Hollywood puts 'no face' on the Palestinian experience. Mo Amer plans to change that
When Mo Amer decided that he wanted to become a comedian, there was never a question about where he might find the best material. After all, he grew up in Texas with the name Mohammed.
Stories about his family's assimilation pains, America's warped view of Muslims and how chocolate hummus is "a hate crime" have been spun into Amer's packed live shows, televised specials such as Netflix's "Mo Amer: The Vagabond" and his sets with the Allah Made Me Funny troupe. Now the Palestinian American performer has poured his life into the semiautobiographical Netflix series "Mo," a new eight-part comedy he co-created with Ramy Youssef.
The show follows a Muslim immigrant named Mo (played by Amer, of course) who was born in Kuwait and raised in working-class Houston, where he still lives with his mother and brother. Mo has been awaiting asylum since they all arrived in the U.S. when he, the pride he has in his misunderstood Palestinian heritage and the universal longing to fit in are the springboard for a bittersweet comedy that dares to venture into dark emotional territory.
