British Nigerian actress Susan Wokoma is known for her roles in Chewing Gum and Crazyhead.
It has recently been announced that Wokoma will be joining The Daily Show correspondent Ronny Chieng as supporting characters in the new CBS sitcom, Super Simple Love Story which centres around characters Morgan (Elizabeth Alderfer) and Kevin (David Walton). Morgan is 30 and successful but is questioning her life choices, Kevin is a recently divorced father of two unsure of what’s next, the two meet and their lives change forever. According to Deadline, their story is told through “interviews and vignettes spanning 10 years about how an unlikely couple becomes an unlikely family.”
Joining as series regulars, Wokoma has been cast as ‘Abby‘ a colleague of Morgan. Chieng will play ‘Harris‘ friend of Kevin. There was initial confusion which turned to criticism when their casting was announced via social media because it was implied that Chieng and Wokoma were the leads of Super Simple Love Story. Which would have been a significant move toward diversifying love stories on the small screen. However, once people realised that they were supporting lead white characters, the mood changed.
The struggle to have love stories on our prime time screens that don’t focus on white characters continues. The trend of diversity in these stories meaning ethnic characters supporting white leads for jokes and chuckles is tired and lazy. However, we are excited for Wokoma’s talents to be seen on a bigger and global platform potentially setting her up to get more prominent roles. We instead direct our questions to the UK as we
Super Simple Love Story as yet has no air date. We’ll keep you posted.
Read TBB’s last interview with Susan Wokoma here.