Television: Late-night is getting less white

During last week's season finale of "Real Time With Bill Maher," newsman Chris Matthews ribbed the host about the evening's lineup: five middle-aged white guys. It wouldn't have taken a "Dateline" investigation for Matthews to take the observation one step further.

Over more than a half-century of late-night comedy, diversity has gotten less attention than falsetto-singing ukulele players. Joan Rivers temporarily reigned as the top guest host on "The Tonight Show" before flaming out on her own venture, while Chelsea Handler is still standing tall, albeit on E!, a cable network best known for reality shows about washed-up wax figures. As for people of color, the genre's only superstar remains Arsenio Hall, whose syndicated series was once significant enough to attract candidate Bill Clinton for a jam session and to give Johnny Carson the only sleepless nights of his career. Aside from those three, late nights have been dominated by Caucasian males, many of whom could share the same tailor and swap monologue jokes without anyone knowing the difference.

That may be about to change. Mo'Nique, the feisty actress and comedienne, launched a new talker this month. In two weeks, both George Lopez and Wanda Sykes will premiere shows that build on their successful careers as stand-up comics and sitcom stars.

But none of them is playing in the big leagues -- network TV on weeknights -- which filled its last open slot with Jimmy Fallon.

"Late-night TV does seem to be kind of a throwback," said Bill Brioux, Toronto-based author of the upcoming book "Night Watch: 50 Years of Late Night." "I don't want to pick on Fallon because he's doing a good job, but that was a lost opportunity to reach out beyond the same old room."

That room extends behind the scenes. A photo of the Emmy-winning writing staff at "The Daily Show With Jon Stewart" could easily have been taken at the Harvard Glee Club. David Letterman might have been sleeping with writers instead of production assistants -- if he could find them. Only three of the 60 writers in the program's history have been female.

Minorities sometimes nab important onstage roles -- bandleader Cleto Escobedo Jr. on "Jimmy Kimmel Live," Biff Henderson on "The Late Show With David Letterman" -- but sometimes the sidekick can slip into stereotype. Brioux chides Jay Leno for turning to black bandleader Kevin Eubanks whenever drugs or football pops up in the monologue ("It's almost cringeworthy the way he's used that way") and suspects that Leno's original sidekick, Branford Marsalis, resigned because he was uncomfortable in that role. Kimmel also gets mileage out of poking fun at security guard/foil Guillermo Diaz for his lack of language skills and his love of tequila.

That background makes the success or failure of these three new shows all the more significant, although each of the main players downplays the term "groundbreaker."

"I'm working with a group of people who don't look at it and say, 'Oh, we've got a challenge because you're a black woman in late night,'" said Mo'Nique, whose show is on BET, which markets chiefly to African-Americans. "I work with a group of people who say, 'Hey, baby. Let's go get it.' If we do like this and put our blinders on, we are not worried about everybody else."

Sykes bristles at the idea that being a woman may serve as an obstacle.

"I put funny first," she said. "I just happen to have boobs."

John Ridley, head writer for "The Wanda Sykes Show," thinks labeling Sykes as a "black female comic" shortchanges her talent.

"If we go at the show as if it's just about her being a black woman, that gets you through the first five minutes," he said of the weekly show, which will air Saturdays on Fox starting Nov. 7. "The other danger is that going with that assumption means being a woman or being black means just one thing. For us, it's really an opportunity to say, 'No, just because we're of color, we may see things completely different.' Let's highlight her uniqueness and not her supposed similarities."

Arsenio set the template

But while the three don't want to dwell on history, they are quick to reference Hall, who was not recruited by networks but embraced by affiliates who picked up "The Arsenio Hall Show" and salivated at the high ratings during most of its five-year run from 1989 to 1994.

Lopez, who appeared on that program 16 times, is hoping to recapture the "party" atmosphere of that series when his show starts Nov. 9 on TBS.

"It's time to take that template and move it to the next level," he said.

Like Hall, Lopez plans to invite minorities who may not get showcased on other talk-show programs. The guest slate on Mo'Nique's show, which debuted to 1.5 million viewers in early October, has consisted almost entirely of blacks, from Ashford & Simpson to Hill Harper.

But they all insist that their primary goal is to reach a wide, mainstream audience.

Michael Wright, head of programming at TBS, points out that Latinos make up only 18 percent of viewers who watch reruns of the sitcom "The George Lopez Show" on Nickelodeon.

"The other 82 percent is everybody else," he said. "We're looking to do a show that serves a lot of underserved audiences as well as play to that broad-appeal audience."

While it would do wonders to the cause of diversity to see Sykes, Lopez and Mo'Nique soar, one needs to avoid labeling any of them as a guru to people of color and women. That's Oprah's department. Their jobs are to be hilarious. If they succeed, they'll have laid the groundwork for the next generation -- and make "100 Years of Late-Night TV" a much better read.

njustin@startribune.com • 612-673-7431