How To Get Away With Changing The World Through Television
What do Grey’s Anatomy, Scandal, and How To Get Away With Murder all have in common? That would be the shows’ amazingly talented writer and producer, Shonda Rhimes (pictured left). For many reasons, Rhimes is an agent of change in television, and I am very inspired by her.
Shonda Rhimes is an agent of change because she makes shows that are inclusive and represent what the real world looks like. The real world doesn’t look just one way. It doesn’t look like just one race, ethnicity, age, or sexuality. It looks like many. And that’s what Shonda Rhimes’ television shows include. Members of many different backgrounds, ages, races, and sexualities. Monica Petrucci from The Odyssey Online states, “Some people are taken aback by the large amount of diversity present in Shonda’s series in comparison to other television shows, but she says they shouldn’t be; she’s simply representing the world as it is. Shonda Rhimes’ take on diversity in television isn’t abnormal, general Hollywood’s is.” Rhimes uses her platform to portray the world and the people we truly see all around us. Not the fantasy world that Hollywood shows. Why are people so shocked to see minorities on television characters that are successful, when this is based on real-life? It’s because they don’t want the world of film to show badass POC (people of color) characters, because they get already enough of that when not looking at television. The world is progressing and more and more minorities are showing their full potential and getting the power, credit, and representation that they deserve and some people aren’t here for it. Those are the people who are shocked. Minorities, however, who have been underrepresented in television media for far too long, have been waiting for this revolution. There are finally shows that have characters that look like them and their communities. Characters that they can relate to and resonate with personally and culturally. In an interview with TODAY, Rhimes says, “One of the things I’m really proud of is getting to put these images out there so that young women can see different versions of themselves… I always think about Scandal and Kerry (the lead actress) having straight hair sometimes or she wearing her natural hair sometimes or Viola (lead actress in How To Get Away With Murder) taking off her wig…if you never see it, it never feels okay.” Both Kerry Washington and Viola Davis are African American women. With them as the lead of two incredible shows whose characters are fearless, educated, vulnerable, successful, and take no bullshit from anyone, they inspire young women, especially black women, that they can be the subject of the conversation. That they don’t need a seat at the table when they can have their own table. That’s what Rhimes shows us. She uses Scandal’s Olivia Pope (Kerry Washington) and How To Get Away With Murder’s Annalise Keating (Viola Davis) to portray women that we know, versus made-up “perfect” women like we see in the fantasies that Hollywood has created. When Scandal premiered in 2012, it was the first show in 38 years to star an African-American woman (Glyder). In 2015, Viola Davis became the first woman of color to ever win the Emmy category for outstanding actress in a drama series for How To Get Away With Murder (Rich). Rhimes, Davis, and Washington continue to make history. There are now quite a few shows that have female African-American leads, but it took Shonda to break the ice. Rhimes, as an agent of change, paved the way for diversity in the world of shows, and for the advancement of POC’s in the television industry.
Works Cited
Petrucci, Monica. “How Shonda Rhimes Shows Are Changing The World.” The Odyssey Online, The Odyssey Online, 16 Oct. 2019, www.theodysseyonline.com/shonda-rhimes-shows-changing-world.
“Shonda Rhimes Dishes On Her New Netflix Shows.” TODAY. TODAY, 9 Oct. 2019, https://youtu.be/c2FMDkO07tI
Glyder, Illustration by Kimberly, et al. “The Unstoppable Force That Is Shonda Rhimes.” National Geographic, 1 July 2019, www.nationalgeographic.com/culture/2018/11/shonda-rhimes-producer-greys-anatomy-scandal-praise-difficult-women/.
Rich, Katey. “Viola Davis Makes History With Win For Best Actress in a Drama.” Vanity Fair, Vanity Fair, 21 Sept. 2015, www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2015/09/viola-davis-emmy.
