The BBC & Showtime Debut 'Dreaming Whilst Black' Season 2's First Look

One of the unsung comedies of the BBC's current lineup, Dreaming Whilst Black, is heading back to the small screen for Season 2 before the end of 2025. The screamingly funny half-hour comedy hails from series co-creator Adjani Salmon, who originally launched it as a web series in 2018. In 2021, it was included as part of a series of web comedies given pilot episodes by the BBC, along with other offbeat hits, like Alma's Not Normal, which was then greenlit for a full season. Loosely based (very loosely based!) on Salmon's real-life experience of trying to become a Black British filmmaker, the series now returns for Season 2, and the first look promises a Jane Austen/Bridgerton send-up.

Dreaming Whilst Black's return to the BBC is a welcome one; however, the series has thus far languished in the U.S. One of the last shows picked up by Showtime before it was folded under the Paramount+ banner, the show was not marketed for either the streaming service or the network. However, unlike The Gold, which Paramount smartly realized would never work for them, and was allowed to find a home on PBS, Paramount's new Skydance owners have held on to the series.

Previous owners Shari Redstone fumbled the shift to streaming; however, Paramount, as a legacy studio that's been around for over a hundred years, actually has all the pieces and parts to create a successful service. Moreover, it has a leg up on most of its peers, with BET, one of the few Black-owned and operated networks, as part of its collection. Redstone had been trying to offload it, but Skydance's David Ellison has walked that back, suggesting that Paramount might be the first high-profile service to bring a solid lineup of programming to Black viewers. Dreaming Whilst Black is a perfect fit for that aim.