I recently spotted a newspaper obituary that brought back a flood of memories: Emmy-award winning actor Gail Fisher died at a hospital in Los Angeles.
If you do not remember that name, maybe you are too young to remember a television show called “Mannix.”
Fisher won an Emmy in 1970 for her portrayal of Peggy Fair, widow to a police officer and secretary to Joe Mannix, the private eye played by Mike Connors. Fisher’s character was added during the second season, the obituary reminded me, to help lift its mediocre ratings. It worked. On the air from September 1967 to the summer of 1975, “Mannix” was one of television’s longest-running hits.
I was not surprised. This dark-brown-skinned African American was beautiful and intelligent, the sort of “super black” pioneer who would pave the way for others in mainstream media.
Remember that this still was a time when blacks were so rare on prime-time television that the mere appearance of “one of us” became an instant family event. Everyone in my African-American household routinely would be summoned to the TV set to witness how well–or how poorly–we were being “represented.”
It is poignantly significant that her obituary did not make it into the newspapers until February, although she died on Dec. 2. It is appropriate for her to be remembered during Black History Month. As one of the first African Americans to be featured in a prime-time drama, she helped to shape public perceptions of all black Americans.
Fisher also was quite possibly the first black person to speak and appear in a national TV commercial. It was for the detergent All in the early 1960s, when any black person on TV was a rare occurrence.
Contrast that with today. People of color are anything but rare on TV. African Americans and other non-whites have moved up into broadcast management and ownership, too. Still, it is dismaying to see how stereotypes persist and how new ones replace old ones.
The hot, new “reality” shows, for example, have made a new stereotype of the good-looking but naughty-acting black male “playa,” to use a popular street slang expression.
There’s Taheed Watson on Fox’s “Temptation Island,” who has lied and cheated on the girlfriend he brought to the show, and both failed to tell the show’s producers that they had a baby together. Having a child was against the rules of the show’s pseudo-adulterous game.
There’s Gervase Peterson from CBS’s “Survivor I,” who slacked off while his fellow “tribesmen” gathered badly needed food and, according to news accounts, had four children with two different women, all out of wedlock, in his off-camera life.
Then there is William “Mega” Collins, the former New Black Panther Party member of CBS’s “Big Brother,” which is now blessedly off the air. The best that could be said for the cocky, self-important Mega is that he, like the other two, was voted off the show quickly.
I know that we should not expect too much brain power or moral rectitude from those who choose to appear on a show like “Temptation Island,” which makes a sport of unfaithfulness to one’s committed relationship.
And, of course, no group’s reality is accurately portrayed on reality TV. These shows are supposed to be entertainment, not documentary. In casting the participants, producers undoubtedly reach for the shocking, the embarrassing and the stupid.
Few people would admit to judging all black people by those they see on TV, any more than I would admit to judging all white people by those who appear on Jerry Springer’s show.
But when viewers are fed a steady diet of stereotypes, stereotypes create a reality all their own in public perceptions. We live in a society that still is so racially divided that disturbingly high numbers of white Americans receive most of their impressions of black life from TV, according to surveys. If so, I do not wonder why racial profiling by police is still a problem.
And as a black parent, I am disturbed that black youths, like other youths, receive too much of their education about what it means to be a man or a woman from the most outlandish “playa” images they see on TV.
With all that in mind, I do not feel the least bit old-fashioned when I find myself longing for the heyday of classy acts like Gail Fisher.
Sure, it is unfair to ask anyone to bear the burden of representing their entire race in the public’s mind. That’s a very heavy burden, but it is inspiring to see someone rise to the task and do it well.
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Clarence Page is a member of the Tribune’s editorial board. Address e-mail messages to cptime@aol.com
