More Black women are creating TV shows. These creators credit each other, not Hollywood

by Randi Richardson via https://news.yahoo.com/

Six showrunners — Leigh Davenport, Nkechi Okoro Carroll, Tracy Oliver, Janine Sherman Barrois, Robin Thede, Lena Waithe — get candid about sisterhood, industry secrets and what it takes to get a show on the air.

Black women in Hollywood have been working behind-the-scenes in TV writing rooms and on sets for decades. Now, more and more, they’re creating their own hit shows.

Take 2022’s TV lineup as an example. For her breakout hit sitcom “Abbott Elementary,” Quinta Brunson made comedy Emmys history; playwright-turned-showrunner Katori Hall delivered another season of Starz’ “P Valley;” Issa Rae is launching a new HBO Max series seven months after “Insecure” ended — and that’s just a sampling.

In 2011, just 4 percent of scripted broadcast television shows were created by a racial minority; and for cable and digital shows, it was 7 and 6 percent respectively, according to a “Hollywood Diversity” report the University of California at Los Angeles released in 2021. By the end of 2020, racial minorities created 10, 21 and 15 percent of all broadcast, cable and digital shows, respectively. There is no breakout data available for specifically Black women show creators.

“Black women have always been behind the scenes and television, particularly (people) like Debbie Allen, Susan Fales Hill, Yvette Lee…

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