Do you like multi-racial comedies in which white characters, in their earnest desire to appear racially unbiased, do and say very awkward things to folks of color ... in scenes that seem to stretch out beyond the horizon?
Well, if that's you, then Netflix's star-studded You People is the movie you ought to stream next. That is, if you were not among the limited number of streamers who already saw the movie over its debut weekend.
You People led all Netflix movies and TV shows with 55.7 million viewing hours across Netflix's global platform for the week of Jan. 22-29, a middling performance, somewhat in line with other recent Netflix comedy films.
Directed by Kenya Barris (best known for exploring Los Angeles-area race/culture issues in ABC's Blackish), and co-written by Barris and Jonah Hill, You People stars Hill as Ezra, a 35-year-old hip-hop-loving Jewish man, who finally ends an arduous adult-long quest when he meets his soul mate, Amira (played by actress Laura London).
The happy bi-racial couple's life is complicated by Ezra's mother, Shelley (Julia Louis-Dreyfus), who is perhaps a little too proud to show off a future daughter-in-law who happens to be Black ... and Amira's father, Akbar, Eddie Murphy, who subjects his future son-in-law to a crucible of mistrust and loathing.
We seem to get a reminder every couple of years at just how much range Murphy has as an actor, and that's once again delivered in You People.
But the predictable plot -- not to mention relentless assault of cringe -- are a bit too much, perhaps explaining You People's 43% critics aggregation score on Rotten Tomatoes, and its 40% audience score.
Finishing just behind You People across all four Netflix ranking categories last week, the second season of mother-and-daughter dramedy Ginny & Georgia captured 55.6 million viewing hours, with catchup viewing of season 1 ranking No. 3 on Netflix's English language TV series chart with 31.1 million viewing hours.
Notable was the outright cratering of That '90s Show, which drew just 26.3 million viewing hours. Perhaps viewers are finally tiring of the same comedic formula after literally decades.
Also notable: Last week's Oscar nominations had only a marginal impact on Netflix audience performance. For example, the German language film All Quiet on the Western Front, nominated for nine Academy Awards, saw a four-fold week-over-week increase in streaming last week -- but that only took it to 8.2 million viewing hours.
