It’s Showtime: Television: Little Mosque on the Prairie

“I’m not throwing my life away, I’m moving to the Prairies!”

And so begins one of the funnier efforts from CBC in a while, Little Mosque on the Prairie. A show that already has won converts purely by the pre show buzz, from CNN to the New York Times and the BBC, to cross Canada media attention, the debut episode probably received more buzz than any other recent effort by the CBC and without having to spend a dime on promotion, the always financially prudent Mother Corp should be quite pleased with that.

Picking apart stereotypes at a pretty rapid clip, the newest effort on the CBC takes a look at the fear of strangers and shows how our mis-conceptions can run amok.

With some pretty witty writing and well timed delivery, the half hour passes by rather quickly. A father who is a contractor (and we all know how dangerous they can be), tries to establish a mosque in the small prairie town of Mercy, Saskatchewan; he rents out the local church hall, hires a hot shot imam from that hotbed of suspicion Toronto and tries to build up his community as best he can.

The townsfolk come across as the perfect foil for comic relief, featuring bumbling reporters, over opinionated radio talk show hosts and cast of others, each floundering in their own perceptions of Islam, terrorism and the Canadian way of doing things.

The imam, once he convinces the OPP that he’s not a sleeper agent for Al Qaeda, finally arrives in the small town only to find the town in uproar having discovered that oh, oh, there are Muslim’s among us. His reception tainted from the get go after a rather free wheeling debate with the local radio show host, followed up by a split among the congregation as they question just how much this “hot shot” from Toronto truly knows about the faith. Driven to the point of abandoning his new flock, he instead sets to work to secure the lease for the mosque and to guide his followers along the path of Islam.

The premise of the show has been compared a bit to Bend it Like Beckham and should also remind one of that long lasting CBC epic the King of Kensington, which also poked fun at Canadians as they came to terms with newly arrived immigrants and their new ways and traditions and how the newcomers to the country adopted to the strange ways of their new home. Nothing works better than when you can share a laugh with someone, regardless of their faith, perceptions or expectations.

If the show can find that same niche that made Al Waxman’s show the long running hit that it was, it could find a rather rewarding future, not only on Canadian airwaves but far beyond.

The title of the show Little Mosque on the Prairie alone is bit of a win, one of those instant attention grabbers that will bring in the audience; of course it helps if you can keep the momentum once you have them.

It will be interesting to see if the writers and producers can keep the volume and quality going for an entire season, the show was recently, if quietly picked up for eight episodes.

But poking fun at Canadian foibles is something that shouldn’t run out of material any time soon, the good thing for the producers is that Canadians for the most part always seem to get the joke. In this case, it’s like sensitivity training with a laugh track. Zarqa Nawaz, a Canadian Muslim of Pakistani origin is one of the creators of the show and in this debut episode (repeated again Wednesday night at 8) she seems to have hit the right pace for the show.

The CBC has been on a winning streak of late with some of their shows, Intelligence is a smart and fast paced crime show, the Rick Mercer Report is some of the best satire on the tube and now Monday nights at 8 pm could quickly become Mosque night in Canada.

If nothing else, we can at least see that some of our taxes are being spent in the right places, it’s pretty easy to kick the CBC around when they screw things up, but when they get things right, the deserve a pat on the back. With Little Mosque on the Prairie they seem to have gotten it right!