Black Character Portrayals in Soaps Today

[frequentsoapfan]

Marcus is nothing more than eye candy. Seriously like TB can not do anything but look sexy he comes off really airhead in every one one of the roles I've seen him in recently. But I like the actress who plays Dayzee and wish they would really focus on her. I thought Thomas and Dayzee had chemistry and she took his character from everyone wishing he was gay just because to people wanting him in pairings with females.

[Dr Neil Curtis]

IKR!!!!! the BET awards are the same way. Denzel and Halle can got 4 yrs without doing a movie and BET nominate them every year.....and they win!

[frequentsoapfan]

I haven't watched the BET Awards since the MJ mess of a tribute.

[R Sinclair]

Ugh! Exactly.

[DRW50]

He did better acting on 7 Lives Xposed.

[Dr Neil Curtis]

You aren't missing a thing....that's all I watch for are the tributes. Whitney Houston's was the best I seen.

That michael one was a mess, because they rushed it.

[DeeeDee]

She'll be recurring in a month.

[VirginiaHamilton]

Last I heard, REG was recurring on The Good Wife. Not sure if she's playing a good role, but from what little I've seen of the show, I'm positive that it's better than the fuckery that she was forced to act out on OLTL - fuckery that would've never been written for her if she looked like KDP (much as I love her).

[antmunoz]

Goldsberry was a featured guest-star as Geneva on Season One of THE GOOD WIFE but her character was downplayed in successive seasons; partly, I think, because Anika Noni Rose's character came to prominence. RHE GOOD WIFE, on the surface, is a very white show, but it does fairly well with several recurring supporting characters of various ethnicities--and, of course, breakout star Archie Punjabi as Kalinda.

Tika Sumpter was GREAT on GOSSIP GIRL and I was really hoping she'd become a regular at the time.

[marceline]

Veering off-topic...

Actually if you look at the last season REG/Geneva got a lot more time than previous seasons. TGW has IMO been very good at featuring characters of color, specifically women. In addition to Geneva, there was Wendy Scott-Carr (Anika Noni Rose), Cary's partner Dana (Monica Raymund) and Imani Stonehouse (Nicole Behari). There was also the girlfriend of Zach Florrick, Nisa. However they've fallen down a bit on black men. We didn't see Lemond Bishop or Peter's minister Pastor Isaiah.

I saw REG this summer doing As You Like It as part of Shakespeare in the Park. She's doing just fine. Trust.

[Quent]

ATWT at one time had the best black characters on daytime. Jessica Griffin, Marshall Travers, Camille Bennett, Denise Maynard, Ben Harris, Isaac Jenkins.. this was a far cry from their days of tokens like Tucker (Steve's sidekick) or Roy Franklin (the token black cop).

[frequentsoapfan]

I wasn't really an ATWT watcher. Did they have black people at the end of the show?

[Quent]

No, at the end of the show there were no major black characters. But in the era I cited above, the show had a great cast. I wasn't a big fan of actress Cassandra Creech, but she had a great storyline involving her with Oakdales two core families, the Hughes and the Snyders, as well as villain David Stenbeck, so she was not on the backburner at all. Lauren Martin's Camille Bennett was a great character, who had her best scenes as the protege of ATWT's best actor, Larry Bryggmann (John Dixon) - and she held her own with him. As for Tamar Tunie's Jessica Griffin, she was fantastic, although they put her in a triangle with someone who clearly had more chemistry with the third part of the triangle.

[marceline]

Isn't it funny how the tokens are always cops and judges? I remember a joke when Novella Nelson (OLTL's Judge Fitzwater) guested on 30 Rock. Tracy said that he didn't want to take orders from someone whose resume said "Black judge" 12 times.

[VirginiaHamilton]

Ah, yes... the third part of the triangle who the writers decided to retcon as having sexually assaulted Jessica instead of getting past their fear of featuring a virile Black man in a prominent (romantic) role on their lily-white show (a.k.a.: the reason why I'd stopped watching ATWT after a few months).

Who were the last Black male characters that was written with care and respect - Malcolm/Neil/Nathan during the Bill Bell days of Y&R?