Death To All Black TV Shows (Except the Ones Made By Tyler Perry)
Wednesday, June 3, 2009 at 9:00AM
Ding dong, your show is dead.If you tried to save "The Game" and "Everybody Loves Chris" on the CW your efforts went unnoticed. You, sirs and madams, are NOT fresh faced white teens. What you want to watch does not matter.
But you knew that, right?
So get out your chisels and the limestone so you can add their names to the wall of black shows that were not given proper series finales and were unceremoniously dumped from the air, mid-cliffhanger, whether they were successful or not.
"The Game" and "Everybody Loves Chris" have familiar company in this no man's land. Like FOX's once no. 1 rated sitcom "Living Single," UPN's "Moesha," "Girlfriends," "South Central," "Half and Half" and "Frank's Place," they're being kicked off the air they same way they were brought in -- underfunded and with little promotion.
All you have left now are Tyler Perry's "House of Payne" and "Meet the Browns."
More after the jump.
I honestly tried to watch "House of Payne" the other night. I really, really did. Because I love Allen Payne, you see. And he is on the show. And he used to be in movies. Like "New Jack City" and "The Perfect Storm," "Jason's Lyric" and "A Price Above Rubies." You know? Real movies. Like, he was the lead in some of them and the love interest in others and he had substantial speaking roles and a few of the films made money! Remember the 90s, Allen? Good times. I tried to watch you! I really, really tried, but I just wanted to put my head in my hands and cry.
What the fuck happened to your career? Damn you, Hollywood! Damn you to hell! It's bad enough you keep cancelling Mara Brock Akil's shows (She took what Yvette Lee Bowser started and made it ten times more awesome!) but look what you did to Dead Mike? I'll never forgive you! And why isn't Jill Marie Jones in SOMETHING already? How is she in beer commercials when she was one of the stars of a popular sitcom? I hate this industry so MUCH!
In my story on the lack of blacks in sci fi I got a testy response from one reader who felt my energy would have been better spent writing a sci fi show than playing "the race card." May I point to Akil as an example of how you can be good at something but it doesn't matter if the industry treats your creations like they're 22 minute pieces of filler until they can come up with the next "Pretty white kids with problems" show.
You can produce great material until you're blue in the face, but if you can't get the industry to support it, you are screwed. Hence why you have someone like me writing about the lack of black people in sci fi. I swear, an industry that can't find a place to stick Jill Marie Jones is wrong on so many levels that if Mr. Playin' The Race Card can't see that it is because he chose not to. The fact that Akil's shows keep getting cruelly slaughtered without even so much as a "fuck you" is a PROBLEM. To be treated like a black audience is basically disposable, that you can throw up some garbage and they will watch and you can build some advertising revenue then DUMP THEM ALL the minute you have enough scratch to create "Gossip Girl" is a glorious, cold, pimp slap to the face.
Or as Akil wrote on the blog Rushmore Drive:
(O)n the one hand I am truly thankful for the blessing of opportunity, but on the other, I’m mad, frustrated and disappointed that my veteran experience, which includes running "Girlfriends" and "The Game" for two years at the same time, doesn’t equal a cushy overall development deal somewhere, like my white male and sometimes female counterparts seem to land even in this time of economic crisis. Somehow, because my characters were of color, my shows don’t count as much. Doesn’t matter that at one point "Girlfriends" was the longest running comedy on television. Successfully producing 236 episodes (172 episodes of "Girlfriends" plus 64 episodes of "The Game") of television doesn’t have as much value. But that is the plight of being black in this business. That is the plight of being a woman in this business.
Yeah. What she said, Mr. Playin' The Race Card. You ass. They try to act like it was just a movie, but "Bamboozled" is frackin' real, people! It's real.
Reader Comments (51)
I feel your pain. I have nothing against Tyler Perry. I've seen plenty of his movies. Enjoyed "Why Did I Get Married?". But I cannot force myself to even glance towards his shows on TBS. I just can't! And I heart Allen Payne, but his presence on that show churns my stomach.
can I just say Amen and AMEN...
I tried to watch the tp shows, but they just made me realize that tp not only stands for tyler perry, but it is also synonymous with toilet paper.
Jill marie Jones!!!!!!! I miss you!
Living Single wasn't really yanked off the air like the others. Like all shows that run a few years. it ran its course, it wasn't as funny anymore and some of the stars left.
Maybe instead of complaining Akil should get in wear she fits in like Tyler Perry did. Didn't TP go to cable b/c he wanted more control?
Black entertainment just doesn't generate the same amount of revenue, don't just blame the network blame the ad agencies
Politically incorrect, why is it that you must poo poo everything. Why shouldn't she complain. She helped to build a fledgling network and got the black people on fox treatment. We all should complain. With as many channels as there are on television, there should be way more black shows. Black people help the GDP and we spend more money than anyone. Why shouldn't we have shows we like on air. Stop giving the corporatists a pass.
In hard times "some people" like amos and andy like carricatures...Seen this before: well before many of you were born...
yeah politicallyincorrect...Akil should get in where she fits in like Perry and produce minstral shows...because that's all Perry is putting on TBS: Black Face for the New Millinium.
I applaud Akil and others like her for trying to do something of substance...something that protrays our people as more than just loud talking babbling, gyrating, slapstick baboons. I am assuming that most of the people that comment on this blog are educated with halfway decent jobs...don't we deserve to see ourselves on television too?
The only thing that Hollywood likes to portray about the black race is its underclass...now that is apart of the experience and culture true enough but that is not where our culture begins or ends.
And to say that black content doesn't generate revenue is insane. Look at what the Cosbys did for NBC. What about Family Matters on ABC, the flagship show of the TGIF series that generated a lot of money for ABC and was a ratings champ for years.
What about what Rock and In Living Color did for FOX...don't forget Arsenio either. Also pisses me off that the only people allowed on late night TV are white men in suits. With all the brilliant comedians of color out there and even white female comedians, the only thing they can find to replace a Conan or a Leno is a Fallon.
Hollyweird sucks!
The TP sitcoms are just not funny...LIKE REALLY NOT FUNNY. It's a shame too because I enjoy his work in movies and such. I don't understand why his show House of Payne is so unbearably unfunny (I won't even waste my time with The Browns).
I think TP made a smart move in not dealing with these start up networks whose MO is to garner funds from pimping good to great black shows only so they can "trade up" (sarcasm) to all white pretty teen/youg adult dramas when they have enough cash. UPN and WB already had a track record in that regard so people should have known what was gonna happen when they merged to become the CW.
@ Politicallyincorrect
Living Single did not run its course, like New York Undercover (another show with POC leads) it was put on hiatus for like a whole season after a season finally cliffhanger, and then it was brought back on with next to zero promotion only to be ultimately cancelled.
For shows like the two mentioned above and Moesha (Miles is still in the hands of those kidnappers) such a send off is hardly worthy of the success and money that they brought to their respective networks.
@ Politically incorrect
Akil is actually trying to get her shows picked up by cable. Her point was she's been in the industry a long time and worked on many shows. Girlfriends went 8 seasons. Any other producer in her position would have an easier time getting work because of her past performance record, but because she's primarily done black shows her success is not viewed the same. She routinely has to prove herself over and over. That was her point.
As for Living Single, my point was that it was dumped off the air when it was the highest rated show on FOX at the time and it did not get a series finale. Yes, the writing was faltering, but most shows with that much of a following would have at least got a series finale. My point is that new, fledgling networks use black shows to build advertising revenue. So obviously someone watches them and they do make money, it's just most networks want to go for the valued 18 to 24 demographic because advertisers prize that one even more, hence all the shows geared towards young white people.
And you have to remember the only reason why Turner Broadcasting took Tyler seriously is because he built his empire from the ground up, touring his stage plays, building an audience and then produced -- for cheap -- DVDs of his stage plays, THEN used that money to make his films -- for cheap -- with no help from the mainstream and when they saw the checks come in the easy money bells began to ring. If Tyler had approached them just as a writer they never would have given him the time of day. He turned himself into a brand that could not be ignored. But Hollywood is short-sighted. Just because Tyler is making money doesn't mean they're all that interested in any other black writers or producers. They just treat Tyler like he's the money unicorn.
Akil is a screenwriter who has been working in the industry for decades. She has worked her way through the studio system like other writer/producers. She's not a gospel stage play producer. It seems insane that a black writer basically has to jump through incredible hoops to be taken seriously, even if she's proven that she can run a show and keep it on the air. And Akil's shows weren't dumped because people didn't watch them. They were dumped because the network wanted to go in another direction. And I can especially understand her frustration with the major networks as there was a time they did produce sitcoms with black casts and now there are zero black shows on network television. So basically we're going in the opposite direction from say the 80s and 90s when there were several black comedies on the air.
Oh. Apparently while I was writing my response everyone else was too!
I wrote about this issue extensively before and it's sad. Sad because Mara is frackin' great at what she does. And I really don't know what we can do. I mean, saying Mara should follow TP's model is ri-damn-diculous. TP got his deal on the strength of his box office viability (which is inversely proportional to his attention to detail and storytelling ability, among other things) whereas Mara tried to stay committed to developing quality Black network TV. I also don't see where moving her stuff to cable will make a huge difference since (1) many of us refuse to buy that over-priced garbage until they go a'la carte and (2) some people just can't afford cable to begin with, not even a basic package.
But I think the Black audience must also accept some culpability in this. There were many of us that came on board WAY TOO LATE in the game (no pun intended) and they just didn't translate to the numbers the corporate folks needed to justify continuing. I looked at a sampling of show ratings on the CW and the 'The Game' ranked higher than 'Top Model' encores and a bunch of other shows that also got cancelled. But it so much as approach the numbers of 'Gossip Girl' or premiere episodes of 'Top Model'. Granted, the Neilsons method is outdated, but it's what the networks rely on right now. To expect them to keep 'The Game' on because we're outraged is to expect them to do something they don't have in them--have sympathy. Sympathy don't generate a profit.
That would be affirmative! I liked this post. Sad but true.
I'm so glad Living Single was able to get a series finale. I can't remember Martin's series finale. Does anyone remember? I think it was kind of awkward or weird because drama between Martin Lawrence and Tisha Campbell-Martin.
Moesha didn't get a proper series finale; Miles is still missing... What about All of Us, Girlfriends, and a host of other shows who did not get a proper series finale? Now 'The Game' was the last hope and that was taken away from us.
I understand both sides of the argument with Tyler Perry's productions but he did take the independent route which gives you 100% control over your content and it's up to your audience to support you.
The only hope for a revival for The Game would be if the DVDs, if they are produced in time, are gobbled up in huge Familyesque numbers. The cliffhanger ending was done beautifully, but we will probably never know what happens with Kelly and Jason. She seemed so crushed when Chamile showed up to pick up Jason from jail. Jason was my favorite character up to that point. Sure he was a controlling, cheap skate, who abused steroids, but he was witty, and not as shrill as the other characters. During the episode when Kelly fainted, and his father was introduced, you really got a good read on why he is the way he is. He is probably the most fleshed out character on the show.
The fact remains, that if you are trying to create a black show with a startup network you are going to get screwed over in 2-3 years (whether you are brand like Tyler Perry or a veteran screenwriter like Akil). I mean, it's a tried and true method used by the likes of FOX, UPN, WB, and now the CW.
How am I giving corporate folks a pass. I stated that this issue must be taken up with the advertisers. Gossip Girl and shows like that have a more "desirable" demographic to advertisers. And networks make money off of commercials. Cosby and Family Matters made big bucks b/c they crossed over to the mainstream. The Game and Girlfriends are niche shows that mainly appealed to black audiences and mainly black women. Advertisers don't think we are much of the valued audience, what do you see when the show black shows? Dr Miracle commercials, ringtones and cars.
They do the same thing to black music radio. Black music stations will be the highest in the city and not be highest in revenue. News talk and pop radio both make more money than black radio stations.
Girlfriends I liked, but The Game I didn't watch much. And I notice BW are fighting for a show that showed the black women as being either bitter or emotional wrecks and the lone white girl was the nice one.
That is a trite interpretation of the female characters on the show. Melanie, though annoying, was in medical school.
Tasha, though loud, fashioned herself into a high-powered sports agent. Kelly was probably the weakest character because so tended to be under someone else's thumb, and easily controlled. It took a lot for her to finally start standing up for herself, but she still had the tendency to revert back to her bad habits of being a pushover. See-Cliffhanger season finale where she crawled back to Jason, only to get her feelings hurt.
Having a career or an education doesn't exclude one from being an emotional wreck. But out of all the women on the show I would rather hang out with Kelly.
I disagree with the idea that Akil should "get in where she fits in like Tyler Perry". pffft. Snob- you hit the nail on the head when you said that Bamboozled is real life. Perry has some decent (and a few very good) drama (movies) out, but his tv shows and comedy movies- well, the actor's may as well put on blackface. Ugh. If that's where someone "fits in", I encourage them to instead opt out. I'd rather not see Black folks in the media if our only recourse is to be a bunch of clowns. NO THANKS!
Tasha is pretty stoic as are pretty much every female character on the show not named Melanie or Kelly. For the most part the women on the show are proactive in getting what they want out of life, and are not prone to break downs.
It is extremely frustrating. I attempted to watch the TP shows and in the words of your blog sister Luvvie... iCant. I was watching with a group of people of different races and I was actually embarrassed (red in the face) of what was on the screen. My 8 year old niece looked at me and said, "We don't act like that, why do they act like that?" Without any good answer, I replied, "It's TV. TV isn't real." In true child fashion, she gave me the "I'm not buying it" look before getting up, grabbing a book and retreating to her room. I couldn't blame her.
I spent 18 months in Hollywood knocking my head against a brick wall, er - uh, writing for a channel that was represented by a little frog. I was brought onto a show about a white chick coming of age who had fabulous hair (yes, that show). I came onboard to add "a diversity storyline" to the show. Out of the 800 pages of script I wrote, 6 pages made it into on show. My episodes were "too ethnic" and might "alienate the viewing base". What about expanding it, I asked naively. Just adding a black character to your show will get a whole new "base" to check it out. They added the character but gave her nothing to say and little to do besides walk alongside the main character nodding sympathetically.
I bailed, moved back to Texas disenchanted and started writing books. But the point is for every step we take forward in some arenas (see 1600 Penn Ave) we seem to get pushed backward two in others. Besides Lincoln Park on ABCFamily, No. 1 Ladies Detectvie Agency on HBO (completely ignoring TP shows), can anyone name a quality all black show on TV anywhere? <sigh> My family and I play a game as we watch TV - where's the black character? Kind of like Where's Waldo but harder to spot ;-)
How can you knock Tyler for giving people what they apparently want. I was on the bus the other day and these women were talking about how they had to go home and catch House of "Pain", and I know a couple of Hispanics who also go to his movies and watch his shows. So people are watching, and on cable you can get away with having an audience under a million
I don't like his shows and his first movie is the only one I have watched more than once. I don't support him in theatres. Can you knock they guy for apparently filling a void for a particular audience.
People are getting emotional about when its more business. This use a black show to build a network has been used over and over again, you would have to be a fool to walk into that situation to think you will be treated differently. The WB did the same thing to the Wayans Brothers show and the Wayans family was established in the industry by then. Even Chris Rock said screw it and made sure his show went out with an actual series finale.
I do not watch any of the TP nonsense I tried *and won't be back. I like all the ones mentioned but very very rarely watched The Game, it was okay if NOTHING else was on. I still think that it is unfortunate that there is still not a venue for AA on television other that the Same ol Sh*t. *kmt, shaking my head.
Even Asians have a hard time getting in. Avatar, a story based Asian and Inuit cultures is being adapted as a movie... with Caucasians. They're not playing every part... just the heroes. Even "liberal" Hollywood couldn't be bothered to reach out to the many Asian actors who can't get work if they don't know martial arts.
And there was news that the new Doctor on Doctor Who would be black. Then there was outrage that a character who routinely changes his DNA would be played by a darkie... so soon a young white (and less experienced) actor was announced.
I really don't want to believe White Privileged has this kind of reach... but I keep getting proved wrong.
politicallyincorrect: "How can you knock Tyler for giving people what they apparently want."
Good lord, where do I begin with this? I think the overriding conceit is that Black folks want a range and variety of representations and stories, so that ONE idea or representation doesn't become the dominating one. "Black" is not a genre or a niche, but anytime something Black is imparted by the mainstream, only one-to-a-few representations can exist at one time. That's a problem. If TP wants to produce some duck-walking, Sanctified Monkey type of product then he is entirely within his right to, and his audience will be more than served. But there's a contingent of Black folks that CONTINUE to be ignored, overlooked and underserved, not just in film/TV but also in music.
TP has established a brand and formula that makes him the donut$ and God bless him. But his ability to produce low-brow, infantile, shallow TV shows and films at a steady clip doesn't mean he's above reproach.