwanzaa philosophy as their guide: Umoja (mutual well-being), Kujichagulia (self-determination), Ujima (collective work and responsibility), Ujamaa (cooperative economics), Nia (purpose); Kuumba (creativity), and Imani (faith). |
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Rounding out the ensemble cast are several talented young actors including China Jesusita Shavers as "Shanora" (TV's "Here and Now"), Tristin Mays as "Angel" ("Cosby"), and Merlin Santana (TV's "Moesha") as "Flex," a young man walking deeper and deeper into a life of violence. Nealon and Hyman, co-creator and head writer, respectively, of the popular PBS children's literacy mystery series "Ghostwriter", bring a deft touch to HARAMBEE! The overt intent of the program to educate viewers on the meaning and importance of the Kwanzaa holiday never eclipses the storytelling, which effectively uses humor and drama to create an authentic African American family story. |
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