TGIF FEATURE: 'Master of None' debuts with Aziz Ansari

A NEW television show will debut today (Nov. 6) - Master of None on Netflix starring Asian/American comic Aziz Ansari. It just might be the best new sitcom of the season.

Ansar, best known for his stand-up and his turn as a small-town bureaucrat turned baller on Parks & Recreation, casts himself as Dev Shah, an actor fumbling his way through relationships, work and this weird thing we call life. (And, as the title of the show suggests, Dev's not exactly great at any of it.)

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In a recent ask-me-anything session on Twitter last week, Ansari revealed even more: Despite the description of the show he offered, the sitcom won't be based on his life - and it will feature cameos from his real mother and father. He also had some fun explaining how the show differs from both the movie "Slumdog Millionaire" and HBO's "Game of Thrones." Oh, and it also definitely won't be like "Parks."

Ansari also told Entertainment Weekly that Homeland star Claire Danes and Noah Emmerich, of The Americans, will turn up in one episode as a couple who aren't getting along with each other.

"I end up having an affair with Claire," Ansari teased. "It gets pretty intense."

Aziz Ansari

Netflix announced in April that it was ordering 10 episodes of a scripted sitcom from Ansari but didn't give much more in the way of details. Ansari wrote, produced and directed Master of None with another Asian/American, Alan Yang, who wrote for  Parks & Recreation.

Describing the new series, Ansari said, “In Parks, I was playing a character who works for the parks department; it was not related to me in my life. This is like dumping my head and my heart into a show…like stand-up.”

If the show is like his stand-up, it will be edgier and more in-your-face about the difficulties  of being an Asian/American in the entertainment business than the other television sitcoms with Asian/Americansn in the lead roles, Fresh Off the Boat and Dr. Ken.

In one episode he depicts the casting indignities a South Asian has to endure to play cabbies or 7-11 employees. 

In another episode, he draws up the guilt Asian/Americans feel when comparing their whining vs. the difficulties encountered leaving their home country and adapting to a strange culture. You may be laughing on the outside, but inside you're own guilt arises when you recall your own parents or grandparents' sacrifices.

INSTANT REVIEW (Nov. 9): Funny and touching. Asian/Americans and Millennials will relate, non-Asians might gain insight and perhaps understanding.