Redirecting the Scene : A small but significant group of African American filmmakers is escaping the ethnic pigeonhole.

It was a call producer Lynda Obst didn’t expect.

And at first glance, it was a stretch to consider the veteran filmmaker expressing interest in her latest project.

Obst and actress Sandra Bullock last year had been seeking a director for “Hope Floats,” the quiet film about a former high school beauty who moves back to a small Texas town after her marriage falls apart.

But they were caught off guard when Forest Whitaker threw his hat into the ring.

Obst knew Whitaker for his acclaimed acting roles and for his previous directorial efforts--”Strapped,” a violent urban HBO drama about a black teen in the Brooklyn housing projects caught up in the world of crime and guns, and “Waiting to Exhale,” the raucous hit 1995 film about four black women searching for love.

Initially, Obst found it hard to determine what perspective Whitaker could bring to a low-key, rural tale such as “Hope Floats”: “I just thought of him as an urban director. It was intriguing and not at all obvious that he would respond to white women living in the country in Texas.”

But when Bullock and Obst met with Whitaker, all the elements immediately clicked.

“I should have known from ‘Waiting to Exhale’ that Forest had a woman living inside of him,” Obst said. “He’s from Longview, Texas, a small town, he loved the same scenes that we did, he knew these women and family issues and rhythms.

“I realized then that it was a non-gender, non-race issue for Forest to direct this movie,” she said. “It was a human issue.”

The gamble paid off. “Hope Floats” was an early summer hit for 20th Century Fox Studios, earning more than $44.3 million since its May 29 release.

More important, Whitaker is part of a small but elite group of African American directors who have previously been involved with mostly black films or projects with black stars but are now steering non-ethnic movies.

The development runs counter to a perception held by several black directors only a few years ago that they were being kept out of “mainstream” Hollywood, compartmentalized into doing mostly black projects.

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Joining Whitaker in the current trend are Kevin Hooks and Carl Franklin, who, like Whitaker, started their careers as actors.

Hooks, whose previous films included “Passenger 57” with Wesley Snipes and “Fled” with Laurence Fishburne, directed Universal’s spring release “Black Dog,” a trucker action drama starring Patrick Swayze, Randy Travis, Meat Loaf--and a country music soundtrack. Franklin, whose two previous projects were the HBO black family miniseries “Laurel Avenue” and 1995’s “Devil in a Blue Dress,” about black private investigator Easy Rawlins, is putting the finishing touches on Universal’s planned September release, “One True Thing,” a family drama starring Meryl Streep, William Hurt and Renee Zellweger, based on a novel by Anna Quindlen.

Some say these projects are a sure indication that Hollywood may finally be tearing down barriers that prevented a significant number of minority directors from steering non-ethnic or mainstream movies. None of these films features black actors in major roles, and is not being marketed specifically to black audiences.

Said African American actor-director Bill Duke: “The walls are coming down in slow-motion, but they’re coming down. I think it’s happening because the executives at the studios know it’s the right thing to do, and also because they realize that minority directors have the ability to do any [kind of movie].”

Producer Warrington Hudlin (“House Party,” “Boomerang”), president of the Black Filmmaker Foundation and curator of the second annual Acapulco Black Film Festival, to be held in July, said he was so thrilled by the apparent shift that he was going to add a category for the festival’s award ceremony to honor directors of films with predominantly white casts.

“This seems to be a real expression of equal opportunity,” Hudlin said. “White filmmakers have been making movies about blacks, so it’s nice to see that it can work the other way as well. Any time the perimeters stretch, it’s a good thing. It now seems like it’s the best qualified person for the job, as opposed to ethnic membership.”

Said Franklin: “It’s another time. There are executives now who are a lot younger. Racial tension is high, but perceptions of each other are a little higher.”

But other insiders cautioned that despite the breakthroughs of Whitaker, Franklin and Hooks, it is still business as usual for minority directors, and that little has improved in terms of being pigeonholed.

“To categorize these directors as ‘breaking through’ is racist,” said Paris Barclay, an African American director and producer on ABC’s “NYPD Blue.” “They’re just good, proven directors who can direct all kinds of people. They’re the right director for the right project at the right time.”

Barclay also pointed out that Hooks, Franklin and Whitaker are also actors, which might give them more clout with studios.

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More importantly, whatever progress Whitaker, Hooks and Franklin have made will not make it easier for lesser-known black directors, Barclay said. “Hollywood still needs to be shown everything,” he said. “They must have something in their pocket to indicate they’re good directors.”

And a report due next month from the Directors Guild of America regarding the hiring of minorities during 1997 indicates that there was no real improvement in equality when it came to the hiring of minority directors. The report indicates the number of total days worked by DGA women and minorities versus the total days worked by all DGA members.

While specifics of the report were not yet available, sources said the findings reflect little change from 1996 when guild President Jack Shea called the employment levels for women and minorities “simply unacceptable.”

The percentage of days worked by African American directors during 1996 was 5.2%, up slightly from 3.9% in 1995. Minorities as a whole in 1996 only accounted for 9.7% of the total number of days worked.

Still, Obst, Hooks and Franklin and others say there is room for optimism.

“Racism in this country is changing,” Franklin said. “And the old stereotype that blacks can only direct blacks isn’t holding water.”

Obst said: “Black directors have been ghettoized to a certain degree, but they should not be marginalized. Ultimately it’s about the human story. We should take each other’s perspective and unify them into our own.”

In the 12 years since the explosion of Spike Lee’s “She’s Gotta Have It,” a wave of black directors has swept into Hollywood, steering a range of projects from low-budget independent films to major studio products. Most of the films, however, have concentrated on black themes and culture.

Hooks, Franklin and Whitaker aren’t the first to cross over into non-ethnic films. Thomas Carter, a former actor (and a co-star with Hooks on TV’s “The White Shadow”), made his feature film directing debut with 1993’s “Swing Kids,” about German youths obsessed with American swing music. Bill Duke raised some eyebrows in 1992 when he directed “The Cemetery Club,” about three widowed Jewish women.

“It was a shock for both whites and blacks when I did that film,” Duke said. “Black people said to me, ‘What does that have to do with us?’ White people asked, ‘What does this black guy know about three Jewish women?’ It has to do with tribal thinking--when you step outside the confines of the tribe, people want to know why you left.”

But films such as “Hope Floats” transcend that tribalism, he said.

“With movies like those, we have stepped into the center of humanity,” Duke said. “We’re talking about human issues. Both tribes can relate to these issues in their hearts.”

Franklin said he has never felt pigeonholed since his first major directorial effort, the 1992 thriller “One False Move.”

“It has never been my personal experience,” he said. “But it is what some people feel.”

Hooks and Franklin argued that black directors are not being squeezed out of directing non-ethnic films as much as they have chosen to do almost specifically black projects.

Said Franklin: “Most of the black directors do black projects because that’s what they want to do. Spike only does what he feels. For these directors, ethnic material is very important to them. Those are the stories they want to do.”

Franklin added: “I don’t choose projects for political reasons. That doesn’t mean they don’t have political import. I pick projects on a personal level.” He said he related to the script of “One True Thing” because he had a “strong emotional response to the fundamental family issues” that all cultures can relate to. “I just couldn’t deny what I was personally feeling. The screenplay slayed me.”

Hooks said that blacks who decide to direct non-ethnic films are wise because they are broadening their horizons and world view.

“We can bring that aspect to our projects that are more personal,” Hooks said. “To go mainstream is not abandoning our culture. To believe that is absurd. I have to constantly change and grow and broaden my own experience.”

Hooks said he was chosen to direct “Black Dog” because of his expertise and prior experience in the action movie genre with “Passenger 57” and “Fled.” However, he was not immediately familiar with country music, which was a major element of the film.

“I never felt like I was the wrong guy for the job,” Hooks said. “If we’re bright enough, we’re put into a position where we have to educate ourselves rather quickly. I educated myself rather quickly.”

But “Black Dog” generated barely a blip at the box office. Hooks pointed to the marketing strategy that eliminated one of the key audiences for action films: young African American males.

“The irony of ‘Black Dog’ was that this was a movie aimed for middle America,” Hooks said. “Less than 5% of the audience was urban. We had no chance for that audience--it was not marketed to them. We also opened the same weekend as ‘He Got Game,’ and I knew that would be the film blacks would want to see. The studio made a choice as to what audience they wanted.”

But Hooks, who said he is currently developing a “mainstream” erotic suspense thriller in the vein of “Basic Instinct,” said he felt validated during a recent trip to the barber shop with his young son, when he was approached by the mother of a boy also in for a haircut.

“She came up and said, ‘I totally support what you’re doing in terms of directing ‘Black Dog,’ ” Hooks said. “ ‘It’s so great that a black director can do a white film. I wish we could do more of that.’ ”