An island in a sea of TV conformity
It's more likely that a 6-year-old reality show will generate most of the buzz.
The latest iteration of CBS' "Survivor" franchise, its 13th, is, arraying its contestants according to their ethnic and racial backgrounds.
Perhaps only a non-American British uber-producer Mark Burnett -- could get away with thumbing his nose at Yanks' politically correct thinking in such a spirited way.
The show will pit teams of Caucasian, Asian, Hispanic and black aspirants against one another -- repping the least solemn twist on diversity a network has ever come up with.
Critics are already surfacing, claiming the approach could be divisive and harmful to race relations. As though things could get much worse.
The show's backers argue that this latest season will rise or fall, like its predecessors, on its tested merits of bickering, back-stabbing and bullying among contestants. But the racial element will, I think, inevitably play a key role.
With what kind of epithets will, for example, one tribe refer to its adversaries? If the majority of the final contestants are of one race, will they vote along racial lines or will they rise above such prejudices?
Burnett told reporters last week that by putting people in tribes, "they clearly have to get rid of people of their own ethnicity. So it's not racial at all."
At least one advertiser, General Motors, has pulled the plug on its ads, though execs insist the decision was made months ago and had nothing to do with the series' creative decisions. Coca-Cola and Campbell Soup also withdrew earlier this summer.
This is not the first time CBS has found itself defending its choices, though in other instances -- the ill-conceived Reagan biopic, the hicks-in-Hollywood reality series "The Real Beverly Hillbillies," which riled rural sensibilities -- the Eye backed off and never aired the offending shows.
So far, this "Survivor," which debuts Sept. 14 and is set on the Cook Islands, is not being voted off the sked. But I'm betting the already assembled footage is being gone over by the network with a fine-tooth comb.
And if it goes ahead -- and works -- Burnett might be tempted to get even more creative.
How about evangelical Christians against secular humanists, or Hollywood agents vs. managers?
