Currently the entertainment industry is under pressure to include more diversity every aspect of production. In reference to my earlier post of the Grammy’s it’s clear that diversity is a huge issue that when not met is criticized by the ever more diverse American audience. There has also been criticism of the Academy Awards for the lack of diversity in nominees and award recipients. The television industry is actually doing a decent job trying to adjust to the demands of the public, making casts and production teams more diverse.
Compared to movies and music individual television shows have a very narrow audience. Instead of appealing to the whole population of the U.S., which still has white as a majority, they have to appeal to niche audiences. Because there are so many television networks and numerous shows per network you develop these niche audience, there no longer is one show that almost every American with a T.V. watches.
This being said Americans have become increasingly demanding of authenticity in all forms of media. Take for instant the modeling industry where models of all body types have begun appearing in advertisements everywhere, this has been welcomed with open arms by the U.S. population as an effort to promote authenticity. The same goes for a T.V. show. It’s no longer believable that a kid that goes to high school is urban to suburban America only interacts with white people. This is not realistic instead casts have been diversified to make the show more believable and realistic. Take for instance shows like The Office, the cast is not all white. In The Office you have Indian, Black, and Hispanic characters as well as straight and gay characters. This makes the show more believable, it would be hard to believe that in Scranton, PA, an urban center, that the cast is entirely white. Television shows are making strides to put people of color as the main character in T.V. shows like Atlanta, The Mindy Project, and Master of None.
Even though the industry is making moves to change the demographics of their casts, the issue of believability still exists. 
In an interview with Aziz Ansari he comments how the all-white sextet of friends in Friends is believable and would have ruined the believability of the show if suddenly they had one Black friend. He also mentions that the stereotypical white girl clique of the show Girls is fine when there are shows like Atlanta and Being Mary Jane that provide diversity to the network. An important aspect of the authenticity of the show that Ansari mentions many overlook is the production crew. He says that you can’t a believable Black girl if they are dressed and their hair is done by someone that has no firsthand experience with their culture.
The television industry has reaped the benefits of diversifying casts; it presents a more believable story that more audience members want to watch. Not only that but it represents groups of people that have been severely underrepresented in film and television for too many years. The industry isn’t perfect, it still under represents groups like gays, American Indians, and the working poor, but give the industry another five or 10 years they’ve already come a long way.
