'Kings of Napa' Showrunner Janine Sherman Barrois Tells Us How One Vacation Turned Into A Script That Caught Oprah's Eye
There are plenty of things that go well with wine - cheese, cured meats, fruits, a nice salad, spaghetti, a good piece of chocolate cake...and a good serving of drama, which is exactly what you get when you turn on OWN's brand new show Kings of Napa: Wine, and a heaping helping of drama.
The series tells the story of the Kings, who are the proprietors of a vineyard in Napa Valley, California - and you get the distinct impression that they are the only Black family who owns a vineyard in the area.
This isn't a story of outsiders constantly coming in to tear them down, though - this is about the family themselves, and what happens to them when their patriarch dies suddenly, and they discover that he had more than one skeleton hiding in his closet.
There are a lot of moving parts in this very excellent show, which airs on Oprah's OWN Network on Tuesday nights at 8 PM, but it all started with one writer - showrunner Janine Sherman Barrois, creator of Claws and executive producer of hit shows like Criminal Minds and ER - and a trip to a Black-owned vineyard that she didn't know existed.
"I had never seen a Black-owned vineyard. I don't think I had ever thought about whether Black people owned vineyards or not."
We were lucky enough to get to sit down and talk to Janine about the show ahead of the season one finale this week, and she told us how one vacation turned into a drama that absolutely begs you to keep watching from the minute you start.
"A while ago, I went to Rideau Vineyard in Santa Ynez, and I was on a picnic blanket drinking wine with my friends - about twelve of us went - and the woman who owned it, she's the first black vineyard owner, Iris Rideau. She wasn't there, but I started picturing, 'What if she was there? What would it look like?'
"And I had never seen a Black-owned vineyard. I don't think I had ever thought about whether Black people owned vineyards or not - it wasn't until my mom told me that this vineyard was Black-owned that it actually went into my brain, and I thought, 'Oh well, this is a great world to actually put a show in.'"
After that, being a writer, she couldn't shake the thought, even when she went to other places.
"I went to a family reunion and I thought about family dynamics in my household; I went to a funeral and saw other family dynamics; and I started piecing together, 'Oh, this could be a family show set on a vineyard.'"
As for the location change from Santa Ynez to Napa, that choice was pretty simple:
"It didn't sound cool to name it, like, the kings of Santa Barbara or the Kings of Santa Ynez, so I made it the Kings of Napa, which is sort of the American Wine Center."
So wait, if she went to that vineyard ten years ago, and the first season of Kings of Napa is just coming out now, we had to wonder: What was that idea doing for all that time in between?
"The idea was percolating - I tried to set it up about four or five years ago, but it didn't really pan out to anything, and...it was around the time Empire came out...and it didn't work, so I put it on the shelf."
Thankfully for all of us, that wasn't the end of that.
"Eventually Oprah's company OWN got wind of the script, they read it, and Oprah and her team really really responded to it, and I went on a journey to develop it with them.
"It was a much larger show, so I re-worked some stuff with them, and they developed it and made it into the show that it is, that I'm really proud of."
And she has reason to be - Kings of Napa is an amazing show with an amazing story and kick-ass characters, and it's impossible to stop watching. Some people have called it a "soapier" version of Succession (which Barrois totally takes as a compliment): The pilot episode gets going with the twists and the drama about fifteen minutes in, and after that you're hooked. Love, lies, betrayal, secret affairs, secret children, sabotage...it's nonstop.
If you're looking to start it now, you've got perfect timing, because you'll probably be just caught up by the time the finale airs on OWN Tuesday night at 8:00 PM.
You can binge the other episodes on OWN.com, or by purchasing them on any major video rental site.
