Abbott Elementary star Quinta Brunson came under fire after joking about the lack of diversity in the hit sitcom Friends during her Saturday Night Live (SNL) monologue.

Saturday night, Brunson opened SNL for the first time by talking about her sitcom, Abbott Elementary. The comedy show follows a group of teachers who work in a Philadelphia public school. While explaining the show, she jokingly compared it to Friends, adding her series had more diversity.

“I have a show called Abbott Elementary, and it’s kind of unique…it’s a network sitcom, like, say, Friends, except instead of being about a group of friends, it’s about a group of teachers,” she told the audience and viewers. “Instead of New York, it’s in Philadelphia. Instead of not having Black people, it does.”

Humorless critics ran to social media to bash the actress for her joke, saying it was pointless since the show aired years ago. Critics mentioned that the show did have Black cast members, highlighting Ross Geller’s (played by David Schwimmer) infatuation for Black women. People also thought they were doing something by listing the sitcoms that contained all Black casts. 

Fans rushed to Brunson’s defense and taught critics that Friends was a knock-off version of Living Single, an all-Black comedy surrounding six friends (male and female roommates) in New York.

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For those mentioning the Black actors and actresses who appeared on Friends, realize that they were guest stars. None of them were the main characters. 

In a 2020 interview with The Guardian, David Schwimmer revealed he was highly aware of the lack of diversity on the show and said he was the one that pushed for his character to date more women of color.

“But I was well aware of the lack of diversity, and I campaigned for years to have Ross date women of color,” Schwimmer explained. “One of the first girlfriends I had on the show was an Asian American woman, and later I dated African American women. That was a very conscious push on my part.”

Friends‘ own star admitted to the lack of diversity while viewers deny it says a lot about how dense critics were quick to gaslight Black people. Additionally, the show was set in New York City, a place filled with Black culture and. people, and viewers didn’t see an ounce of it (Ross singing “Baby Got Back” doesn’t count).

Friends‘ lack of diversity and Brunson’s SNL joke supported that Blacks struggled to land starring roles for years before Black sitcoms came around. Shows containing all-Black cast members surfaced due to U.S. networks’ refusal to cast more Black characters. Thanks to the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), shows were created for Black actors, and the organization pushed for Black representation in Hollywood.

During the 19th and 20th centuries, when Blackface and minstrel performances reigned, African Americans were portrayed as brute and jovial slaves. This led African American performers to create their own minstrels for Black audiences, using comedy and satire to show the Black experiences the audience, and performers understood and experienced.

As years progressed, Black actors landed supporting roles with white-starring cast mates. Today, some Black A-list entertainers obtain leading roles, but no doubt they face discrimination during the audition process. 

Unlike white entertainers, Black actors and actresses worry about being seen as too dark for a role on top of their acting skills, forcing them to work twice as hard. Viola Davis is 

pushing through those barriers and showing young Black girls what’s possible, but even she has called out Hollywood, specifically for subjecting Black actresses to marginalized roles. Black women were either playing a mammy-like character or a mad Black woman.

To those who listed all-Black cast shows to justify the inequality in Hollywood, that’s like saying, “Black people have their own network and month, so they should stop victimizing themselves.”

Meanwhile, white people can sip their tea and enjoy the privileges that come with their skin color, while BIPOC has to pray their race doesn’t prevent them from enjoying basic pleasures like equality.