Dad Stop Embarrassing Me!

Jamie Foxx returns to sitcoms after a 20-year hiatus and opts for what appears to be a safe bet, but turns out to be a recipe for disaster. The Netflix series Dad Stop Embarrassing Me! is centred around a father’s relationship with his 15-year-old daughter and, sadly, it’s nothing more than a patchwork of recycled material lacking spark.

Jamie Foxx is Brian Dixon, the CEO of a cosmetics company. Following her mother’s passing, his daughter Sasha goes to live with him in Atlanta, in a house populated by relatives, friends and colleagues. From the moment he fails to pick her up at the airport, it seems that Brian can’t do anything right. The two decide to give therapy a try in order to fix their relationship, and they recount all the issues they’ve had, as they talk to their eccentric and inappropriate therapist. The attempt at humour is mainly based on the generational clash that sees Brian try to get in touch with his daughter’s world of TikTok videos and hot yoga classes, while she feels totally misunderstood, but the laughs fail to materialise as every scene is flat and every dialogue formulaic.

The series seems to be put together superficially, with no real effort to create solid comedy or present hot topics with any originality or wit. The content is said to be inspired by Foxx’s own experiences as a parent, but unfortunately the authenticity does not come through at all. The sitcom rather seems to resort to gags that are all too familiar: the father disapproving of his daughter’s “revealing” dress, his choice of flamboyant clothing, the classic parent fail of making promises that he does not keep.

Too desperate to provoke laughter, Foxx’s production boils down to a string of predictable and less than funny jokes, mixed with clichéd conflicts that punctually lead to cheesy resolutions. It is a wasted opportunity for the actor to make a strong sitcom comeback, which he would have been perfectly capable of creating and delivering if he had made the effort. 

Mersa Auda

Dad Stop Embarrassing Me! is released on Netflix on 14^th April 2021.

Watch the trailer for Dad Stop Embarrassing Me! here: