S1: Welcome in San Diego , it's Jade Hindman. On today's show , PBS NewsHour co-anchor Jeff Bennett is out with a new book about a golden era for comedy , the 90s. This is KPBS Midday Edition. Connecting our communities through conversation. You know , laughter and joy have always been central to the black experience , and the 90s especially , were a golden era for black comedy. But it didn't just start. Then there were others that paved the way for shows like In Living Color , Martin and A Different World. The truth is , black comedians have always shaped culture and civil discourse in America. PBS NewsHour co-anchor Jeff Bennett is out with a new book all about that. It's called Black Out Loud The Revolutionary History of black comedy , from vaudeville to 90 sitcoms. San Diego News Now's Laurence K Jackson sat down with Jeff to hear all about it. Here's that conversation.
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S2: Good , good , good. Listen. Uh , you were the 2025 Washington Association of Black Journalists journalists of the year. So as soon as I saw that , I was like , Jeff's gotta write a book. He's got a he's got a he's he's gotta have something coming at least some t shirts or something. But we get black out loud. Although I know you , you were working on this book for over two years , so can you take us back to the initial inception of Black Out Loud ? Yeah.
S3: No. Well , thank I should say , you know , to your point , I've covered national politics for some 20 years. And so in thinking about the book that I wanted to write , one of the questions I got from publishers is , why aren't you writing a book about politics ? Well , I will tell you , it's because from where I sit , culture , especially these days and and some of the stuff that we certainly saw in the 90s is way more like culturally enduring and durable than is politics and policy. And so one of the lingering questions I've had is , what was it about the 1990s where you had all of these formative and foundational shows that I grew up with black sitcoms like A Different World , Living Single , Martin , Fresh Prince , In Living Color , which sketch comedy ? How did they all exist on the air at the same time ? It wasn't as if there was a single breakout hit , but you had all of these hits that were top rated and they were on the air. They were competing , they were cross pollinating. And what it meant was you had all of these different versions and visions of black life on the air in people's , you know , Americans living rooms , 20 million people a night were watching these shows. And so what was the cultural imprint of that ? What was the cultural legacy of that ? How did we get to that moment ? What did it mean when these shows were on the air ? And then ultimately , why did it all unwind and what are we left with as a result ? And so that was the genesis of this book.
S2: That's really , really cool. I really like your early books message of for those who laughed against the odds and made that laughter a legacy , was the idea of almost laughing as a form of rebellion.
S3: If you look at the origins of black performance in this country , it's minstrelsy. It's vaudeville. So you had these black performers who were on stage and coming up with acts that had to exist in real narrow limits. I mean , all they could do was perform these degrading and dehumanizing caricatures , because that's what the culture allowed. Even before that , a joke was was powerful for enslaved people. I mean , there was a level of communication that was baked into jokes at the time. It was a way of preserving one's dignity , one's humanity. And so in understanding how we got to the 90s and how we got that real renaissance of black comedy and , and sitcoms on the air. When I did the research and I started understanding what influenced the creators and the comedians of the 90s , going back decade before , decade before , decade before decade. What you end up with is the origins of black performance , black comedic performance. And that's what really that's the beginning of the arc of this book. So I start with minstrelsy , I go to vaudeville. You get to the 60s of early 70s with , you know , Dick Gregory and Flip Wilson , Richard Pryor , who sort of just blows the doors off of the place and reinvents what comedy can do. And all of that is the path that the that that the comedians and different performers , performers walked to get to the 90s Renaissance.
S2: All right. Absolutely. Let's let's talk some central themes of Black Out Loud. I'll throw out one and then I'll let you just go for me after going through it. Representation obviously is is to me a central theme , especially when you speak about the 90s and you speak about the breakout shows. You know , all of these families weren't perfect , picture perfect families , but it was nice to get a range of kind of working class , maybe a little bit more rough around the edges , and then just everyday black folks , where sometimes it feels like you have to , you know , be doctor , doctor certain to just to just get acknowledged. But talk to me about some , some of the central themes that we and readers will find in Black Out Loud. Yeah.
S3: Yeah. And it's a great point that you that you raised , because I think one of the gifts of that era was that there were so many shows on the air simultaneously. What it meant was that no one show had to bear the burden of representing the totality of black life. And for black folks who were watching , it meant that you saw different visions , different versions of of yourself , of your friends , of your family. And then again , these shows were popular cross racially. They were the top rated shows at the time. So what it meant was for for other folks , it meant that they were seeing normalized images of of black joy , aspiration , ambition , chaos , as was in the case of Martin Lawrence , um , in their living rooms. And so that's why. One of the reasons why I think these shows were so resonant and impactful was that even though you had these storytellers coming up with these sitcom ideas that were very specific and authentic and true in many ways to the black experience , because they were so specific , it meant that they had universal appeal. Wow.
S2: Wow. That's powerful. Another excerpt from your book that I really liked , it said , I'm a journalist now , but I grew up loving comedy because it was one of the first places I saw truth telling as an art form. Comedians lately. We even did a package on KPBS about this. They've been more vocal around being censored and feeling like , oh , even when I do my stand ups in the Comedy Cellar or the show , the reactions aren't the same as what they used to be. Do you see any comparisons to that and recent threats to our First Amendment rights , and kind of using comics and comedy as a way around that ? In a way it's like , hey , I'm just joking. I'm just joking. Yeah.
S3: Look , you know , comedy has a way of lowering defenses and black comedians for sure have always used comedy as a way to critique , um , the current moment , whether it's , you know , racism or classism , whatever , whatever , whatever the case may be. Um , and it's interesting to hear you say that , you know , modern comics tend to focus more on being being censored , um , because it hasn't always been , you know , that self-referential , the comedy. Um , but yeah. No , it's it's a it's a great point. And one of the reasons , you know , speaking with Sinbad about his , his role on A Different World , he had made the case because that shows the socially conscious in a way that few sitcoms were previous. And he made the point that , you know , that's that's when comedy works at its best , when it gets people to consider a point that they wouldn't have otherwise considered because it's wrapped up in the conceit of a joke. Laughter has always been , in so many ways , central to the black experience. I mean , and it's also true that black comedy has never been just about the laughter. It has been a survival strategy , which was the case for its slaved people. It's been a political language. It was an economic engine. I mean , one of the reasons why the 90s was so seminal in terms of sitcom was because that was when networks and advertisers were looking at black audiences differently. There was a growing black middle class , uh , there was a determination that that was a group of demographic , a TV watching demographic that network wanted to go after. And that was reflected in the programming. So whether it was from , you know , vaudeville to 90s network sitcoms to streaming , black performers have always used comedy to critique power , um , to , to code language , um , and in so doing , it really shaped American identity itself. Absolutely.
S2: Absolutely. Jeff , from vaudeville to 90s. Talk to me about some of the research and preparation. I mean , you are a journalist after all. Talk to me about some of the hard research you went into. Did you go to any libraries ? Did you have to get some undercover files ? I know you did some interviews as well. But talk to me about some of the organization and the preparation that went into organizing a book that is part history from vaudeville to the 90s.
S3: So I knew I wanted this book to be part oral history , because I knew that to really get to the bottom of it and to answer this question , how did all of these shows exist at the same time , and what was the cultural imprint to that ? I had to talk to the people who were either on those shows or created them. So I spoke to the cast , not some of the cast members of A Different World spoke to a Yvette Lee Bowser who created Living Single , who was a writer on A Different World , spoke with Larry Wilmore , who was in the writers room of Of Living Color , who then went on to create any number of shows and then was a mentor to Issa Rae and Quinta Brunson. Um , spoke with Barry Diller , who created the Fox Broadcasting Network , and it was Barry Diller who decided in the early 90s that he wanted the Fox broadcast network to be countercultural and to be completely different from the big Three networks. And that decision is what allowed Keenen Ivory Wayans to have a show like In Living Color. So it was a lot of interviews , a lot of conversation to do the archival work. Um , lots of time spent at the Schomburg Research Center in New York City. Uh , speaking to again , contemporaries of of some of those big acts from the 60s and 70s , uh , and really getting an understanding of how all of it worked together. So , for instance , there would be no Keenen Ivory Wayans without Eddie Murphy. There'd be no Eddie Murphy without a Richard Pryor. There'd be no Richard Pryor without a red fox. There'd be no red fox without the Chitlin Circuit. And so that was kind of how my research evolved. I approached this with the heart of a fan , but with the instincts , instincts of a journalist , and through the research and the conversations , tracked my way to the very beginning of black comedic performance in this country , which was the minstrel stage.
S2: Awesome , awesome. Two of the shows that are mentioned in Black Out Loud are Living Single and Family Matters. They're both shot right here in California. In your research for the book , was there anything new that you learned about either of those two shows or the two of them ? Two of my favorites. Obviously , we have a local hook we have to acknowledge here , but anything new you learned about living single or family matters ? Shot in Culver City , I believe , where you worked for a while.
S3: That's right. Yeah. So Family Matters is interesting because Jaleel White auditioned for Rudy Huxtable. Um , that role was written as well. They were. They wrote the role originally for a boy , and Keshia Knight Pulliam came in and apparently blew the casting director away and ultimately got that role. But Jaleel White was in the running for that role. So had he landed that job , we probably would not have had a family matter. The other thing is that that show was not written around , uh , sort of a nosy next door neighbor. Um , now we all think of that show , sort of a star vehicle for Jaleel White , when really the Steve Urkel character was really not envisioned that way. But it was , you know , when he came on , I think it was the second season. But when he came on that show and , you know , the viewers reacted to it. It then became ultimately The Steve Urkel Show. It created some tension behind the scenes. We talked about that in the book , then living single and speaking with Yvette Lee Bowser. The network execs didn't want the character Maxine Shaw on that show. They felt like she was in some ways superfluous and thought you could just do without it. But Yvette Lee Bowser was intentional about every character on that show and fought for that role. And of the four women on that show. The four characters , the the Maxine Shaw character is , is so important because that character influenced so many young black women who watched it to go into powerful positions. So Kamala Harris , uh , Congresswoman Ayanna Pressley. Stacey Abrams , according to Erica Alexander , have all told her that that Maxine Shaw , attorney at law character , made them think differently about their own pursuits and about what they could achieve because they could watch her sort of work all that out on a fictional sitcom in the early 90s. So those two things really stand out to me , um , as new and surprising. All of which is detailed in the book.
S2: Absolutely , Jeff. Yeah. Instead of just asking you plainly , you know , why would a journalist write a book about non politics ? You tell us when you read the book. You write in a moment when politics can feel both inescapable and exhausting. It's worth remembering that cultural power can be just as essential. Just as essential. Excuse me.
S3: It doesn't happen through politics. And in this moment where you have all sorts of diversity policy being rolled back , um , it's cultural power that I think in many ways is more durable and more enduring. It's not to say that policy isn't important. Of course it is. Policy opens the doors and has opened the doors in so many different ways. But there's really no other alternative , um , to having a family sit down for a half hour and watch whether it's a different world or , um , you know , Cosby Show , um , or Fresh Prince and to watch that whatever hijinks plays out , to have that play out on camera for a half hour every night , you know , and and to have and to come away with normalized images of whether it's black ambition or joy or aspiration or just chaos , if it's in the case of Martin Lawrence. Um , and just to just just see that , uh , and would you have had a Secretary of State , Colin Powell , would you have had a President Barack Obama ? Um , without the the sort of enduring legacy of that cultural power , I'd argue you wouldn't. Certainly not as as quickly as we did.
S2: Geoff , you spoke to it throughout our interview. But if you can , who were some of the other comic figures or show creators that you interviewed for blackout ? Louder ? If you're able to just rattle off some names for us.
S3: Karen Parsons , who played Hillary Banks on Fresh Prince. Um , Sinbad , I think , one of my favorite comedians still to this day. Um. Yvette Lee Bowser. Darryl Bell , who played Ron Johnson on A Different World. Uh , Larry Wilmore. Uh , Barry Diller. Uh , so you get a cross-section of of creators. And then in the book , I also pull from Eddie Murphy's biography , Will Smith's biography , to get a sense of of where they were mentally when they were doing this incredible , um , you know , culturally significant work.
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S3: I mean , the thing about writing a book , I've discovered this is my first book. It is the thing you think about when you wake up. It is the thing you think about when you go to sleep. So one of the reasons I didn't want to write a political book was because that's what I do for my day job , and politics is all encompassing. I didn't want politics or any politician to occupy any more space in my brain than it already , than it already has. And writing this book and then reading the book , um , has just been an act of joy and in these fraught times where people , I think deservedly need a break. Um , this is a great book to pick up. Biased though I am.
S1: That was San Diego News Now's Laurence K Jackson speaking with Jeff Bennett , PBS NewsHour co-anchor and author of Black Out Loud. That's our show for today. I'm your host , Jade Hindman. Thanks for tuning in to Midday Edition. Be sure to have a great day on purpose , everyone.
