First Impressions: Beyond The Gates Gets Off To A Sizzling Start!
I don’t remember how I came to watch soap operas. I think it was the summer when my best friend went to gymnastics camp, and I was bored. I do remember my mom delivering an ominous warning. “Don’t do it. You’ll get hooked” — as if Erica Kane was a Class A narcotic. My mom then dropped a bombshell. Unbeknownst to me, she was a reformed soap watcher who had beaten the addiction. I did not listen. All My Children was my gateway drug. It was only one hour a day, right? Maybe I’d stick around for One Life to Live and perhaps a little General Hospital. At one point, I was up to five soaps. I didn’t get out in the sun much that summer and dragged my mom back into the madness. Soaps became our thing, a shared interest to bond over during my adolescence. After a while, we established a rule to only watch one (or maybe two) a day based on which storylines we wanted to follow, and we’d fill in the blanks with Soap Opera Digest recaps. Many years later, I was ready to move on from my job as a newspaper reporter and spotted a job ad with the line “Knowledge of soaps a plus.” And thus began 11 years as a professional soap watcher for Soap Opera Digest magazine. By the time I exited Digest, I’d stopped watching soaps in my free time. I did not expect to tune into daytime dramas again until I heard that CBS was launching a soap centered around a Black family, Beyond the Gates.
Back when I first started watching soaps, I rarely saw significant and relatable characters that looked like me, so AMC delighted me with the legendary Angie and Jesse, who, in the early ’80s, became soaps’ first Black supercouple. In the four decades since then, daytime has had a spotty record of showcasing Black families and has never depicted Black communities in the same way as Beyond the Gates. The fictional Fairmont Crest, an affluent, gated community, is set in Maryland, near Washington, DC; it mirrors Prince George’s County, MD, historically home to some of the wealthiest predominantly Black communities in the country. It’s a world seldom acknowledged in pop culture. Beyond the Gates portrays Black Excellence authentically by having Black folks on camera and behind the scenes. The show was created by soap powerhouse and seven-time Daytime Emmy Award winner Michele Val Jean, who serves as executive producer and head writer. Sheila Ducksworth, President of the CBS Studios/NAACP Venture, executive produces, and there is a wealth of Black creative talent in key backstage roles, including set design, costuming, and hair.
Beyond the Gates offers a rare glimpse of Black generational wealth with the Duprees, a high-achieving family reveling in all their aspirational soft-life glory. They are bright, beautiful, and messy, messy, messy. My first impression was that I love the look and feel of the show. A few minutes into the debut episode, I emailed my editor a five-word review: “I’m in Bougie Black heaven.” The family is headed by glamorous matriarch Anita Dupree, portrayed by As The World Turns vet Tamara Tunie (ex-Jessica Griffin). Anita is a former singing star, and her husband, Vernon (Clifton Davis), is a one-time civil rights activist and retired senator. They have two grown daughters, Nicole (Daphnée Duplaix; ex-Rachel Gannon, One Life to Live), a psychiatrist with a seemingly perfect life and marriage, and former model-turned-momager Dani (Karla Mosley, ex-Maya Avant, Bold and Beautiful), and several ambitious grandchildren. There’s a great big cast of characters and burgeoning subplots.
While the show’s premise and setting are new, the storylines deliver all the classic tropes for soap watchers. The initial episodes revolve around Dani and her reaction to her ex-husband Bill’s (Timon Kyle Durrett) imminent marriage to Hayley (Marquita Goings), their daughter’s one-time best friend. As expected, Dani isn’t taking it well. Bill’s insistence on turning Hayley from pariah to pillar of the community has Dani crashing out in the most hilariously over-the-top ways.
I found myself wanting to get to the next episode to see if Dani would keep on slapping folks, if Hayley would continue to attempt to positive-think her way into society, and if Bill could be an even bigger jackass.
After more than a decade away from soaps, watching Beyond the Gates felt like tucking into a chicken pot pie or grilled cheese with tomato soup on a cold, gray day. I knew what to expect, but that familiarity was comforting and brought up happy childhood memories.
So my DVR is set. It’s only one hour a day, right?
CBS debuts Beyond the Gates on February 24 at 2 p.m. ET and 1 p.m. PT, and is available to stream on Paramount+.
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