On June 4, the IndieWire Honors Spring 2026 ceremony will celebrate the creators and stars responsible for crafting some of the year’s best television series. Curated and selected by IndieWire’s editorial team, IndieWire Honors is a celebration of the creators, artisans, and performers behind shows well worth toasting. In the days leading up to the Los Angeles event, IndieWire is showcasing their work with new interviews and tributes from their peers.
Ahead, Robert Carlock and Sam Means, the creators and showrunners behind freshman NBC comedy series “The Fall and Rise of Reggie Dinkins,” which was recently renewed for a second season, share with IndieWire what qualities make star and Maverick Award recipient Erika Alexander a legend.
“Legend” is the first word that comes to mind when we think of Erika Alexander, but it also feels past tense, and Erika Alexander is anything but.
When we cast her as Monica Reese-Dinkins in “The Fall and Rise of Reggie Dinkins,” playing opposite Tracy Morgan, Daniel Radcliffe, Bobby Moynihan, Precious Way, and Jalyn Hall, we knew that she had both the comedic chops to stand up to a hilarious, unhinged cast like this, and the dramatic gravitas to ground a hilarious, unhinged cast like this.
We’d seen her wring laughs out of studio audiences on “Living Single“ (among many others), and bring both heart and hope to the screen in “American Fiction“ (among many others). But none of that could have prepared us for the sheer joy that she would bring to every episode and every scene, and the unique mix of high silliness and deep vulnerability with which she would embody Monica Reese-Dinkins.
Erika Alexander is a legend, no question, but she’s not resting on any of her well-deserved laurels; she is continuing to grow and evolve and she is having a goddamn ball doing it.
“The Fall and Rise of Reggie Dinkins” Season 1 is now streaming on Peacock.
Read Erika Alexander’s full IndieWire Honors profile here.
