Outkast Movie FLOPS

[Shallow]

Its because no white people wants to see a musical involving all black people.

What a stupid statement.

Generally speaking, that is true.  Most movies that feature all black characters and that were made by black directors/producers/screenwriters don't do too well.  Movies like "Boyz N The Hood" are a rare exception.  White people love anything gangsta, but pretty much any black movie that feels too "urban", they won't see.  How many black romantic comedies, for example (think "Deliver Us From Eva"), manage to cross over to white audiences and earn serious $$$$?

Well lets look at TV. The Jeffersons averaged between 15 and 18 million viewers an episode over the course of 11 seasons. The top dram and comedy on TV CSI and Desperate Housewives this year average 20 million and 17 million viewers respectively. The Cosby Show was number 1 with 30 million viewers a week for 3 years straight and 5 years at number 1 in total. White people will watch all or mostly black casts if the content proves successful. In films black stars can drive big filmss like Will Smith or Eddy Murphy have in recent eras, or Poitier in past eras. Generally white people will tend to stick closer to white films, and even white artists in music, but I'll bet my life if you did a pole on black households in America you'd find that the top grossing movies among blacks and the best selling albums were way more black films and black artists than the rest of America. I will admit that the racism in Hollywood has been far more apparent than in music as far as what kind of black films and how many are released. It's very rare to find black directors making big budget films and when they do they are almost alwaya "black" films that end up stereotyping their own people or using way too many negative images. Hollywood never had anything like MoTown. The Blaxploitation films were far more demeaning to the black heroes rather than the whites and italians that were made fun of in them.

[Narrator]

^^^^^^ Yet another person who, like Jrome The Nerd, thinks I'm talking about racism when I'm simply talking about whites not being able to relate to "black" movies.

All of the shows/movies you've mentioned are exceptions.  I see enough "black" movies and listen to enough "black" music besides hip-hop to know who their biggest audiences are, and white people are a nearly invisible fraction of it.

[Shallow]

^^^^^^ Yet another person who, like Jrome The Nerd, thinks I'm talking about racism when I'm simply talking about whites not being able to relate to "black" movies.

All of the shows/movies you've mentioned are exceptions.  I see enough "black" movies and listen to enough "black" music besides hip-hop to know who their biggest audiences are, and white people are a nearly invisible fraction of it.

I never said you were calling whites racist or blacks racist. I was just stating that people tend to indentify more with those that seem like them. And they weren't just exceptions. Around the time Jeffersons started, Flip Wilson's show and Sanford and Son were both huge ratings winners. Over the years Good Times, What's Happening, A Different World, Family Matters, Fresh Prince etc had all been hits. The problem wasn't white people relating it was white people getting the chance to see, and quality black shows being made a released. A lot of that cookie cutter shit that flops on UPN and shows like that new Damon Wayans show fail for the same reason so many white comedies fail; because they a text book and they suck.

The racism does exist though. How many mostly black dramas can you think of in the last 20 years? I've read reports that state whites aren't interested in serious back shows because they can't relate but seriously, how many have ever been given the chance to fail? They aren't even being brought out. New York Undercover did okay with certain demographics and no other shows were really pushed. You do see a lot more blacks as major characters of shows but while you see so many almost all white shows you see almost no all or mostly black dramas. Shit, look at Roots; it was a massive hit averaging 80 million viewers a show and a finale that was the highest rated episode ever for a show until Mash's finale and is still the 3rd highest with over 100 million viewers. The sequel didn't do as well but still very well, yet no other black dramas were really pushed after that. If that's not racism then nothing is. A show about black slaves depicted as heroes fighting against the white enemy could get all these white people to watch yet people want to tell me whites won't watch if they can't relate. I won't buy that. Roots succeeded because it was good and ratings grew as the miniseries went on, and everyone at ABC feared it would flop before it was released, but because of quality it succeeded. If TV networks put out back shows that were amazing shows they'd succeed. Of course Networks can't even find hits with white shows these days so I wouldn't hold my breath.

As for music, 60% to 70% of hip hop sales come from whites, and go to any Blues concert by a big name guy like BB King and take a look at the crowd; mostly white faces.