Little Mosque On The Prairie

Here it comes, North America's the first Muslim comedy:

That's right, Little Mosque on the Prairie is premiering this Tuesday on the Canadian Broadcasting Corp., featuring, as the press notes say,

LITTLE MOSQUE ON THE PRAIRIE is a new comedy from CBC Television about a small Muslim community in the prairie town of Mercy, many of whose residents are wary of their new, more “exotic” neighbors. The series takes an unabashedly funny look at the congregation of a rural mosque and their attempt to live in harmony with the often skeptical, even down right suspicious, residents of their little prairie town. The sitcom reveals that, although different, we are all surprisingly similar when it comes to family, love, the generation gap and our attempts to balance our secular and religious lives.

If it takes a sitcom to make us really "suprisingly similar," then fire up the laff track.

The creator of the sitcom Zarqua Naraz was raised Muslim in Toronto and moved to her own little town on the prairie, which was fodder for her short films which "riffed on terrorism, burqas, and fatwas." Seems like thin gruel for a sitcom to me; not something I regularly find myself chuckling over.

Her task is going to be difficult, perhaps insurmountable. Muslims may enjoy riffs on terrorism, burqas and fatwas. White folks will look at Naraz in her hijab and wonder if there's a fatwa-reading terrorist underneath.

But like I said, if a sitcom can span the terrible gap that separates Islam from the rest of the world, then bring on the laff track ... because we probably won't be laughing much.

Also blogging on this: Sigmund, Carl and Alfred and Atlas Shrugs.

Related Tags: Islam, Muslims, Christianity, Little Mosque on the Prairie