Has anyone seen that old show? It's like an old fifties TV show with an all-black cast that is virtually banned from TV....you would never see it at Nick at Night or TVLand. It was pulled off the air following complaints by the NAACP and it has become almost archetypal of racist stereotypes about blacks. So when Trio last night had an hour-program on the show, I eagerly watched to see what all the hullabaloo was about.
The show had humor. There was an episode where the wealthy and conniving Kingfish tried to sell Andy a movie set as a house but, having wised up to Kingfish's ploy, Andy was able to get his money back by beating Kingfish at his own game. But since the show was written by the same guys who wrote for Leave it to Beaver, the show was an obvious cariacature that was almost painful to watch in some parts. The very way Amos and Andy spoke was so affected, so unnatural, and so obvious that the actors were trying their best to talk the way white Hollywood has traditionally represented blacks as speaking (cf. the scene on this subject in Bamboozled). But what really struck me was how the female characters spoke and expressed themselves -- although I could hear snatches of affectedness here and there, they sounded much more genuine, much more real.... much less like they were playing stereotypes. That made me wonder whether white stereotypes of blacks were much developed for men than for women, and whether I was witnessing an intersection between race and gender in the formation of ideological constructs that the actors used in their performances. And even some of the comic situations, which would have worked well with Laurell and Hardy or Abbott and Costello, came off as embarrassing to watch in the way they reinforced certain notions. For instance, it took an excruciatingly long time for Amos and Andy to realize that their house was only a thin facade prop, and while I could perfectly imagine Laurell and Hardy doing the same scene, the fact that there already existed a racist stereotype about the slow-wittedness of blacks pretty much dominated my mind as I watched the scene -- not the humor it was trying to provide. The show is funny, it is also pleasant to watch in some respects, but it stands as a witness to how blacks were represented on TV not too long ago (and still today tho not in the same way). In sharp contrast was another show I saw on Trio several months ago called "East Side, West Side" (starring a young James Earl Jones) which like Amos 'n Andy was also set in Harlem but totally unlike the other show displayed the gritty realities of life and discrimination faced by blacks. Hardly a whisper in Amos 'n Andy about discrimination.
Anyone else saw the show who has opinions?