The Hub’s Entertainment Watch List: Carl Weber’s The Family Business
Carl Weber’s series, The Family Business, provides a combination of crime, drama and Black cinema. The series takes viewers on an inside look into the Duncan family as they navigate balancing their “family business” with maintaining a legitimate front. The show began airing with BET+ back in 2018 and has now expanded into its fourth season which kicked off on September 1. All four seasons are available to viewers with the BET+ app.
Viewers are introduced to the Duncans, a prominent family from Jamaica, Queens that is known for their lavish lifestyle. Despite living a life of luxury with mansions, cars and ample wealth, the family still endures a variety of challenges due to their alternative lifestyle in the drug game that only a few people know about.
From the outside, LC Duncan runs a successful car dealership with help from his sons Orlando and Junior, his brother Lou and his son-in-law, Harris Grant (Miguel A. Núñez Jr). Throughout the series, Orlando becomes the chosen one to lead the next generation for both of the families’ businesses. The show also features matriarch, Charlotte “Chippy” Duncan, who is played by Valarie Pettiford.
Chippy and LC are parents to two no-nonsense daughters, Paris (Javicia Leslie) and London (Tami Roman). London is the wife of Harris Grant who serves as the family’s attorney and works with the family at the car dealership. Although Harris proves himself as a valuable business resource, the mental and physical abuse that he puts London through leaves him on the outs with the Duncan family.
Other notable characters include Vegas (Michael Jai White), who is the oldest son of Chippy and LC as well as his son Nevada (Dylan Weber). Viewers are introduced to the youngest Duncan child, Rio (Arrington Foster), and Sasha (KJ Smith) who is the niece of LC.
Before the show made its way to the small screen, it began as a book series with the same title. The six-book collection began being published in 2012 and its next installment, The Family Business 6, is expected to be released on January 24, 2023. Other books related to the collection include To Paris with Love (2013), Trouble in Rio (2019) and The Education of Nevada Duncan (2021).
