The No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency [Racialicious Review]
by Latoya Peterson
On Sunday night, I sat down to watch the premiere of The No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency after catching two or three specials on the making of the series while browsing HBO.
Now, let me just put this out there: I approached the series with some trepidation. First, I have never read the books. The novels, written by Alexander McCall Smith, are generally well received but knock up against some very strong views I hold about the narrative and stories of people of color. Since the voices of both women and PoCs tend to be marginalized in mainstream publishing, I try to seek out and support authors who would not otherwise be heard. So, instead of buying McCall Smith’s story about a woman from Botswana, I’d rather track down a book written by a woman from Botswana. I’ve written about this before in White Authors, Ethnic Characters and fleshed out my thoughts about times when it goes right and times when it goes wrong, but have decided to err on the side of supporting smaller authors (and smaller publishing houses).
However, the series was tempting to me from the get-go, as I love Jill Scott and like to support her work. In addition, the series is on HBO with a predominantly black cast in a time when diversity on television declines with each passing year.
Jill Scott stars as Precious Ramotswe, a kind hearted “woman of traditional build” with a penchant for mysteries and bush tea. Anika Noni Rose is Grace Makutsi, Precious’ quirky secretary. Lucian Msamati (J. L. B.Matekoni) and Desmond Dube (B K) round out the cast.
The New York Times review notes:
[Precious Ramotswe] has longed for the independence of city life, but she loves her printed caftans and bush tea (the equivalent of coffee in a Greek cup on “Law & Order”), contentedly resisting the newly cosmopolitan pressures to remodel her body closer to a Western dictate.
The tension between tradition and modernity is rendered as broad subject and passing detail: in an early scene three young women right out of “Sex and the City: Manolos Below the Sahara” walk by the newly opened No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency to ask how a woman could be a detective, and how anyone at all might go undercover who is “the size of a small elephant.”
Feminism is encroaching with the staying power of the Spartans at Attica, a reality that seems to be felt most intensely by Grace Makutsi, who serves as a secretary to Precious in a makeshift office with a manual typewriter. (Recording an outgoing answering-machine message, she plugs the agency’s areas of specialty: “Did your husband go missing? Did someone steal your cow?”)
Makutsi, played with an endearing, ramrod rigidity by Anika Noni Rose, scored 97 percent on her secretarial exam, a fact she keeps repeating, baffled as she is that all the best-paying jobs are still going to the short skirts.
I watched the episode and I was charmed by the whole series. There isn’t a lot of grit in this detective story, and it isn’t the typical hard-boiled crime drama that I tend to gravitate toward. But there was a lot to like in the series. Starting with Precious’ relationship with her father, the series features lots of love between characters, particularly in families.
The series also passes the Bechdel Test with flying colors. The women of the series are normally talking about the business or a case and occassionally about their personal lives. While there are some men who will eventually become part of the story line (like Precious’ abusive ex-husband, Note) the premiere spent most of its camera time on women talking to other women.
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