Divided nation: How TV is responding to an election-fueled 'wake-up call'

If the election of Donald Trump was a surprise to some, no corner of the country was more shocked than famously liberal Hollywood.

But the sheer size of his group of supporters — many of whom felt disenfranchised and their concerns overlooked — has led TV studios to sit up, take notice and cater to an audience that, while hardly monolithic, represents nearly half of Americans.

Networks readying pilot episodes for potential series are mulling several with religious, military, small-town or spiritual themes that tap into the heart of Trump's appeal.

Channing Dungey, ABC Entertainment president, caused a stir shortly after the election with a speech at a media summit in London, in which she called for a corrective to a slate of her networks’ dramas that too often featured people with fancy cars and nice homes. While TV once embraced geographic and socioeconomic diversity with homespun dramas like Northern Exposure, Everwood and Picket Fences, she said,  “in recent history we haven’t paid enough attention to some of the true realities of what life is like for everyday Americans,” even as comedies including The Middle poked gentle fun at the struggles of average American families.

“Candidly, the election was a bit of a wake-up call,” says David Zaslav, CEO of Discovery Networks. “It asked the question, do we really know who our audience is? Do we know what their worries are? Do we know what they’re passionate about?  It’s the first time in my lifetime where the prism of politics has an effect on what you see about America that’s great, and what you don’t. It was a pivot point.”

In movie theaters, it's more business as usual. Film is a decidedly slower process, with projects often taking years to move from script to screen.

"It's tough to develop a film that speaks to a certain audience on a certain subject matter when it’s going to take you two years to get it out," says Paul Davidson, executive vice president of film and TV for entertainment distribution company The Orchard, which will release its political documentary 11/8/16 close to the anniversary of Trump's election.

And some argue that Hollywood should put its focus on telling the stories of communities at risk. "We have a responsibility to show people what’s going on in the world and that it’s wrong," says veteran film producer Brian Oliver (Hacksaw Ridge).

But TV, by definition a mass medium, has long provided red-state fare: Duck Dynastyjust wrapped a five-year run; AMC has tapped an enduring interest in Westerns; WWE and NASCAR are popular, quintessentially middle-American favorites; and CBS is the most rural-skewing (and most-watched) network.

Some TV veterans argue that racial diversity is still lacking, and say there are already plenty of entertainment choices for the white working class side of the divide.

Discovery’s channels, including TLC and Animal Planet, skew right of center and middle America, so that prism can be reflected differently. “When we do a series on junior pageants, in New York and L.A. it’s a prurient, laughable series of ‘Can you believe it?' ’’ Zaslav says. But in the rest of the country, “it’s ‘That’s where I’m going next Saturday.’ It reinforced these two Americas.”

Discovery adapted its programming focus in the wake of the election. “We didn’t quite understand the challenges and the velocity of the concerns and the anxieties of everyday Americans," he says. "We’re working that into all of our shows.”

But in confronting the new divided nation, showbiz is walking its own tightrope. Would viewers looking for escapist entertainment really rather watch The Waltons than Dynasty, or WGN America's Outsiders (about an off-the-grid Appalachian clan) than Empire? (Apparently not: Outsiders has been canceled).

Representing both sides of the aisle “doesn’t mean you can’t do a show that takes place in a small town, with aspiration, that’s joyful and full of hope,” ABC's Dungey says. “There are a number of different ways to balance the portfolio without saying you need to make something that feels sad or depressing or not fun to watch.”

One of ABC’s first pilots for next season stars country singer Reba McEntire as a Kentucky sheriff who forms an “uneasy alliance” with an FBI agent of Middle Eastern descent who comes to town to help solve a horrific crime.

In other ways, TV is nodding to the new political era. CBS streaming series The Good Fight was hastily reworked last fall to build in reaction to the election by Diane Lockhart, its liberal-leaning lead character, a Chicago lawyer played by Christine Baranski. And Azteca America, a small Spanish-language broadcaster, in April announced The Wall, a drama about a “controversial” president who builds a border wall from the other side to take advantage of cheaper labor.

But for most entertainment executives, something for everyone is the key, especially in a time of fragmented audiences.

“We think a lot about trying to do shows that represent the whole country,” says NBC Entertainment chairman Robert Greenblatt. “We think about, should we be doing shows that appeal to everyone? And the answer is yes, that’s the definition of a broadcast network. We’re more aware than ever that it’s a very diverse country, not just ethnically but socioeconomically.”