New, back and black - African-American television programs - includes related article

As the new fall TV season gets under way, it is apparent that the networks haven't broken any new ground in delivering diverse and challenging Black-oriented programming.

While veteran and new Black actors and actresses are appearing in eight new programs and are prominently featured in numerous ensemble casts, they are generally featured in slapstick comedies or ultraviolent street dramas.

Not only are Black performers relegated to specific roles, there are fewer roles for them. This fall season, Blacks have suffered a net loss in prime time shows on the major networks.

Last year, NBC led the way with three new programs that had Black performers in the lead roles. All three shows were canceled. This year, NBC has no new shows starring Blacks, but The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air is back. There are no new Black-oriented shows on the CBS fall schedule either. ABC added two new comedies and has seen a net gain of one. Fox offers returning hits Martin, In Living Color and Roc as well as four new shows aimed at Black audiences.

Talk-show hosts Oprah Winfrey and Arsenio Hall will return to the talk-show circuit this season. Hall is likely to face a stiff challenge in the crowded field of late-night talk shows.

This year's dearth of Black-oriented shows, experts say, underscores the networks' inability to develop quality programming for Black audiences in the post-Cosby era.

Still, all is not lost.

Television megastar Bill Cosby returns to NBC in a series of made-for-TV movies as a crime-solving sleuth. Cosby will also reprise his role as Alexander Scott in an I Spy television movie filmed in Vienna, Austria, that airs on CBS in November.

In addition to her talk-show role, Oprah Winfrey also provides a positive image of Blacks when she steps into the prime time spotlight as executive producer and star of the ABC made-for-TV movie There Are No Children Here. The popular talk-show host and movie actress stars as LaJoe in the real-life story of a Black woman living in a Chicago housing project who refuses to allow her two sons to be defeated by gangs, drugs and poverty. Another Black woman, Anita Addison, directs the movie.

Two other dramas depicting the diversity and abilities Of African-Americans are scheduled to take their place on the fall schedule.

Actor Donald Franklin probably has the most pivotal role of any Black actor in a new drama as Commander Jonathan Ford, skipper of a futuristic submarine in the Stephen Speilberg-created seaQuest DSV. The underwater adventure series, set in the year 2018, airs Sundays at 8 p.m. (EST) on NBC. Also on NBC, veteran actor Michael Waryen of Hill Street Blues fame stars as a high school principal in small-town Texas in the new family drama, Against the Grain, on Fridays at 8 p.m. (EST).

However, the networks are not going against the grain when it comes to new comedies; they are going with the flow, the usual wisecracking roles. The new sitcoms do not vary widely from those presented in recent seasons.

Former heavyweight boxing champion George Foreman stars as George Foster in the ABC sitcom, George, airing Saturdays at 8 p.m. (EST). Foreman plays a retired boxer who starts an after-school program at a high school where his TV wife, played by Sheryl Lee Ralph, is a teacher.

Making her television debut is comedian Thea Vidale, who plays the proud and feisty widowed mother of tour children in the ABC sitcom, Thea, which airs Wednesdays at 8 p.m. (EST).

Standup comic Marsha Warfield returns to nighttime television as a Miami doctor on the NBC sitcom Empty Nest. Seasoned actress Nell Carter joins the cast of ABC's top-rated Hangin' With Mr. Cooper along with pint-sized rapper/actress Raven-Symone. Popular actress Daphne Maxwell-Reid replaces Janet Hubert-Whitten as Aunt Vivian on NBC's The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air. And actor Meshach Taylor returns as a plastic surgeon on CBS' new sitcom, Dave's World.

Blacks also are featured in the ensemble casts of two new NBC comedies. Telma Hopkins, Deon Richmond and Merlin Santana star in the sitcom, Getting By, about a Black family and a White family who share a home in the Chicago suburbs. The show moved from last year's ABC lineup to NBC, where it can be seen Tuesdays at 8:30 p.m. (EST). Also, Daryl (Chill) Mitchell co-stars on The John Larroquette Show on Tuesdays at 9 p.m. (EST).

Hoping to gain on the Big Three, the Fox network features comedian Sinbad in a show about a single parent raising two foster children. The Sinbad Show, which airs Thursdays at 8:30 p.m. (EST), also features comedian T. K. Carter.

The upstart network also unveils Townsend Television, a variety show in the mold of The Flip Wilson Show of the 1970s, starring filmmaker Robert Townsend. The program, seen Sundays at 7 p.m. (EST) offers an array of musical numbers, sketches and film pieces performed by an ensemble cast of comedians, including Paul Mooney.

Also airing on Fox on Sundays at 8:30 p.m. (EST) is Living Single, starring rapper Queen Latifah, comedienne Kim Coles and actresses Kim Fields and Erika Alexander. The show is set around four young, upwardly mobile African-American women living in New York and trying to make sense of their lives and careers. Yvette Denise Lee, a Black woman, is the creator and co-executive producer.