BET for many years hasn't gotten a lot of respect, reviled for airing mysogynistic music videos, mindless reality shows and more recently, mediocre sitcoms.
That may change with its first hour-long drama "Being Mary Jane" starring Gabrielle Union and debuting tonight at 10 p.m.
When BET introduced a 90-minute film version in July, social media feedback was "Scandal"-like heavy and almost universally positive. More than six million people viewed the July 2 debut and an encore geared to the west coast. Critics even liked it.
"#BeingMaryJane is a good look for BET. This is an upgrade they really needed," wrote blogger Awesomely Luvvie on Twitter that night.
"People were surprised that BET would take on such a gritty, risque, raw and smartly written series," said Omari Hardwick, an actor who grew up in Decatur and plays a married man in love with the very single Mary Jane.
But even before it aired, BET executives knew they had something good going. The network had already shot eight more episodes at EUE Screen Gems in Atlanta that previous spring. They figured it was a perfect fit for a black female demographic seeking a realistic, complex single character handling life in utterly imperfect ways.
"I read ths script and thought, 'I can be good at this, this is in my wheelhouse,' " said Union, who plays Mary Jane Paul, a CNN-type anchor with both challenging family and love-life issues. "The role challenged me in a way that I was ready for."
But BET decided to hold the show's debut for six months - to build anticipation. And that anticipation is rife. On Twitter in recent days, comments such as "I really can't wait for Being Mary Jane - no one understands" pop up every few minutes.
"It goes into our source of pride," Union said. "We weren't surprised. We were prepared. We knew we did good work. But the series makes the pilot look bad. It's so good! If you love the pilot, you'll gag for the series."
Union (who lost out to Kerry Washington for the lead on the very buzz-y ABC series "Scandal") notes that Mary Jane may be smart, gorgeous, engaging and generous, but she is no saint. She can be dogmatic and sanctimonious at work at a channel that she said is "fifth out of five news networks struggling for ratings" even beind CNN. She can be angry and resentful toward her aimless family members she helps support. And she makes poor choices when it comes to men.
She modeled her broadcast persona after Soledad O'Brien, the former CNN anchor best known for "Black in America" series. "She's the barometer for black female journalists with integrity and compassion that are well respected."
http://youtu.be/ZAiBOUUggwM
Mara Brock Akil, the creator of "Being Mary Jane," said Union, who recently got engaged to basketball player Dwayne Wade, "embodies many layers of Mary Jane. She's fearless in her approach to the work. She dives headfirst. She leaves everything on the screen."
This is Akil's first drama after penning "Girlfriends" and "The Game," successful 30-minute sitcoms. "I've mixed real-life drama into these pieces," she said. "But it's still not enough room to express things fully. I have more to say. I needed a bigger canvas."
Her favorite moments on the show, she said, are the times when Mary Jane is alone, thinking or cooking. "Often in storytelling," Akil said, "everything is so rushed. There's not enough time to breathe. I enjoy the space of an hour-long series to tell stories and to give characters a chance not to say anything. Sometimes, that says a lot."
And she notes that when we see single people on TV, they are rarely alone. "Even when I wrote 'Girlfriends,' they were always together. I find that's not really true. We wanted to show that fourth layer of her being by herself."
Akil said she loves writing about women, especially black women - "the nuances, the details, the choices they make, the environment that informs them."
She chose cable journalism as a profession for Mary Jane because "she's telling everyone else's story. Is she really telling hers?" And Akil herself was a journalism major at Northwestern in the early 1990s. "I feel that experience has made me a better screenwriter," she said. "I really love rolling around and figuring out the why."
But she won't be so heavyhanded and tie her work life plot lines so closely with her personal life. "That can get stilted," she said.
And Akil likes how Mary Jane has to balance breaking news at work vs. her personal life. "If my love life sucks, I can throw myself into work. If my love life is great, let me figure out a way to get out of work."
And how did the name Mary Jane come about? It had nothing to do with marijuana. It was the name of an Alanis Morrissette song she ultimately used in the film.
What's the point of trying to dream anymore
I hear you're losing weight again Mary Jane
Do you ever wonder who you're losing it for
"I listened to that song in a loop while writing the pilot," Akil said.
The original show title was "Single Black Female." She loved that name but sister station VH1 already had a hit drama "Single Ladies," also shot in Atlnata.
The new title is more amorphous but also more universal, she said: "Anybody can watch my show and connect with it. They shouldn't be jarred by the fact it's a black woman."
Akil also spent some time working for another sitcom back in 2009, ABC's "Cougar Town" (now on TBS.) She learned from creator Bill Lawrence that comedy didn't require all the comedic writers in one room. He liked to have two or three writers work in pods. "It's something to incorporate," she said.
TV preview
"Being Mary Jane," 10 p.m., Tuesdays starting January 7, BET
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