‘In the Life’ Challenges Gay Stereotypes

For five years, “In the Life” has struggled to keep a toehold on PBS station schedules across the country. Some carried the show about gay and lesbian issues and culture from the beginning but tucked it into late-night slots.

The program has persisted, despite a sometimes hostile political environment, and has even in some cases received a better time slot.

John Catania, communications director for nonprofit In the Life Media Inc., acknowledged that early installments of the program were a bit amateurish, saddled as the series was with a small budget that could attract no big names.

“In the Life” still searches for funds, getting most of its production money from the H. van Amerigen Foundation and from individuals. It now spends from $130,000 to $150,000 for each episode, although Catania said that includes all production and office costs and the pay for all nine staffers and contract producers (some of whom work for broadcast networks but don’t want their bosses to know).

“They try to help us out,” he said. “We give them a fraction of the normal fee.”

Now, in its fifth season, the bimonthly series is on more than 90 PBS stations, including KCET-TV Channel 28 in Los Angeles and 18 of the other top 20 markets (St. Louis is the lone holdout).

Presented--but not financially supported--by New York’s WNET, the magazine-format show says its mission is to challenge society’s “hard-held stereotypes” of gay men and women.

Most of the shows are done on location, Catania said, and the goal now is to create a monthly series.

“We went through quite a few format approaches,” he said. “We’re very happy now with it. ‘In the Life’ has a certain access to the gay and lesbian community. We talk about teaming up with an HBO, for example, or, producing a special. We go places and ask questions that others won’t ask.”

“In the Life” premiered in June 1992 on six PBS stations--it’s available free to any station--and immediately became the target of lawmakers. Then-Senate Minority Leader Bob Dole, while leading a discussion about legislation authorizing $1.1 billion in funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, held up the series (which hadn’t yet aired) as an example of PBS’ “far-out, liberal themes.”

But neither CPB nor any public entity ever financially supported the series. And in some ways that has allowed the series a certain freedom despite increased scrutiny of public-TV funding.

Catania said “In the Life” has done no viewer surveys and relies on mail or responses to its Web site to estimate viewership (about 1.5 million nationwide for each installment, he thinks).

Except for a few characters on broadcast series, and a flurry of interest over whether Ellen DeGeneres’ character will come out on “Ellen,” his show is one of the few to provide viewing about gays and lesbians to people in smaller towns and cities.

“This is not a staff necessarily made up of New York natives,” said Catania, who is from New Berlin, Wis. “A lot of us come from smaller towns and smaller cities and the states between the coasts.”

* “In the Life” will next be seen on KCET-TV Channel 28 in February.