How to make and sustain Latinx TV

It's Been a Minute

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🗓️ 15 February 2022

⏱️ 32 minutes

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Summary

Streaming has totally changed the face of TV, but in all its abundance, who gets to make a show, and which shows live to see another season? Sam chats with TV writer and producer Gloria Calderón Kellett (One Day at a Time, With Love), who has long grappled with this question. They talk about what it takes to make something for your people in the industry right now, what she's doing to claim space for Latinx creatives and how she copes with it all.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Hey y'all, you're listening to It's Been a Minute from NPR. I'm Sam Sanders.
0:04.6	You know, over the last decade, streaming has totally changed the face of TV. Netflix has
0:10.0	revolutionized the way that we watch. And old-school networks like NBC and CBS have begun their own
0:15.6	streaming platforms just to keep up. And it's all led to this moment where there is more stuff to
0:21.6	watch than ever before. Truly, ever. Last year on all the platforms, there were 559 scripted English
0:31.6	language shows. A record. But in all this abundance, there's some big questions. Namely, who actually
0:39.3	gets to make a show more often than not? And which shows stick around? Take for instance one day at a
0:47.2	time. This show bounced around and around from platform to platform until it was canceled twice.
0:54.5	One day at a time was the reboot of the 1970s sitcom by Norman Lear. It's all about a single mom
1:00.4	and her two teens. In the original, this family was white. But in the 2017 reboot, the family was
1:06.4	Cuban-American. And this one, I don't like her anymore. I don't care if you like me. It sounds
1:14.7	like you're both on the same page. Your daughter does not want to have a keen sis. What? Why? We
1:20.8	already booked the room and I found a great band. Okay, it's a DJ. Okay, it's your brother with
1:26.4	a knife on a playlist, but it's a very good playlist. Gloria Calderon-Kellet was one of the creators
1:32.4	of the remake. And she was one of the only Latina showrunners working in American TV back then in
1:37.9	2017. In this show, it was loved by fans and critics, but still after three seasons Netflix cancelled
1:45.4	it. Fans made a ruckus and then one day at a time got picked up by pop TV in 2020. But then the
1:52.4	show was canceled again after one more season. Gloria says she was surprised by how fans reacted.
1:58.2	I was so moved that one one day at a time got canceled. There was such an outpouring of love.
2:01.9	Like that really surprised me to be honest. And I think spoke to this community that feels so
2:08.3	starved for for authentic representation. But flash forward to now and the list of canceled TV
2:14.1	shows that were led or created by or featured Latinos. It's gotten pretty long. Pintified.
	...

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