Fans are already bingeing The Best Man: The Final Chapters, and spending the hours leading up to the holidays finding out how the story of Harper, Robin, Jordan, Lance, Murch, Candace, Quentin and Shelby as they move on to the next chapters of their lives.
Executive Producer Dayna Lynn North has described these last stanzas of The Best Man‘s narrative as a “midlife metamorphosis” for the characters. As a co-showrunner, she was excited to work with this team of actors that is so willing to jump back into the material time and time again.
“It was beautiful to witness,” North tells ESSENCE. “This group of actors really does love each other like family. They have been together and gone through the arc from when they were very young and early in their careers.”
“Then, it’s the opportunity to revisit characters that have this depth to them, that you can continue to peel back the layers on,” she continued, noting that making this last part of the story a limited series provided more opportunity to delve deeper into the lives of the women on the show than ever before.
The eight episodes play out over the course of 10 years, taking our characters from the events of The Best Man Holiday into the not-too-distant future as they take on life as spouses, parents to tweens and teens, senior-level professionals, and lifelong friends.
“I think that if we’re lucky, we’re coming of age throughout our lives,” North says of their midlife story arcs. “‘Coming of age’ is one of those turns of phrases that are often shown in high school or college. Of course, when we met The Best Man crew, they were just out of college, early in their 20’s. But I think coming-of-age stories can apply at different phases.”
“Things can happen in life that make you go ‘Hm, this life I’ve been living for the past 20 years, do I want to keep living my life this way? Do I want to stay in this relationship that I’ve been in? Do I want to stay in this job? Do I want to hold on to this friend? Do I want this friendship to look the way that it’s looked?'”
“It’s important to call attention to the idea that, hopefully, we’re evolving and looking at our lives and meeting the challenges that may come up in a post-pandemic world. Living a Black life in 2022 in America, coming of age is a real thing. We’re continuously coming of age. It doesn’t happen just once.”
The Best Man: The Final Chapters is now streaming all episodes on Peacock.