By: Valerie Milano
Pasadena, CA (The Hollywood Times) 3/13/20 – Showtime has renewed the hit comedy series BLACK MONDAY for a second season. BLACK MONDAY is a co-production between Showtime and Sony Pictures Television Studios.
The show stars a group of outsiders who hilariously take on the system established by the blue-blood, old-boys club of Wall Street during the historic stock market crash of 1987. The scope of Season 2 will widen from NYC to Washington DC and Miami. However, BLACK MONDAY was filmed on location right here in Los Angeles!
BLACK MONDAY completed its first season with 300,000 total live tune-in viewers. Showtime hopes for an even bigger following during the second season.
The materialistic excesses of the 1980’s may strike a chord in a country and world now run by billionaires. Anyone who ever believed or disbelieved in deregulation and trickle-down economics should be well satisfied with BLACK MONDAY.
Bolstered by Showtime’s typically stellar production values, Season 2 of BLACK MONDAY shows women and minorities trying to take over a world usually restricted to rich white men. The arc of the moral universe may be long, but it bends towards justice.
Racial humor is to be expected on a comedy show called BLACK MONDAY. “I have an MBA–which does NOT mean Majestic Black A**!” insists Dawn Towner, the leading female character. And, less humorously, Asia is already breathing down the USA’s economic neck.
BLACK MONDAY was discussed at a Winter 2020 Television Critics Association panel taking place at the Langham Huntington Hotel in Pasadena on Monday, January 13th, 2020. Present were showrunners David Caspe and Jordan Cahan along with stars Don Cheadle, Regina Hall, Andrew Rannells, Paul Scheer, and Casey Wilson.
Despite appearances, the show is not merely a televised issue of MAD Magazine or an extended exercise in improv! Threads of fact are woven throughout every fun-filled half-hour episode. The fashion-challenged 80’s costumes strive for authenticity with ample servings of champagne, clam chowder, and fondue.
But BLACK MONDAY may be more than a subversive time capsule. “There’s going to be another crash,” David Caspe prophesied. “The question now is will the stock market crash before the world explodes?”
Somber observations like these may whet viewer appetites for smart satires like BLACK MONDAY all the more. At least we can laugh as the economy strips us to our tighty whities.
