TV REVIEWS : ‘Crosses’ Focuses on Racial Drama

A new industry opens in a struggling, mostly white working-class neighborhood, but initial joy turns ugly when it is learned that some jobs will go to minority outsiders in “Crosses on the Lawn,” today’s frank CBS Schoolbreak Special (3 p.m., Channel 2).

White high school star athlete Chaz (Justin Whalin) sees his father’s pain at being jobless for a year, and his own dreams for college receding. When his dad (Nick Angotti) misses out on one of the jobs at the new plant in favor of a minority candidate, Chaz and his friends are ripe for exploitation by an older racist youth, despite the fact that Chaz’s close baseball buddy Chris (Rugg Williams) is African-American, as is the popular school vice principal Andre (Michael Warren).

The group starts by wearing T-shirts to school with anti-black slogans--”We gotta stand up for our rights,” one of them tells Chris. Besides, it’s only outsiders they’re against, they tell him. Chris knows better and so does the vice principal, who forbids the shirts on campus. It isn’t long before the teen-agers adopt Klan tactics and burn a cross on the vice principal’s lawn.

Director and writer Alan Gansberg makes clear how close casual racism--jokes, patronization--is to violence, dehumanization and persecution. And, in one wordless scene, with slumped shoulders and labored steps, Warren makes clear an African-American man’s pain and anger--and bitter lack of surprise--at becoming the target of open bigotry.

In the end, Chaz’s shocked father realizes that his own prejudices have contributed to the ugliness and Chaz wakes up enough to stop what he is doing and make a guarded peace with Chris. The show offers no quick fix, but it does make a strong statement against scapegoating and ignorance.