ABC’s new scripted series “mixed-ish” got off to a good start in its television premiere on September 24, 2019. The series, about mixed race children who strive to fit in with their Black counterparts, is a spin-off of ABC’s black-ish.
mixed-ish topped black-ish in the TV ratings with a 0.8 rating and 4 million viewers. black-ish, which follows mixed-ish at 9:30 p.m., dipped slightly with a 0.8 and 3.52 million viewers.
mixed-ish is the brainchild of black-ish star and executive producer Tracee Ellis Ross, the 46-year-old biracial daughter of R&B icon Diana Ross and her ex-husband Robert Silberstein.
Ross plays Bow, short for Rainbow, on black-ish. Newcomer Arica Himmel plays 12-year-old Bow on mixed-ish.
In the third episode of mixed-ish, titled “Let Your Hair Down,” young Bow struggles with her decision to keep her natural curls or straighten her hair with a relaxer to fit in easier with the Black girls at school.
In a recent interview with TV Guide, Ross says she wanted to do an episode on her loosely curled hair.
“I always say I could chronicle my journey of self-acceptance through my journey with my hair,” Ross told TV Guide via phone.
“There is a breadth of story, a narrative, in black women and our hair — and that specific part of that community that is mixed women and what that means as you navigate two different cultures, both in your household and out in the world. I knew that when mixed-ish got picked up and we knew what was happening, I was really strong about the fact that we needed to do [a hair episode] and do it early on in the season. It’s one of those stories that is so specifically of the mixed experience.”
Bow’s younger brother, Johan (Ethan Childress), also has issues with his hair that isn’t tightly coiled enough to have the same haircut as his favorite Black rappers, and too textured to style like the popular white kids in school.
