Plot
Living Single centers on six friends in their 20s who live in Prospect Heights, Brooklyn. [2]
The series focuses on two different households in one brownstone, one shared by a trio of independent women and another shared by two men who have been friends since childhood while living in Cleveland, Ohio. In the first apartment, Khadijah James (Queen Latifah), a hard-working editor and publisher of the fictional urban independent magazine Flavor, lives with her sweet but naive cousin Synclaire James (Kim Coles)—an aspiring actress who works as Khadijah's receptionist and has an affinity for Troll dolls—and Khadjia's childhood friend from East Orange, New Jersey, Regina "Régine" Hunter (Kim Fields)—an image-conscious boutique buyer on a constant search for a well-to-do man with which to spend her life, and his money. Later in the series, Régine becomes a costume assistant for the soap opera Palo Alto. When the soap is canceled, she becomes a wedding planner and leaves the apartment to move in with her fiancé, Dexter Knight (Don Franklin). Maxine "Max" Shaw (Erika Alexander), a sharp-tongued Attorney and Khadijah's best friend from their college days at Howard University, frequently stops by to share her unique insights and the events of her day, to make sure that the girls' refrigerator isn't overstocked, and to start trouble with Kyle, looking for any chance to make his life worse.
Kyle Barker (T.C. Carson) lives in the second apartment with Overton Wakefield Jones (John Henton). Overton is the friendly but bucolic maintenance man for the owner of their building and the one next door. He holds a deep affection for Synclaire and plenty of hilarious homespun wisdom for everyone else. Kyle is a stockbroker whose constant verbal sparring with Maxine does little to mask their obvious sexual attraction to each other. Kyle and Maxine pursue a sexual relationship, but when he decides to take a job in London and invites her to join him, she turns him down.
Maxine subsequently becomes distraught over her decision and, after legally defending a man who claimed to be the second coming of Jesus (Harold Perrineau), she begins to take her life more seriously. Through a series of events, Maxine decides that her purpose is to become a mother. She pursues pregnancy via IVF, and unknowingly selects Kyle's sperm donation based on a list of qualities she would like for her child. Kyle returns in the series finale, and the two reconcile.
Overton and Synclaire also get together, and their relationship culminates in marriage by the end of the fourth season. In season five, they move in together, leaving Overton and Kyle's apartment open for new character Roni DeSantos (Idalis DeLeon), a New York-area D.J. It is eventually revealed that DeSantos had a fling with Ira Lee "Tripp" Williams III, (Mel Jackson), a songwriter whom Khadijah and Régine allowed to move in when Synclaire's room became available. Synclaire joins a comedy improv troupe where she gains the attention of Tony Jonas, a Warner Bros. Television executive, who casts her as a nun for a new comedy series he is developing.
Along with trying to make Flavor a success, Khadijah also looka for Mr. Right. She eventually finds him in childhood friend Scooter (Cress Williams), with whom she leaves the brownstone one last time in the series finale.
