K’naan turns cameras on Somali community
Rapper wraps pilot for HBO
For Somali-Canadian rapper K’naan, the story he is trying to tell in his proposed HBO series Mogadishu, Minnesota is one he has lived — that of an immigrant coming to America and trying to adjust.
But the 39-year-old ran into opposition from fellow Somalis as he prepared to film the series pilot in Minneapolis, home to the largest Somali community in the U.S. While K’naan envisions a family drama, critics worry the series will focus on young Somalis who have gone overseas to join terrorist groups. The concerns were raised by the series’ original title, The Recruiters, and the involvement of Academy Award-winning director Kathryn Bigelow, whose films include Zero Dark Thirty, about the hunt for Osama bin Laden.
“‘We don’t want Muslims being stereotyped,”’ K’naan says opponents tell him. “I say, ‘ Me, too. That’s why I’m writing this.’”
Filming of the show’s pilot wrapped Oct. 28 after shooting at about 14 main locations in the Minneapolis area. K’naan, who lived in Minneapolis in his early 20s, said he wanted to shoot in a city he found “inherently cinematic.”
Born in Somalia, K’naan came to the U.S. when he was 13 and lived in New York and then Toronto, where he spent his teenage years. He said he is “trying to tell a story that reorganizes in the public consciousness how they see Muslim-Americans,” and wants to move away from stereotypes and tell a tale about “people’s lives and how they really live them.”
“The Somalis living here are a summer people against a winter backdrop,” said K’naan, looking relaxed after a late-night shoot. He called Minneapolis “a new American experiment, a place where America is negotiating its differences and its commonalities.”
“It’s a new Ellis Island, in a way,” said K’naan, who said he came up with the idea for the series — named after the capital of Somalia — about three years ago. “And I thought, what a great place to set a story, to dispel the myth about Somalis and immigrant threats and Muslims in general.”
An estimated 57,000 Somalis live in Minnesota. While K’naan emphasizes the true-life aspects of his characters and his desire to tell a nuanced story, opponents worry that the show will focus on the recruitment of young, disaffected Somalis to join terrorist groups.
More than 20 young Minnesota men have joined the militant group al- Shabab in Somalia since 2007, while about a dozen people have left to join militants in Syria. Nine Minnesota men are set to be sentenced later this month on terror charges for plotting to join the Islamic State group.
K’naan has met some resistance in Minnesota’s largest city.
In September, he had to cut short a free performance in the CedarRiverside neighbourhood when a protest over the upcoming pilot broke out. Police used a chemical irritant on the crowd and arrested two people. And the owners of Riverside Plaza, home to many Somalis, rejected a request to film the series there.
But the project has support from city leaders, including the mayor, Betsy Hodges, and city council member Abdi Warsame, who is Somali.
A decision on whether HBO will green light Mogadishu, Minnesota as a series is expected next year.