TV Diversity Results Will Be Years in the Evaluating

Last May, the major networks presented prime-time lineups possessing a striking shortage of minority faces. The press pointed it out. Interest groups complained. Network executives promised to do better.

Eight months later, the question of television’s racial and ethnic diversity in front of and behind the camera remains a hot-button issue, sure to be prominent during the latest round of network meetings with TV critics in Pasadena--beginning with NBC on Sunday--as it did the last edition of this semi-annual tribute to platitudes, long-winded questions and hosted cocktail parties.

Still, even those experiencing what might be called “diversity fatigue”--which would be, in all likelihood, just about everyone associated with the debate--had better get used to the topic, since it isn’t going to be resolved any time soon.

Indeed, the goals agreed to by NBC and ABC this week after negotiations with the NAACP, clearly thought out in great detail, call for a series of initiatives that will take years to sort out and evaluate.

NBC’s plan, for example, proposes putting at least one minority writer on each of its second-year shows, hoping this experience will allow them to go forth and become the next Steven Bochco or David E. Kelley, adding more diversity to the ranks of TV’s star “show runners.” But such aims will take years to realize, especially if these additions are viewed as token hires before they can demonstrate whether they possess the write stuff.

Similarly, seminars and the stated desire to hire more minority actors, directors and vendors may also help change attitudes; still, given the protracted process of developing new programs--and the high failure rate among all shows, regardless of color--it could be a long time before we know if there’s room in today’s fragmented TV landscape for a cross-over hit a la “The Cosby Show” or a widely embraced minority drama, an aspiration that has yet to be truly achieved.

Based on the longevity of most TV executives, this means many of those at the networks who hatch out these deals won’t be around three or four years from now to bask in the glory or, conversely, pay the piper. As with their prime-time lineups, whose shortcomings are often pawned off on predecessors, assigning accountability will be, to say the least, awkward.

Moreover, even if the new guidelines work fabulously, there is a certain cottage industry built around such issues, meaning advocacy groups will be reluctant to relinquish their outrage. How much progress will be enough before blacks, Latinos, Asian Americans and Native Americans will all be able to say, “OK, everything’s swell, we’re going to move on to griping about the shipping industry”?

Television and movies are a popular target precisely because they are constantly in the public eye--their deficiencies there for everyone to see--assuring exposure for any group choosing to protest. Not everyone sees the preponderance of white faces in the halls of advertising agencies or on Wall Street. But TV, well, we can count heads night in and night out.

Indeed, the crush of complaints has become so overwhelming they often begin to lose meaning, undermining larger aims. A Jewish group gets upset about a farcical sketch on “Saturday Night Live.” Certain Latinos gripe about a throwaway line on “Will & Grace.” An Italian American organization voices its discontent about HBO’s “The Sopranos” perpetuating stereotypes--a charge older than “The Godfather” saga.

Amid that din, nerve endings to the public’s offensiveness detector become increasingly numb, causing network officials--privately, and no doubt with some validity--to question how much ardor there really is behind these campaigns.

No one involved should delude themselves. The networks are not agreeing to these proposals because they fear a boycott by minority viewers, because such threats have never materialized in any substantive way. What they fear, and rightly so, is public-relations damage, while recognizing that the snowy palette used last fall reflected an embarrassing signpost of how myopic--taken together--their programming strategies had been.

This is not to say those seated on either side of the diversity bargaining table are not sincere in their desire to implement change. It only means press conferences and pronouncements of grand intentions are easy, and legitimate progress comes hard and, in most instances, slowly.

Five years from now, it will be interesting to examine what this summer of diversity has wrought--whether minorities are actually better off now, to quote an old campaign line, than they were in the spring of 1999. Because the truth is, we probably won’t be able to tell with any certainty until then.

Of course, that reality won’t silence the debate, which could leave most people a little deaf by the time the answer comes.