We have a habit in this country of liking to believe that we don’t have a racism problem. We don’t like to talk about it. It comes from that deep part of our cultural subconscious that still reveres the stiff upper lip and ‘Keep Calm and Carry On’ mugs. If you talk about it you’re only adding fuel to the fire. That’s how we convince ourselves that groups like UKIP and the BNP are just a lunatic fringe that will just bugger off after a while. So let’s start a conversation. Let’s talk about the lack of non-white faces on our television screens.
There are of course a number of high-profile faces in British television these days. We’ve been lucky enough to be blessed with the talents of Idris Elba, Richard Ayoade and Paterson Joseph in recent years. But I can count the number of black and minority ethnic actors regularly appearing on our screens on one hand. Casts of major TV shows still tend to be dominated white actors. While dramas such as Top Boy have introduced a wider audience to the Black British experience, comedy still falls far behind when it comes to diversification.
In the USA the problem is far more obvious, especially given the context of continued racial tension currently pervading American culture. Although recent American sitcoms have tended to include at least one non-white cast member – Mindy Kaling of course now holds the lead in her own show – historically American television comedy has been a whitewashed industry. Take for example, Friends, perhaps the biggest and most recognisable American sitcom of recent times. In a city in which the white community makes up under half the population, only one non-white character appears with any regularity. Charlie, a professor of palaeontology, appears in a grand total of 9 of 236 episodes.
Across the pond the alarming trend of white-dominated casts has been countered by the equivalent of baseball’s colour line. When The Cosby Show first aired thirty years ago, it not only revived the sitcom genre in the States and introduced the world to Bill Cosby’s on-point jumper game, but with its predominantly Black cast opened up a space for self-expression for the African-American community. Following in its footsteps came In Living Color, The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air and, this year, Black-ish.
This separation of comedy can of course be controversial, yet has proved hugely successful. These are shows that not only give voice to the problems facing a disenfranchised and marginalised group, but have remained accessible to audiences regardless of skin colour. Perhaps, the key to this is the way such shows blur our perceptions of what it means to be black in America. More often than not, at the core of these sitcoms have been successful, middle-class families, because these shows are as much about class as they are race. For too long to be black has been to simply be side-lined as ‘urban’.
Or perhaps it’s just down to the universality of comedy. There’s a false belief that culture is defined by race. It’s a horrible, pseudo-science hangover we’re still nursing from the Victorian era – the same is true for the very concept of race. Race does not define culture, or what we find funny or moving. Culture is rather defined by shared experience. There is no naturally occurring, scientific reason to explain my dislike of Marlon Wayans. The same is true of my admiration for the work of Dave Chapelle.
Could such a method work over here though? It already has. Goodness Gracious Me and The Kumars at No. 42 not only kick-started the careers of Sanjeev Bhaskar, Nina Wadia and Meera Syal, but showed that there was a place for South Asian voices in mainstream television. Voices that had as much to say about white British life as the British Asian experience.
Of course, one swallow does not a summer make, and it would be naieve to suggest that the workings of the American industry could be applied to our own industry as a miracle salve. The problem facing our own comedy industry is potentially far more worrying. There simply aren’t enough comedians of an ethnic minority background being given the spotlight. With the exception of the aforementioned British Asian comedians, ethnic represenation on British television seems to be confined to a revolving door of appearances of Stephen K. Amos, Doc Brown and Andi Osho on Mock The Week.
If we are to encourage the emergence of further non-white talent to enrich our screens, is it not crucial for us to establish a space for the expression of the black British or British Asian comedians? How many countless American comedians could point to the inspiration of the success of Bill Cosby and Richard Pryor. The comedy industry is failing these communities by failing to offer them the role models they deserve.
The importance of establishing a space for the expression of the black or Asian experience is not to isolate and exclude, but rather to open a dialogue. It forces us to confront the problems facing ethnic communities we live alongside day to day with and helps us see the faults in our own. It’s thirty years since Theo Huxtable came back to his family with a report card full of D’s, and its impact is still talked about to this day. Will we say the same about Not Going Out?
Benjamin Cook
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