ABC | VivirLatino

Posts Tagged ‘ABC’

Another Show I Won’t be Watching in the New Year : Homeland Security USA

9:57 am By Maegan La Mala · TV · Comments Off

24 Dec 2008

Reality tv is turning into pr for the United States Department of Homeland Security with their own reality show on ABC.

What would you do?

1:42 pm By Jennifer Woodard Maderazo · TV| race · Comments Off

24 Mar 2006

I rarely watch network TV, but last night I was lucky enough to catch a fascinating episode of ABC’s Primetime entitled “What would you do?” ABC conducts experiments to see what people what people would do in certain situations: if they saw a child getting beaten up by other kids in a park, a couple fighting, etc. But I was particularly interested in the segment called “Taxi Cab Slurs”.

The premise is simple: put an actor in taxi cab as the driver and have him go off on a racist tirade to see how the passenger reacts, if at all. All of this is caught on hidden camera, of course.

They started out in New Jersey, where they picked up a business woman who is described as “Puerto Rican”. The driver starts going off on “Arabs” and the woman looks uncomfortable. Slowly she starts to counter his claims saying something like “I don’t agree because that would be prejudice and I am not anywhere close to being prejudiced.” Well, maybe not against middle eastern people, but what about Asians? When given the chance, this “woman of color” starts on Asians and can’t stop. Her prize-winning moment is when, in talking about the way Chinese people drive, she says “You know they can’t see right to left out of their eyes.” Classy.

Lopez + Prinze Does NOT = “Latino Hour”

7:53 am By Maegan La Mala · TV · 6 Comments

18 Oct 2005

A recent article calls attention to ABC’s 8pm-9pm Wednesday night line up. It quotes:

Let’s get one thing straight: Just because George Lopez and Freddie Prinze Jr. are Hispanic men with their own sitcoms on ABC, and their shows just happen to be scheduled consecutively on Wednesday nights, doesn’t mean there’s a new “Latin hour” on prime-time television.

Now, I have to say, I agree with part of this statement. You couldn’t come out and say “It’s Jewish Time”, or “African American Line-Up”…but many people are referring to The George Lopez Show and Freddie as the “Latino Hour”.

Here’s the only part I really don’t agree with of the quote mentioned above:

…and their shows just happen to be scheduled consecutively on Wednesday nights…

Their shows are not accidentally lined up next to each other. I’m sure the ABC had planned on marketing this either officially or unofficially as a “Latino Hour”. And, Prinze thinks so, too. In another article he states:

“I’m not so sure that the network should be creating a Latino hour,” he said. “Maybe our two shows should stand alone.”

Maybe he’s right. You don’t have to know that Freddie is a “Latino” show. You just have to know if you like it or not. If you laugh, keep watching. If not, then find something else.

[Lopez says:]“Just watch because you think the shows are funny. Don’t watch because we’re a couple of Latino guys.” To which Prinze added: “I have no patience for that. Because Latino is cool, all of a sudden, they’re like, we’ll say this and we’ll be cool. Shut your face, man. It’s TV.”

It’s no secret that corporations are finally aware of the power of the Latino/Hispanic audience. But there are still a lot of lessons to learn. Maybe today’s lesson to big business is this: If you want to focus on an audience, a target market, then do it. Research everything there is about it, and create your campaign based on those needs. But by throwing around the words Latino and Hispanic in situations that it could feel discriminating, you may be hurting yourself more than helping.

Via / Buffalo News

Prinze complains about “Latino Hour” in another interview.

Daddy Yankee in good with the big guys

10:49 am By Jennifer Woodard Maderazo · Celebrities| Marketing| Music · 1 Comment

30 Sep 2005

After heavy coverage in the New York Times and a general buzz that just won’t quit, it seems mainstream media has truly embraced Reggaeton in earnest now, as evidenced in this press release from HispanicBusiness.com (via PR Newswire):

ABC Radio Networks To Create And Syndicate Daddy Yankee National Radio Program

PR Newswire

NEW YORK, Sept. 29 /PRNewswire/ — ABC Radio Networks announced today an exclusive agreement to create a weekly two-hour syndicated radio program hosted by Puerto Rican Reggaeton sensation Daddy Yankee. This new enterprise underscores the network’s commitment to develop quality programming for the fastest-growing segment of the United States population.

Very transparently, the last line of that paragraph refers to the Latino market boom. ABC, surprisingly, has been pretty quick to identify Daddy Yankee as their inroad into the elusive Latino youth market. And pretty quick to write him a quote in the release that I can’t image actually coming out of his mouth:

“I aspire to be a trendsetter and I hope that with this deal I will be able to open doors so that others might be able to follow. I am proud to be the first Reggaeton artist to have his own nationally syndicated radio show and with this tool I will be able to reach audiences we hadn’t been able to reach before, this will prove to those that still doubt it, that the Reggaeton movement is a real musical genre,” Yankee reiterated.

“…Yankee reiterated…”

I love PR.

Freddie’s Stubborn Grandmother

11:52 am By Maegan La Mala · TV · Comments Off

19 Sep 2005

Related to a previous post “Español Ready for Primetime”, ABC will also air a new sitcom “Freddie” on October 5. The characters in the show will include Freddie’s (played by Freddie Prinze Jr.) grandmother, a temperamental woman who refuses to speak English and only responds in Spanish.

Her dialogue will apparently be subtitled for English-speaking viewers. Although I’m not sure that this sitcom will be long-lived, nor am I confident that this scenario is the most appropriate one, this is part of an overall trend to use and accept the Spanish language as part of American culture.

Español ready for prime-time

8:23 pm By Jennifer Woodard Maderazo · Bilingualism| Marketing| TV · 1 Comment

16 Sep 2005

Some people have no idea what that button on their remote marked “SAP” does. Network giant ABC knows, and they want Latino viewers to use it, according to the LA Times.

This Fall, ABC will become the first English-language broadcast network to make all its prime-time programming available in the language of Cervantes. While the Spanish subtitles (or dubs) may mark a pop-culture milestone, it’s unclear they make for wise corporate strategy.

Wise or not, it was bound to happen. With the success of ABC shows like Lost and Desperate Housewives in Latin America and Spain, as well as competition in these markets from CBS’ CSI, it’s no shock that networks would want to attempt to replicate that in the US Latino market. I, for one, believe that there are many people who will take advantage of this when it is offered, and not all are monolingual Spanish speakers.

adriana: I have been following this too, as my alma mater is one of the colleges that banned the Russell gear [...]

Nelson G.: Did Ruben show up? [...]

Transgender Day of Remembrance and Latin@s | VivirLatino: [...] America still painted as more transphobic than the good old U.S. of A, all we need to do is lo [...]

Maegan La Mala: intellectual jism....ja ja. I love you [...]

Maegan La Mala: Chip, Thanks for the info I will add this above. I don't have any other info about the Sunday vi [...]

VivirLatino