Humor or serious?
‘A lot of people think I’m not funny. But I’m fucking funny! I do understand. They know me as a columnist at NRC who wrote about serious topics: social inequality, racism, climate change and (anti-)capitalism. But if you are in the middle of a social debate for a long time, that becomes too much at a certain point. I don’t want to be constantly on the barricades anymore. It’s also exhausting to repeat yourself over and over.
‘A year and a half ago, Hasna El Maroudi and I had Netherlands, we need to talk about racism made for the VPRO. To do this, we conducted a series of conversations. That was interesting and well looked at, but we didn’t feel like talking just about theory or trauma. We thought: how can we make the subject fun for ourselves too?
‘With satire and humor, perhaps the ideal form. When racism happens to you, it is often downright absurd. You may not expect it, but often you think: this is actually also very funny. Why does someone treat you like this? That makes no sense, does it?
‘Bee Seef Spees a group of random Dutchmen of color goes into therapy, which alternates with the most absurd sketches about money, family, love and relationships. In this way we can analyse, challenge and criticize Dutch society in a playful and disruptive way.
‘But it’s also just a laugh. A combination of content, black humor, satire and weird internet culture. Inspired by comedy shows our generation grew up with: The Daily Show† Key & Peele† Chewing Gum and Fleabag†
‘We wanted to do that with a young generation of makers from different backgrounds. With actors such as Soundos el Ahmadi and Romana Vrede, but also with rappers and influencers. Together we are the culture makers of our time. It was important that Giancarlo Sánchez, known for Mocro Mafia† Ares and Horizon, took charge. He made Joardy Season and thus already had a lot of experience directing absurdist humour.
“I think Giancarlo initially thought — or maybe still thinks, ‘You’re one of those woke people, aren’t you?’ And we about him: ‘You are not outspoken at all! You mainly do entertainment!’ haha. It’s good to challenge each other like this, get over prejudices and see that you can work well together if you are different and don’t take yourself too seriously. In that way, as a crew, we were actually a good example for society as a whole.’
Stereotypes: to joke or not to joke about it?
‘Yes, of course. Stereotypes exist and you can laugh about that. Only they should not become ‘the’ truth. With humor we try to compromise a bit in between. Moreover, we have always thought: why is this funny or not? Just laughing at a group of people, with flat humor, is no fun. There must be cleverness in it; you want to refer to something.
‘It helped that we had an agreement that mistakes could be made. And if someone couldn’t find something they couldn’t do, that could also be said. But we had to learn the limits by pushing them. We’ve come up with very wrong, bad things. That we thought, ‘Where did this come from? That’s really dark.’
‘There was a skit in the pilot, which I had a bit of trouble with. It was about a couple: a black girl and a white boy. They came to his parents’ house after a Black Lives Matter protest had just taken place. Then his parents received her with cake: congratulations! All awkward† She thought: why are they acting so strange? Then they started singing for her. It’s not my birthday, she said. At some point, things got worse and a fight broke out. In the end, the girl was turned away by her boyfriend. That wasn’t funny anymore. That was real. If it’s too close to the truth, it’s no fun anymore.
‘It is possible that people will soon say: this gives a bad image of us. We talked about that before. If there is well-founded criticism, we will say: shit, we hadn’t thought about that, we’ll take it with us. What else can you do? Ultimately it is satire. But I’m not going to lie: we’ll be watching the reactions with interest.’
The average Dutch person without a migration background: conservative or tolerant?
‘The Netherlands is simply quite a conservative country. Whether that is socially or economically. Look how long the fucking VVD and CDA have been in power here. How to vote, for a decade. That is absurd in itself: everything goes wrong, but we keep choosing the same parties.’
Optimist or pessimist?
“I’m not happy with how things are going at the moment. We often take two steps forward, but also one step back. You see a shift in thinking about Black Lives Matter, Zwarte Piet and institutional racism. But there are also anti-democratic and radical right-wing parties in the House of Representatives. In terms of climate: the Urgenda case marks a watershed. But how seriously does the state take that?
‘In the end I’m not a pessimist, I believe in change. Only: it’s not going fast enough for me. And sometimes we seem to be in a vicious circle. You also notice that abortion is back on the agenda. Incredible, but apparently we have to fight some values over and over again. Sometimes I think: will fundamental rights have to be fought for forever? Will there ever come a time when we’re done fighting?’
Image or paper?
‘I’ve always wanted to be a filmmaker. Actually, I ended up on the opinion pages and in the columnists by accident. I diligently threw myself into it (Gargard also wrote the book dragon daughter and founded the intersectional feminist media platform Lilith, red†
‘But the great thing about audiovisual media is that you have more flexibility and freedom. You don’t have to have the answer in a few words. You can’t do that as a columnist.
‘I just didn’t feel like it anymore. I got bored. I want to continuously reinvent myself as a maker. Don’t get me wrong: if you can do something really well or like it, you should keep doing it. Sheila Sitalsing must be Sheila above all, obviously† But that’s not how I work.’
Tired of looking forward to the Netherlands or not?
‘I have lived in Liberia and the United States, but I have built my life here in the Netherlands. It is known here: I have friends, a house and comfort. I have a lot of family in the United States. Certain conversations and themes, for example about racism, are much more advanced there than here. I get inspiration from it. But it is a bizarrely contradictory country. The conservatism here is nothing compared to there. My family is from Liberia. The climate there is more attractive. But there is also a lot of poverty.
‘I am a mix of all those cultures. My starting point is: we don’t have to choose. You are not one or the other. I don’t think any country is perfect, I tend to live in different places at the same time. That I go back and forth every now and then.
‘At a certain point I have played the Netherlands out a bit, I think. Then I will need something new. To other impulses.’
In 2018 you had to deal with threats and thousands of hate messages after you made a livestream of a protest by Kick Out Zwarte Piet. Trauma or closed chapter?
‘You can’t just ask about that, can you? Poke a little trauma. Let me put it this way: I did not stop as a columnist at NRC for that reason.
‘I also like excitement. It’s nice to break things open. Or doing things slightly differently than others. You can see that character trait in everything I make. Where essential conversations take place, there is also friction. But you do have to respect each other and certain boundaries.’
Laughing: ‘If I let threats stop me, I would have done something else than Seef Spees† I think that will also produce shit.’
Seef Spees can be seen from Monday 28 March for four weeks between 21:25 and 22:00 on NPO 3.
†
Clarice Gargard, CV:
March 3, 1988 Born in Philadelphia, United States
1992 Comes to the Netherlands, grows up in Purmerend and Middelie
2010-2014 School of Journalism in Zwolle
2008-2016 Creator and editor of radio and television programs for SALTO, MTNL, AT5, NTR and BNNVARA
2017-2021 Columnist NRC Handelsblad
2019 Co-Founder Lilith Magazine, Online Feminist Media Platform
2019 UN Women’s Representative on behalf of the Netherlands, addresses the General Assembly
2019 The truth about my father (BNNVARA), director Shamira Raphaëla wins Best Short Documentary with her film The Golden Calf
2019 Black Achievement Award, People and Society category
2019 Book publication dragon daughter (Workers Press).
2020 Wins Emma Goldman Snowball Award for Commitment to Feminism
2022 Satirical Sketch Series Seef Spees, conceived with Hasna El Maroudi. Directors: Giancarlo Sánchez, Fadua El Akchaoui and Michael Middelkoop. Actors: Soundos El Ahmadi, Noraly Beyer, Romana Vrede.