The Racialicious TV Roundup
Courtesy: Advocate.com
By Guest Contributors Kendra James and Jordan St. John and Managing Editor Arturo R. García
MSNBC’s Transgender in America: Hosted by Melissa Harris-Perry, this 20-minute segment started off with a bang when she gave a definition of ‘cisgendered’ on national mainstream media television and only got better from there, including taking time to speak about the CeCe McDonald case. If you still have a bad taste in your mouth from Barbara Walters’ 20/20 interview with Jenna Talackova (in which every question is somehow worse than the last and Donald Trump thinks he’s clever), Harris-Perry’s MSNBC segment might be just what you need to restore a bit of faith in the media. You can read Autostraddle’s full wrap-up here. - KJ
Glee: From 20/20 to MSNBC… to Glee? This episode of Fox’s musical dramedy couldn’t have aired with better timing. When Wade (a student from rival glee club Vocal Adrenaline, played by Glee Project runner-up Alex Newell, who is not a trans actor) comes to Mercedes and Kurt for performance advice, they discover she wants to perform as her female alterego “Unique.” While at first appearing male to the audience, she reveals to Kurt that she identifies as female. Perhaps this isn’t as much of a traditional learning experience as the MSNBC special but, for a show aimed at a younger viewing audience, it seems to be a fairly big step.
Alex Newell. Courtesy: Glee.Wikia.com
This show tends to be one of those shows that thinks they’re being wonderfully progressive by having characters do horrible things, (Like when Finn outed Santana in the middle of a crowded hallway, and it was all okay because she’d been mean to him and because later he spent an entire episode singing to her? Or when their tribute to The Rocky Horror Picture Show included transphobic slurs?), so one can understand the instant apprehension watching this episode might cause. While I was slightly horrified that Sue attempted to purposely humiliate a transgender student in their attempt to present as they identify, Glee’s treatment of the character was fairly positive. They managed to stay away from the slurs this time and, in the end, Unique is just another student giving an improbably good performance in a high school auditorium instead of an oddity or other to be gawked at. Given the series’ track record, that’s a win. - KJ
Smash: Eleven episodes in, NBC’s soapy drama about the making of a Marilyn Monroe musical is still finding its rhythm. There is always one dream sequence too many and some painful over-acting, but then you get a moment that actually works–an inventive cover of Christina Aguilera’s “Beautiful” like we saw in the pilot or the just about any moment with the delightfully campy Angelica Houston–and it feels one strong scene away from finding its niche. Also a plus for me is the show’s effort to show a little diversity with its casting.
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