Analysis Of Hollywood Diversity Report

Produced by the UCLA Center for African American Studies, the 2015 Hollywood Diversity Report is the second in its series, with the goal of analyzing diversity in the Hollywood entertainment industry. The report makes it clear that white men have dominated positions both behind and in front of the camera since the inception of televised media. However, “evidence from this report…shows clearly that America’s increasingly diverse audience prefer diverse content created with the input of diverse talent” (Hunt 13). The call for more diversity from audiences will be an essential driving force for making this desire a reality. The report goes on to cite the subtle corruption of the entertainment academies, which are controlled by white males, and

Like the 2015 Hollywood Diversity Report, which she references in her article, Teitel asserts that more input from diverse talent is the only way the entertainment industry will be able to sustain itself in the future. She supports this claim by talking about the children’s show “Make It Pop”, which is heavily influenced by South Korean K-Pop culture, saying that “the most interesting television show(s) tackling diversity shortage in entertainment exists not within the realm of TV for adults, but for children” (). Teitel goes on to attack the conventional way in which diversity is portrayed in media, a type of “tokenism” of marginalized characters, in which you have a stereotyped casting of minorities as well as a “one is enough” standard. In a concise summary of her article, Teitel states that there is “power in representation, but greater power in numbers”

These actors discuss the growing diversity on television, especially non-network shows like the ones the interviewees are a part of. Uzo Aduba, a black actress, states that “new tv shows signify a move in the right direction but it’d be foolish to think that tv has evolved as much as it needs to” (Berman n.p.). Titus Burgess, a black gay actor, stated that if he had had the type of representation he himself was providing today, he might have had an easier time accepting himself as he was growing up, proving that representation has a large impact on the targeted audience. The shows these actors appear in have been widely popular, supporting the claim from the 2015 Hollywood Diversity Report that input from diverse actors is what audiences want to see more of. “Audiences are ready for the truth and whatever that truth might look like…[and] authentic representation as an extension of that” (Berman n.p.). “Can Empire Change TV?” explores the growing and consistent trend of shows that feature a diverse cast and key minority roles having some of the highest ratings in their respective genres. The