There's a clear link between talking about diversity (or lack thereof) on TV in the past via The Nicest Kids in Town and Black Power TV and thinking about diversity on TV today. While there are more people of color on screen now than there were in the 50s, 60s, and 70s, the rate of change has been frustratingly slow (it was just news, for example, that New Girl will have two Black leads this season, because rarely do non-family sitcoms feature more than one Black main character).
A recent lightning rod for TV's overwhelming whiteness has been SNL. Over the past month, Saturday Night Live has been heavily criticized for its lack of diversity, and in particular its lack of Black female cast members. The show has had a diversity problem for the entirety of its 38 year existence, but recent comments by current cast members have prompted wider discussion.
After cast member Jay Pharoah said that SNL needed to follow up on its promise to hire a more diverse cast and cast member Kenan Thompson stated that Black women weren't getting hired because the ones who auditioned for the show weren't ready, a firestorm erupted on the internet. Some entertainment websites published lists of qualified Black female comedians and chastised Thompson for his comments. Others claimed that the problem lies partially in the lack of diversity at places like UCB, Second City, and Groundlings, comedy theaters where SNL often finds new cast members. The New York Times ran an article arguing that "being diverse may be better than being 'ready'".
The show acknowledged the controversy during the cold open of Kerry Washington's hosting stint, but made no promises about future cast members. SNL will hire a Black woman, the sketch says, "unless, of course, we fall in love with another white guy first." The show (or at least Lorne Michaels, the creator and executive producer) clearly doesn't understand the importance of intentionally assembling a diverse cast, but hopefully they'll heed the recent uproar when they start looking for new cast members next summer.
Here's the Kerry Washington sketch:
A recent lightning rod for TV's overwhelming whiteness has been SNL. Over the past month, Saturday Night Live has been heavily criticized for its lack of diversity, and in particular its lack of Black female cast members. The show has had a diversity problem for the entirety of its 38 year existence, but recent comments by current cast members have prompted wider discussion.
After cast member Jay Pharoah said that SNL needed to follow up on its promise to hire a more diverse cast and cast member Kenan Thompson stated that Black women weren't getting hired because the ones who auditioned for the show weren't ready, a firestorm erupted on the internet. Some entertainment websites published lists of qualified Black female comedians and chastised Thompson for his comments. Others claimed that the problem lies partially in the lack of diversity at places like UCB, Second City, and Groundlings, comedy theaters where SNL often finds new cast members. The New York Times ran an article arguing that "being diverse may be better than being 'ready'".
The show acknowledged the controversy during the cold open of Kerry Washington's hosting stint, but made no promises about future cast members. SNL will hire a Black woman, the sketch says, "unless, of course, we fall in love with another white guy first." The show (or at least Lorne Michaels, the creator and executive producer) clearly doesn't understand the importance of intentionally assembling a diverse cast, but hopefully they'll heed the recent uproar when they start looking for new cast members next summer.
Here's the Kerry Washington sketch:
5 comments:
I think that SNL is waiting to find another Black female comedian as wonderful as Maya Rudolph and they need to realize that giving another Black woman a chance is the only way to find it. Rudolph didn't start out as a star on the show, but over time she became a favorite performer of viewers. She was, however, able to pass for other races. It is disturbing that SNL's longest tenured Black comedienne was there for seven years because of her ability to pass. Saturday Night Live has few performers from any minority--Kenan Thompson and Jay Pharaoh are both Black, and Fred Armisen is the only Asian cast member (1/4 Japanese) and Latino performer (1/2 Venezuelan). SNL's way of dealing with their current criticism is to joke about it, but I am curious to see what they do after this season. I believe that there would be serious ramifications if Lorne Michaels does not cast a Black comedienne and/or another minority, but is it too little too late? Would it only seem like he was doing this because of the uproar caused by this year's casting?
I actually wrote a blog for Ms. Magazine recently on this same topic: http://msmagazine.com/blog/2013/11/01/to-find-black-women-comedians-snl-should-look-online/
For the article, I interviewed Azie Dee, the actress who stars in and writes for the web series Ask A Slave. One thing she said that stood out to me is that the reason SNL likely hasn't found black female comedians they love is because of where they're looking. SNL looks at expensive comedy schools for their talent, schools that black females are less likely to be able to afford to attend. I pointed to the number of hilarious black women making web series as proof that if SNL changed where it was looking, it would be simple to find the talent (because making a web series has way less financial limitations on who can be involved).
Luckily, producers on other shows are paying attention to this online talent, and Shonda Rhimes is currently in talks with the maker of Awkward Black Girl to make a TV show. Why aren't other shows, like SNL, willing to look in more diverse places to find a diverse cast? How are web series creating new opportunities for black individuals to share their stories, even while mainstream media continues to ignore them?
I think it'll be interesting whether the pressure on SNL to hire Black female comedian(s) will continue to garner media attention or fizzle out now that the program has "addressed" the issue publicly. Although the cold open made the nebulous assertion that SNL "look[s] forward to rectifying [the lack of diversity] in the future," the program never issued a press release about expanding its talent search or made a formal promise with a concrete timeline. The lack of such announcements makes me think that SNL's cold open statements were made merely to appease the masses, acknowledging the criticism with no real intent to act. In the punchline ("unless, of course, we fall in love with another white guy first"), they poke fun at their casting track record while simultaneously alluding to the very real possibility that the tradition will continue. The hope is that SNL acknowledging its own flaws is only step one of correcting them, but I wouldn't be surprised that once the clamor dies down, nothing changes.
I liked this article from Slate that discusses the cold open and how "cracks about the show's lack of diversity, however well executed, don't make the show diverse." http://www.slate.com/blogs/browbeat/2013/11/03/saturday_night_live_and_race_kerry_washington_episode_is_funny_awkward_and.html
I think that it's interesting to compare the current and former casts of SNL with those of MADtv, another sketch comedy show that aired Saturday nights on FOX. MADtv often featured a very diverse cast including former comedians Orlando Jones, Aries Spears, Debra Wilson, Keegan-Michael Key, Jordan Peele, and Nicole Randall Johnson (the star of the famous sketch "Can I have your number? Can I have it? Can I have it?") who are all Black, Korean comedian Bobby Lee, and Latino comedians Nelson Ascensio and Johnny A. Sanchez to name a few.
Diversity was such a key factor in the creation and continued success of MADtv, and it's disheartening to see such a contrast in SNL.
This is a link to a 13 minute NPR interview with former comediennes of color (Anjelah Johnson and Debra Wilson) on MADtv and their thoughts on SNL's lack thereof:
http://www.npr.org/blogs/codeswitch/2013/11/06/243476284/comediennes-of-color-i-am-funny
NPR selected the most notable sound bites and printed them further down on the page. After listening to the interview and also reading Rachel's response, how SNL is searching for their missing cast member is definitely a crutch. Neither Wilson nor Johnson auditioned for their roles in MADtv (they are asked to share those experiences with NPR), and yet they each had a successful career both within and beyond the show. It's time for SNL to make diversity a priority and go beyond auditions.
I think SNL is falling into the Chicken and the Egg job problem, that is to say they are looking for these women to have experience and to already be proven but how do these women prove themselves unless they are given opportunities first? I would also be very interested in learning the racial diversity of the writers room right now. I think it would help illuminate whether SNL has an overarching diversity problem or if Lorne Michaels is just balking at picking out one female black comedian to represent all female black comedians. However, my biggest problem with this whole debate is that I don't think we need one woman of color on the show, I think we need two. They need to make sure they do not tokenize whomever they hire, they need to strive for real diversity, not just make a gesture.
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