The Unwritten Rules of Black TV

The Experiment

The Atlantic and WNYC Studios

President, Policy, Documentary, Joe, Law, Wnyc, American, Presidency, Supreme, Society & Culture, Congress, The, Racism, Court, State, History, Biden, Government, Race

4.5 • 2.8K Ratings

🗓️ 16 September 2021

⏱️ 35 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

The Atlantic staff writer Hannah Giorgis grew up in the ’90s, watching dozens of Black characters on TV. Living Single, Sister, Sister, Moesha, and Smart Guy were just a few of the shows led by Black casts. But at some point in the 2000s, those story lines and some of the Black writers behind them seemed to disappear. In a cover story for The Atlantic, Giorgis traces the cyclical, uneven history of Black representation on television.

One writer whose career encompasses much of that history is Susan Fales-Hill. She got her start as an apprentice on The Cosby Show, wrote for A Different World, and now is an executive producer of BET’s Twenties. This week on The Experiment, Fales-Hill and Giorgis talk about how power dynamics behind the scenes have shaped what we watch, what we talk about, and how we understand ourselves.

A transcript of this episode is available.

Further reading: “Most Hollywood Writers’ Rooms Look Nothing Like America”

Be part of The Experiment. Use the hashtag #TheExperimentPodcast, or write to us at [email protected].

This episode was produced by Meg Cramer. Reporting by Hannah Giorgis. Editing by Katherine Wells. Fact-check by Jack Segelstein. Sound design by David Herman, with additional engineering by Joe Plourde. Transcript by Caleb Codding.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	I don't know what it is about the American sitcom.
0:13.9	It just has a way of seeping under our skin.
0:17.4	I think for those of us who grew up watching TV, we all have that one show that to some
0:23.9	extent taught us what life could look like or maybe what we thought life should look like.
0:35.8	For instance, my parents used to watch this show, it was amazing called Ghibasa USA, which
0:42.2	was essentially a mirror for them.
0:44.8	It was about Cubans who arrived in Florida and there's this one episode they would always
0:49.5	play for me as a little kid, where the kids in the show try to hack the US citizenship
0:55.1	test.
0:56.1	My mother figure out that on the yes and no questions there is 80% chance that the right
1:01.5	answer will be yes.
1:03.0	Hey, that's a good one.
1:05.3	And when they practice the questions with the grandparents on the show, antics ensued.
1:10.6	Are you willing to take full oath of allegiance to the United States?
1:14.9	Yes.
1:15.9	Have you ever engaged in prostitution?
1:19.1	I like it.
1:20.1	I like it.
1:21.1	I like it.
1:22.1	I like it.
1:23.1	And I bet for a lot of recent immigrants, it was pretty powerful to have a sort of mirror
1:28.9	like that, to see their experience fictionalized and joked about on American TV.
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from The Atlantic and WNYC Studios, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of The Atlantic and WNYC Studios and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.