Debra Lee tries to shake off BET’s bad rap with revival mission
 
By R. Thomas Umstead
Multichannel News
(October 8, 2007) Black Entertainment Television CEO Debra Lee is in the midst of unveiling the network’s most ambitious original programming lineup in the network’s 27-year history.

The lineup features an eclectic mix of reality shows, religious and public-affairs programs, such as an American Idol-flavored gospel music competition called Sunday’s Best, and scripted fare, such as the coming-of-age-comedy for 20-somethings, titled Somebodies.

By BET’s definition, this will be more fresh programming with more variety than has ever been available to an African-American audience on one channel.

Picketed at home
Yet Lee only has to look out the window of her Washington, D.C., home to see that BET still has a long way to go before it convinces all African-Americans that it’s ready and willing to offer more than the booty-shaking, sex-and-violence-heavy music videos that defined its programming in the 1980s and 1990s.

Religious leader Rev. Delman Coates of the Mt. Ennon Baptist Church in Clinton, Md., has peacefully gathered 300 to 500 people in front of Lee’s house each of the past four weekends. His purpose: To protest BET’s airing of gansta-rap videos such as Yung Joc’s drug glorification music video “Coffee Shop” and the network’s controversial, hip-hop heavy, pro-literacy video spot “Read A Book,” which, in his view, portrays African-Americans in a negative light.

Such is the conundrum for BET. The network at long last is moving toward producing quality original programming for its core audience of 18-to-34-year-old viewers for the first time since its launch in 1980. But the network knows that despite its best efforts, it will never please every segment of the African-American community — each with its own idea of what type of programming BET should air.

“It’s not [a] fair [burden], but I don’t think its ever going to change,” Lee said. “Folks feel so personal about BET and they are so committed to the network that they think it should reflect their own personal preferences, whether they’re 60, 45 or 18. We’re always going to suffer from that no matter how many times we tell people our core audience is 18 to 34.”

But she’s determined to provide a balance of original programming with the hopes that all African-American viewers will eventually find something that they like on the network. Under the tutelage of Hollywood filmmaker and BET Entertainment president Reggie Hudlin, the network has ridden a lineup of successful original series to record ratings and viewership numbers.

This includes such programming as American Gangster, which takes a critical look at notorious criminals such as Crips gang leader Stanley “Tookie” Williams; College Hill, which follows the lives of young co-eds; and Keyshia Cole: The Way It Is, a celebreality show that follows the troubled but inspirational rhythm-and-blues singer.

Since the beginning of 2006, when such programming arrived on the network, through September 2007, the network has averaged its highest primetime rating (0.5) and viewership numbers (672,000 viewers) in its history.

On the business side, BET is expected to generate a network record $519 million in net revenue in 2007 compared to $494 million in 2006, and more than double the $231 million in 2001 when Viacom acquired the network from Johnson for $3 billion.

Yet the network still has its detractors who remember the BET of the 1980s and 1990s, which was devoid of original programming and offered mostly music-video fare. Last month, The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People requested a meeting with BET executives to talk about its future programming plans, according to association officials.

Other groups, such as The National Association of Black Journalists, have raised concerns about the network’s lack of news and public-affairs programming. BET cut BET Nightly News in 2005 due to low ratings and high costs and now offers several short news segments throughout the day, as well as documentary programming such as the two-part Hip Hop vs. America town-hall meeting event, which aired Sept. 25 and Sept. 26.

Activists such as the Rev. Coates have taken their concerns a step further. Coates has spearheaded a campaign, dubbed “Enough Is Enough,” to protest stereotypical images of African-Americans in the media. This has led to the four consecutive weekend protests at Lee’s home. Coates hopes to get BET to remove such images from its network.

“Millions of African-Americans have been deeply concerned about the negative stereotypes on BET and how it fails to represent the depth and breadth of the African-American community,” said Coates. “The network has failed to respond to the concerns of its audience.”

Lee said she hopes BET’s detractors will give it a chance to showcase all the programming it has planned over the next six to 12 months.

BET plans to launch as many as 16 new or returning series over the next year. And it is projected to spend a network-high $119 million on programming in 2007, according to SNL Kagan.

The first of the new original series launched last week: Sunday Best, a reality competition that seeks to discover the next big Gospel singer; and Exalted!, a documentary series that examines the lives of religious leaders such as prophetess Juanita Bynum.

In the near future, the network will debut its first animated, scripted sketch-comedy series. BUFU features actor Orlando Jones (Mad TV) and Everybody Hates Chris’s Ali LeRoi.

In 2008, the network will debut its first live-action, original scripted series, Somebodies. The show focuses on the lives of a group of college graduate “slackers” trying to adjust to life after school.

Also on tap for 2008 are two animated projects: Hannibal the Conqueror, produced by actor Vin Diesel and based on the legendary African warrior-king; and The Cipha, created in conjunction with actor Will Smith, which takes a futuristic look at the government’s attempts to outlaw and silence hip-hop artists.

The network is also planning a slate of films that will debut in movie theaters, as well as television movies that will premiere on BET.

Doubting the benefit  
Hudlin says the lineup includes exactly what the network’s critics were seeking: new, original and exclusive programming targeted to African-Americans. Viewers just have to have patience, he said.

“It’s frustrating because Debra and I understand that a lot of people do not give us the benefit of the doubt,” he said. “So we will gladly sit down and show people what we’re working on so that they can know that this is not just lip service.”

But even with the new shows, USC School of Cinematic Arts professor of critical studies Todd Boyd said the network will be hard pressed to be the end-all network for African-Americans. With the exception of the 40 million-subscriber TV One, the Comcast and Radio One co-owned network geared for a 25-to-54-year-old audience, no other highly penetrated cable network specifically targets the 38 million U.S. African-Americans. That places a heavy burden on BET to serve every interest of every segment of that vibrant community.

“It’s idiotic to assume that one network is going to be all things for all black people. … We’re talking about a very diverse group of people — race being one factor that defines identity,” said Boyd. “Yet anytime you have an under-representation of African-Americans in an area when there is some minimal form of representation, that form is going to have to carry the burden of the absence involving so many others. The task ahead of BET is perhaps more difficult than other networks might face.”

Past limitations
Still, the new-look BET is certainly a far cry from the music video-heavy network that launched in 1980 under the ownership of Bob Johnson.

Back then, BET had limited financial resources. Johnson successfully built the then-upstart service mostly with inexpensive music videos to appeal to young viewers. Even in 2001, when it sold out to Viacom, the network was garnering 10 cents per subscriber from operators, as other music networks, such as MTV, took in nearly twice that amount.

At the time, Johnson bitterly complained that the industry didn’t give him the same resources through higher licensing fees to develop original programming that it did for networks with similar distribution. He also accused the advertising community of discriminating against programming for minorities by not paying as much for spots as they would for more mainstream programming.

Johnathan Rodgers, president of the competing TV One, said Johnson doesn’t get enough credit for what he was able to accomplish with BET, given his financial limitations. “I thought BET really did a remarkable job occupying the 18-to-34 space with the resources he had,” he said.

Indeed, the network was successful by many financial benchmarks. The network generated 50.2 cents of cash that it could plow back into operations, on each dollar of revenue, at the time of the sale. That is well above the industry’s average of 32.5 cents, according to SNL Kagan.

But Johnson was criticized by organizations such as the NAACP for relying too much on music videos and not spending the money necessary to develop quality original series and public-affairs programming.

Even Hudlin was critical of the network before he joined in 2005. “I had the same frustrations a lot of people had … people wanted BET to create more original content,” he said. “We loved BET and we needed BET, but we wanted it to flex its muscles.”

Yet even with the new, original programs that the network has rolled out over the past two years, such as American Gangster and College Hill — and a reduction of music-video programming to less than 20% of its overall schedule — Hudlin said the network is still fighting the negative perceptions of the network from years past.

“On the one hand, as we put shows up, people are now paying attention to the network, which is great,” he said. “At the same time, it also stirs up some old frustrations. So we understand that we’re catching people’s attentions with our new programming [but] there’s still a lot of people with a lot of residual frustrations.”

But not all the frustrations are “residual.” Some of Hudlin’s original projects have set off new concerns.

Earlier this summer, a BET limited series originally dubbed Hot Ghetto Mess caused a dust-up within the African-American community. Based on a Web site of the same name that shows such images as kids posing as gangsters and other negative images of people of color in an effort to shame such behavior, the BET show was targeted by bloggers for its potential to exhibit the most egregious examples of bad behavior even before the show aired.

Gina McCauley of Austin, Texas, launched an online campaign against the show through her blog What About Our Daughters (www.whataboutourdaughters.com), saying the show would perpetuate negative stereotypes of African-Americans. Her campaign caught the attention of the Associated Press and other news organizations.

The attention appears to have led State Farm Insurance to pull its ads from the show before its July 25 premiere, according to published reports. Blogger pressure also forced BET to change the name to We Got to Do Better even before its July 25 air date.

The show generated a 0.7 rating over six episodes, better than the network average. BET, though, has not said if it’s considering renewing the show for a second season.

The network also took some heat for “Read A Book,” a short video with a tinge of hip-hop that was intended to promote literacy. Critics such as the Rev. Coates contended the video perpetuated negative images of how African-Americans conduct themselves.

The approximately two-minute video uses stereotypical hip-hop language and images [“read a book, read a book, read a (expletive) book” in a recurring verse repeated in the video as a female dancer shakes her booty with the word “books” tattooed on her derriere] to convey messages of literacy and good hygiene.

But Coates said the video is “offensive” and says BET is being hypocritical for airing a video that network executives would probably condemn if a non-minority-targeted network had aired it.

“Had that video been made by Don Imus or any other white person and they gave the same rationale that they were trying to send a message to young kids in the language they understand, every black leader and organization would be outraged, including BET, but because it’s a black person producing it and perpetuating it, it’s OK,” he said.

Chopped up
But Hudlin, who admittedly was surprised by the controversy over the video, claims the Read A Book short was created as a form of satire in the same vein as Mad magazine or Saturday Night Live, and should not be labeled as a public service announcement for literacy.

“We wanted to create something that parodied all of these clichés and ignorance in hip-hop and make fun of it,” he said, contending that most viewers in the network’s target audience actually got the message.

The NABJ also took BET to task by awarding the network the organization’s infamous “Thumbs Down Award” during its annual convention this past August. The downer? BET’s lack of news and informational programming.

Singled out specifically was BET’s decision not to cover live the February 2007 funeral of Coretta Scott King, the wife of civil-rights leader the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.

St. Petersburg Times TV critic Eric Deggans said he’s seen some improvement from BET on the news side since the NABJ’s “Thumbs Down Award” decision and is willing to give the network the benefit of the doubt with regards to its news coverage.

“I suspect some of the things that we were worried about are a little better now,” said Deggans, who heads up the NABJ’s Media Monitor committee. “They can do documentaries that are very interesting and that talk about things that most people haven’t heard about.”

In fact, during the same NABJ convention in Las Vegas the network won two NABJ “Salute to Excellence” Awards.

BET’s newsmagazine show The Chop Up won NABJ’s best feature/long form award in the network television category for a “Black Ice” segment examining the spread of the drug crystal meth, while news special SOS: Saving Ourselves — One Year Later was named best documentary.

The network’s commitment to news, Hudlin contended, was also displayed through its the two-part Hip Hop vs. America town hall, which took a critical look at the genre and its effects — both negative and positive — on America’s culture.

The series, which aired on Sept. 25 and 26, drew an average of 960,000 viewers and a 0.7 household rating, above the network’s 0.6 third-quarter primetime average.

“We do news that actually connects with our audience,” he said.

Hudlin said he hears the complaints from all corners and takes them all seriously. But he’s also not going to let outside forces dictate the network’s programming decisions.

“The network is not where I want it to be,” he said. “But we work very hard every day to make it better and better. And even with some high profile setbacks this year, we’ve still had a really strong year with great success.”

Will viewers keep the faith? Lee believes so. “I think people will give us a chance. If we give them what they want, they’ll stick with us. If not, they’re going to go somewhere else. But I think the majority of our audience is rooting for us.”

Maybe, but Boyd says the network needs to put up all the shows that it has talked about for months — and soon — or viewers could start tuning out BET completely.

“You can’t blame Hudlin for the things that happened before he got there, but the stakes are really high now,” said USC’s Boyd. “It’s one thing to talk about the changes, but up to this point [those changes] aren’t evident, and people’s patience [with BET] is running thin.”

 
 
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