The first TV series adapted from a TikTok is upon us, though it’s also rooted in a groundbreaking Latin show from the early 2000s.
The Nov. 4 premiere of NBC’s “Lopez vs. Lopez” will bring George Lopez back to network comedy 15 years after his eponymous ABC series concluded. This time he shares the soundstage with his daughter, Mayan Lopez. They play a father and daughter working to fix their relationship in a fictionalized version of their own experience.
Mayan and George had not been on good terms for nearly a decade due to his infidelity and eventual separation from his mother. But when the pandemic hit, their concern for George, who is immunocompromised, brought the whole family together in unexpected ways – and Mayan couldn’t help but chronicle it on social media.
“They still acted like an old married couple. My mom was always trying to fix her hair,” Mayan says. “I randomly put my phone and put it on TikTok, and we had 60 million views overnight. I was like, ‘Huh, I think I’ve got something here, air my dirty laundry for entertainment!’ »
“She was revealing the sordid details of her parents’ divorce…and twerking all the time!” recalls showrunner Debby Wolfe, who discovered Mayan’s posts during a 3 a.m. scroll. “I was immediately like, ‘This is a show.’ This Gen Z Latina, isn’t afraid to call out her boomer dad for bad parenting. Raw and hilarious.
Wolfe is also a young Latina with self-proclaimed “dad issues,” which initially drew her to the material: “As I got older, I learned to forgive him. Part of the show’s theme is coming to terms with the fact that your parents had a past too. They’ve also been through trauma and they’re really doing their best.
Wolfe enlisted the support of Bruce Helford, his boss on “The Conners” and co-creator of George’s first show, then launched the father-daughter duo on a nostalgic multicam. It didn’t take long to convince George, who was already learning to embrace the world by seeing the depths of his personal life.
“I have no control over [Mayan’s TikTok], but I wouldn’t tell him what to do anyway,” George laughs. “One time I was with Anthony Anderson, playing golf, and he said, ‘Have you seen Mayan’s TikTok?’ I said, ‘Yes, I did.’ He said, ‘What do you think?’ I said, ‘I can’t think anything!’ He was like, ‘Word,’ and we just kept walking. ‘Yeah, word.’
But with “Lopez vs. Lopez,” George can help craft the narrative, which he considers a meditative experience.
“Watching Mayan in the hallway at NBC, I don’t think I even told Mayan, but you know when you watch a show and the schedule goes by? January, then February, then years go by? he says.” I can see Mayan’s face many times a day: when I was little in first grade and when I was a preteen when I drove her to school and when she wore her braces, and I can see her face through all the hard times in our lives.
“And then we ended up where we are,” he continued. “I see someone who grew up, had therapy,” he says. “She was ready to take care of me every day and relive our lives in those scripts. I respect her for doing it so well.
“Mayan grew up on the set of ‘George Lopez,’ watching her dad do his thing. She always dreamed of doing it one day too,” Wolfe observes. to heal their relationship was on the set of a network sitcom. Sometimes when we shoot a scene, they don’t do the script. They really talk to each other. »
Mayan describes the work as “role play therapy”: “We just did a Christmas episode, but I haven’t spent Christmas with my dad in 10 years. I became jealous of my character. But on the other side, my mom went to this recording and we all had a great family conversation,” she says, considering the chances of having a real vacation together. “So I want this printed because maybe this year it will happen! »
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