"Somebody has to make a visit to the kitchen," says Aunt Donna, the 46-year-old self-described "b - - - - of the family," "and tell them there are 10 Italian-Americans staying in the house and we'd like antipasto and cheese and food around all day."
So you thought "The Sopranos" did New Jersey and Italian-Americans a disservice?
Wait until you catch "The Family," an ABC reality-TV show, that features a sweatpants-wearing middle-class Italian American clan, on Tuesday Night, on ABC, at 10PM (Check your Local Listings).
Dr. Manny Alfano will be taking note of the Sponsors, and will be providing Email addresses, where we will be able to have our dissatisfaction expressed.
"The Sopranos", a drama, with all it's I-A Negative Stereotyping, was stupidly dismissed by some of the more oblivious, as merely "fiction/entertainment".
How will they excuse "The Family", a REALITY show?
"Using" a family's desperation for their 15 minutes of "fame", to hold up an entire ethnic group to ridicule and humiliation is unacceptable!!
Please notice in the first news item that Zell Miller, a Senator from Georgia objected strenously to his Senate colleagues, that the proposed CBS "The Real Beverly Hillbillies, was intended primarliy to ridicule an "ethnic" group--"HILLBILLIIES"!!!
The second news item about "The Family" does a similar diservice to Italian Americans, states Paul Rosetti, editor of the Newark-based Italian Tribune, Rep. Bill Pascrell Jr. (D-8th Dist.), an Italian-American, and Robert Thompson, director of the Center for the Study of Popular Television state.
Paul Rosetti, editor of the Newark-based Italian Tribune, said the show "has all the makings of yet another in the countless attempts by the major media to capitalize on the stereotypes categorizing Italian-Americans as either blubbering buffoons or wise-cracking mobsters."
And Rep. Bill Pascrell Jr. (D-8th Dist.), an Italian-American, said "The Family" "can only add fuel to the fire of perpetuating stereotypes about Italian-Americans. Apparently the producers feel there is only one way to portray Italian-Americans."
As Robert Thompson, director of the Center for the
Study of Popular Television at Syracuse University... states: "If it's
something set up to get loads of laughs, mocking someone's ethnic (background),
that would not be good to do,"...
===============================================
The New Jersey Star Ledger
Tuesday, March 04, 2003
Today's Entertainment
»
Another
Jersey joke
A week ago today, Zell Miller,
a Senator from the great state of Georgia, interrupted a debate over the
judicial nomination of Miguel Estrada to introduce his colleagues to a
true threat to our national security and moral fiber: CBS' proposed "The
Real Beverly Hillbillies," in which a real-life Appalachian family would
be plunked down into a fancy mansion with a see-ment pond, as cameras chronicled
their every slack-jawed move. Miller was shocked (shocked!) to learn that
a television network might present a series designed to make viewers laugh
at ordinary citizens, some of whom might be his constituents.
NJ.com:
Star-Ledger Entertainment http://www.nj.com
/entertainment/ledger/index.ssf?/base/entertainment-0/1046762
=========================================
10 ITALIAN AMERICANS IN
ONE HOUSE = WELL, YOU DECIDE
New Jersey Star Ledger
By Peter Genovese
Star-Ledger Staff
Tuesday, March 04, 2003
You think "The Sopranos" did New Jersey and Italian-Americans a disservice?
Wait until you catch "The Family,"
an ABC reality-TV show, in which a sweatpants-wearing middle-class clan
from Manalapan and various New York 'burbs, ensconced in a glittering Palm
Beach mansion, wage a no-holds-barred battle for a million bucks.
"Somebody has to make a visit
to the kitchen," says Aunt Donna, the 46-year-old self-described "b - -
- - of the family," "and tell them there are 10 Italian-Americans staying
in the house and we'd like antipasto and cheese and food around all day."
Paul Rosetti, editor of the Newark-based Italian Tribune, the nation's largest Italian-American newspaper, said the show "has all the makings of yet another in the countless attempts by the major media to capitalize on the stereotypes categorizing Italian-Americans as either blubbering buffoons or wise-cracking mobsters."
And Rep. Bill Pascrell Jr. (D-8th Dist.), an Italian-American, said "The Family" "can only add fuel to the fire of perpetuating stereotypes about Italian-Americans. Apparently the producers feel there is only one way to portray Italian-Americans."
However, Paul Levinson, chairman of the department of communications and media studies at Fordham University, said that "The Family," unlike "The Sopranos," doesn't pretend to be a serious drama and therein lies all the difference.
"The Sopranos is obviously fiction -- very realistic fiction -- so I can understand people being offended by it," Levinson explained. "But you have brilliant acting and writing. It's in the tradition of high-quality movie-making.
"Reality TV is something completely different," he added. "In many ways it's the lowest form of television. It's not storytelling, it's not acting. The only clever part is in the original idea."
Allison Grodner, co-executive producer of "The Family," expects only minimal backlash from Italian-Americans.
"It's inevitable with anything," said Grodner, who, with Arnold Shapiro, helmed "Big Brother" 2 and 3. "People might look at this, see the (newspaper) headlines and react. But if they look deeper, they will see this is not a crime family, this is a large loving family. They just happen to be Italian-American."
Aunt Donna, a plain-speaking, domineering school bus driver who makes Carmela from "The Sopranos" seem positively wallflowerish, is, with husband Michael, (Uncle Michael) the co-ringleader of this ever-argumentative brood. Their son, Anthony, a dance instructor who lives at home, is a playboy. There's Cousin Ed from Oceanside, N.Y., a catering supervisor and self-described "wise guy;" Cousin Maria from Boston, the family gypsy; bubbly Cousin Jill, from Brooklyn; Cousin Dawn Marie from Staten Island, who believes her family perpetually sells her short; tattooed, bald-headed Cousin Michael from Brooklyn, a warehouse foreman; and Cousin Robert, the ruthless bartender from Manhattan.
"I have a low threshold for bad behavior," hisses Ringo, the mansion's social secretary, as he observes various indignities such as dinner guests stuffing "dirty" napkins back in napkin holders.
"My first thought when I seen frog legs on the table, I wasn't gonna' eat it," Dawn Marie says at the dinner table.
She and the rest of her extended family were chosen from about 100 families who auditioned for the role.
"We cast a family that had big personalities," Grodner explained. "We wanted a large loving family, a competitive family that would fight for that money but in the end would stay a family."
Grodner said the characters' lines were not scripted and their distinct accents -- "Shaddup, shaddup," one of the cousins shouts at one point -- were not altered or pumped-up in any way.
"We didn't tell them to talk a certain way," she said.
Robert Thompson, director of the Center for the Study of Popular Television at Syracuse University, said reality TV shows are by nature "stupid, and that's why we love them." However, he said he would be troubled if the cast members of "The Family" were chosen expressly for their comic appeal.
"If it's something set up to get loads of laughs, mocking someone's ethnic (background), that would not be good to do," he said.
Thompson said "any student of Western drama" needs to take reality-TV shows like "The Family" seriously.
"Starting with 'The Real World,' this was a new way of telling a story," he said.
Levinson, who predicts reality TV "will be completely gone in two or three years," said it "just makes sense" to treat "The Family" as escapist fun, nothing more or less.
"It's theater," he said, laughing. "Theater of the absurd."
10
Italian-Americans in one house = Well, you decide
http://www.nj.com/entertainment/ledger/index.ssf?
/base/entertainment-0/1046762433312560.xml