Watching in black and white
Only one Asian-American and not one Latino among nominees for top acting prizes
LOS ANGELES — When cameras pan across the faces of Emmy Award nominees at today’s ceremony, TV viewers will see a record 12 African-Americans vying for comedy and drama series acting honours. But it’s a lop-sided outcome in the struggle for diversity.
Master of None star Aziz Ansari, who is of Indian heritage, is the sole Asian-American to be nominated for a continuing series lead or supporting role. Not a single Latino is included in the marquee acting categories.
An Emmy version of the 2015-16 OscarsSoWhite protests would miss the point. Worthy films and performances from people of colour were snubbed by movie academy voters, while insiders say the scant Emmy love for non-black minorities largely reflects closed TV industry doors.
“There are a lot of us, but because we haven’t gotten the opportunity to shine, you don’t know we’re around,” said Ren Hanami, an Asian-American actor who has worked steadily on TV in smaller roles but found substantive, award-worthy parts elusive.
The hard-won progress made by the African-American stars and makers of Emmy-nominated shows including black-ish and Atlanta has brought them creative influence, visibility and, this year, nearly a quarter (23.5 per cent) of series cast nominations.
While that success is cheered by other ethnic groups, they say it illuminates how narrowly the entertainment industry views diversity, despite the fact that Latinos and Asian-Americans are America’s first and third largest ethnic groups, respectively.
But it also stands as proof that change is possible with a combination of activism, education and business savvy, according to industry members and outsiders seeking change.
“TV has never been brownish,” said actor-comedian Paul Rodriguez, riffing on the title of the hit African-American family comedy. He starred in the 1984 sitcom a.k.a. Pablo, one of the handful of Latino-centred series, and wrote The Pitch, or How to Pitch a Latino Sitcom that Will Never Air, a 2015 stage show he reprised this month in Los Angeles because, he said, Hispanics haven’t gained ground.
“They don’t put us on television enough for them to even know if it’s not working,” Rodriguez said. “They just assume it won’t work. And it goes on year after year. Our population keeps growing, and so does our frustration.”
It’s reached critical mass, said Alex Nogales, president of the National Hispanic Media Coalition. In 1999, the coalition joined with the NAACP and others to demand action from broadcast networks in the wake of an allwhite slate of new shows.
“I’m tired of being the nice Mexican. It hasn’t taken us anywhere,” Nogales said. His new plan is to make sure networks and increasingly popular digital platforms such as Netflix know when Latinos — nearly 18 per cent of the U.S. population and with an estimated buying power of about $1.5 trillion US and growing — are unhappy with their programming.
“Networks have brands that have been around for a very long time. We can damage that brand, we can do it by marching in front of their offices and embarrassing them. We can do it through social media,” Nogales said, including putting pressure on TV advertisers.
The financial bottom line is key, agreed Gary Mayeda, president of the Japanese American Citizens League, which focuses on civil rights issues affecting Asianand Pacific Islander-Americans. “Diversity is profitable,” he said. “Cultural diversity takes nothing nor steals from any other group.”
He called for more and better market research on consumers, a point Rodriguez drives home in his play Pitch. In one scene, a network executive character uses a pie chart that purports to show why Latinos are a loser for TV — compared with blacks, they don’t watch enough TV.
But a different picture emerges in the Nielsen research the industry uses. According to a recent report, the number of Hispanics that TV reached monthly in the first quarter of 2017 exceeded African-Americans (50.7 million compared with 39.3 million). Blacks still spend more viewing time weekly than other ethnic groups (43 hours vs. 23 hours for Latinos and 14 hours for Asian-Americans), but with smartphones and other viewing devices favoured by young people the gap narrows or disappears.
Dispelling stereotypes and tired assumptions is familiar to Tiffany Smith-Anoa’i, CBS’s executive vice-president for entertainment diversity, a department she created in 2009.
“I’m always saying diversity doesn’t mean black, it means so much more,” Smith-Anoa’i said. She’s used to encountering the industry attitude of “we have a black woman, or we have a black guy, we’re done for the day.”
“’Have your eyes look a little further,”’ she tells producers.
“It might take three phone calls to find an actor, writer or director instead of the two that you’re used to.
“But it definitely is worth it when you’re looking for real authenticity and fresh voices, and you get it.”