TV REVIEW : ‘Color Adjustment’: A Bittersweet Look at Black TV Roles

The character of Edith Bunker, the charmingly naive wife on “All in the Family,” has one of the most telling lines in “Color Adjustment,” Marlon T. Riggs’ bittersweet exploration of African-American images on television.

In one of many clips from vintage shows featured in the effective but flawed 90-minute film (which kicks off the fifth season of PBS’ “P.O.V.” series at 10 tonight on KCET-TV Channel 28 and KPBS-TV Channel 15), Edith (Jean Stapleton) is asked by her son-in-law and daughter what she thinks of blacks. She notes that in only two years, blacks have gone from working as servants and janitors to being teachers, lawyers and doctors.

“They’ve come a long way on TV,” Edith concludes.

Using extensive excerpts from programs stretching from “Amos ‘n’ Andy” to “The Cosby Show,” Riggs shows that African-American images on television have come a long way from the subservient, leering portrayals popular during the medium’s infancy.

He also asserts, however, that in many ways, the successful and affluent images put forth by “The Cosby Show” are just as damaging and false in depicting the black experience as TV programs were in previous decades--that the Huxtables were just a white version of the Nelsons in “Ozzie and Harriet” or the Cleavers in “Leave It to Beaver.”

Riggs maintains that television has concentrated too heavily on presenting white viewers with images of African-Americans that are soothing, amusing and inoffensive. Those images, he implies, have helped to perpetuate racism and misunderstanding.

“Color Adjustment” is at its best when it contrasts “true” reality with television reality by switching back and forth, remote control-style, between shows featuring black characters and news footage of events taking place during the same period.

In one sequence, Riggs mixes upbeat material from “The Nat King Cole Show” in 1957 with footage of black children being attacked and beaten as they try to attend white schools in Little Rock, Ark.

Interviews with celebrities and producers also offer interesting insights into shows such as “Julia” and “Good Times,” which were developed to present blacks in a more favorable light. The recollections and clips are commented on by pop culture critics and sociologists who say those shows may have caused more harm than good by perpetuating false images and racial stereotypes.

During another sharp-edged sequence, CBS’ “Good Times”--which ran from 1974 to 1979 and starred Esther Rolle as a domestic trying to raise her three children in a Chicago tenement--is blasted as being one of TV’s most valiant attempts at realistically depicting black life, and perhaps its greatest failure.

Although the comedy series contained gritty elements, Riggs and others say that its impact was greatly diluted by the increasing focus on the teen-age character J.J., known for his clownish antics and “dy-no-mite” catch phrase. Riggs slows down a scene of J.J. to the point where it looks as if he’s dancing in slow motion, intercutting the sequence with drawings of grinning minstrels.

The anger that Riggs feels toward many black television images is apparent, especially in Ruby Dee’s narration, which drips with soothing cynicism. Although he mostly targets comedies, Riggs and others also lash out at “Roots,” the groundbreaking 1977 miniseries that at the time was the most-watched program in television history. Instead of serving as a condemnation of slavery and racist American society, they argue, “Roots” was basically a simple tale of how one strong black family triumphed over “some bad people.”

“Color Adjustment” falls short in several ways. Producers and creators of black-oriented shows are not given an opportunity to respond when Riggs and others charge that their programs ended up being more negative than positive, thereby robbing the film of some potentially interesting dialogue.

Riggs also leaves out several instances where networks did attempt, although not always successfully, to present realistic, positive black role models. “Room 222” with its black high school teacher and assistant principal, “Benson” featuring a black lieutenant governor, and the highly acclaimed “Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman” are ignored.

Most distressingly, “Color Adjustment” does not address the African-American images of more recent programs such as “In Living Color,” “Fresh Prince of Bel Air,” “A Different World,” “Family Matters,” “True Colors” or “Roc.” An unaware viewer watching “Color Adjustments” might think that “The Cosby Show” was the last and only show on the air depicting black families.

These drawbacks do not prevent “Color Adjustment” from being an entertaining, barbed look at television’s failed attempts at realistically portraying African-Americans. But with a little more “adjustment,” it could have been even more powerful.