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'Hillbillies' reality show: Something to heehaw about?
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- A CBS plan to produce a new reality show based on the old "Beverly Hillbillies" sitcom touched off a controversy this week when an advocacy group took out ads in newspapers blasting the TV network. Tuesday's ads from the Kentucky-based Center for Rural Strategies accused CBS of reinforcing stereotypes about rural Americans and mocking people who have endured poverty, hardships and inequities. On the new series, a family from a small U.S. town would be chosen to live in a Beverly Hills mansion as viewers witness how they deal with their new surroundings. Will the show be a stroke of marketing genius or an affront to rural folk? Former U.S. Rep. Ben Jones, D-Georgia, who also played Cooter on "The Dukes of Hazzard," and Sandy Kenyon, a Parade magazine contributing editor, stepped into the "Crossfire" on Tuesday to debate the issue with hosts Robert Novak and James Carville. NOVAK: Let me see if I can get this right, Mr. Cooter Jones. You are upset about the stereotype of hillbillies being perpetuated by CBS after you did so much to perpetuate the hillbilly as Cooter on "The Dukes of Hazzard," where you played a not-so-bright guy. Is that right? JONES: You never watched the show. NOVAK: I sure didn't. JONES: It's been a long time ago. ... And no, we weren't portraying stereotypes. It was pretty much of a Southern show created by Southerners -- a wonderful piece of Americana. Good guys always won; nobody got hurt. Very healthy, positive, ennobling heroes in fact. KENYON: With all due respect, you had a little guy in a white suit and a big fat cigar named "Boss" Hogg. Now if he wasn't a stereotype, I don't know what was.
JONES: But it was for fun, and he always lost and the good guys always won. ... At any rate we're both from the South, and the South is that place where it's OK to [portray] us any way you want to. Reinforce those stereotypes [that] we don't have any teeth, we don't wear shoes and that we're all racist. People are getting sick and tired of it. Now I could care less, but I understand where these people are coming from. What that media elite in Hollywood is saying is, "We're superior. Our culture is superior to your culture, and we're going to make fun of you." And that's offensive to anybody. CARVILLE: I think we'd all agree that if [they] said, "Why don't we take a family of Hasidic Jews in, say, the Williamsburg section of Brooklyn and stick them in the middle of a small, all Anglo-Saxon Protestant town somewhere in the Midwest or the South and just see how they adjust," that we'd all say this is ridiculous. I mean, I would certainly be against that. KENYON: Yes, but look, I've heard a lot of bald jokes in my time. Are you going to organize the people against baldness? Can I say this about "Joe Millionaire," a show that got 30 percent of the young audience? I've got a friend in Arizona named Mike Short, who builds houses. Is he going to be upset because they make fun of this construction worker, the big lug [who] can't dance? You know, this is an equal opportunity offender here. These folks are on TV. I wouldn't do it. You wouldn't do it. CARVILLE: ... All I'm saying is, if we did that to a family of Hasidic Jews or we took an African-American family and we put them there, we would all be appalled. ... KENYON: Everybody is getting humiliated if you wait long enough. These reality shows are the hottest thing going. CARVILLE: I've got a great reality show. JONES: Listen to this. CARVILLE: I want to go to Hollywood, and I want to take these producers, and I want to take these writers and stick their arses in a coal mine and let them make a living there for a year. Let them live off $6.30 an hour, and let's see how they adjust. And the CBS executives. Les Moonbeam [Les Moonves] or whatever the hell his name is, drop [him] down into a damn coal mine. NOVAK: When I'm with Mr. Carville I become the advocate of fairness. It's very unusual for me. But I want to give these people who are developing this program a chance to say what they're doing. And let's see what Dub Cornett, who is the new "Beverly Hillbillies" developer, says. He says, "We will accomplish the most if we cast it well with people who respect themselves but see the humor in themselves. We will end up with a piece that truly has, God forbid, social commentary, and maybe will enlighten, that's it not all barefoot hillbillies." What's wrong with that? JONES: We've got the cast. Me and you. ... What I said was I don't care. I don't think that the lowest common denominator can ever be reached by these geniuses in Hollywood. It is a vast wasteland. They don't have any taste. It is sleaze. They don't care about the heartland of America. KENYON: Then don't watch it. JONES: I'm not going to watch it. Why would I watch it? KENYON: But there are tens of millions of people who are watching this. JONES: They really want to see reality because they don't have anything else to watch. ... CARVILLE: In all of the creativity out there, and there's a ton of it, and all the people out there, you're telling me they can't think of something to entertain people other than trying to let poor people try to make fools of themselves or put them in an environment that they're completely ill-equipped to deal with? ... I saw this "Catch Me If You Can," which was a very creative movie. All these geniuses [have] got to be able to figure out a way that they can entertain young people without making fun of people who have had a hard time in life. That's what we're saying. ... JONES: I loved "The Beverly Hillbillies." CARVILLE: "The Beverly Hillbillies" always won in the end. "The Beverly Hillbillies" was a mock on Beverly Hills. They were making fun of Beverly Hills. KENYON: But also remember this, like "The Beverly Hillbillies," the rich people here will be made fun of. It's a fish-out-of-water story.
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AIRS: Weekdays 4:30 p.m. ET / 1:30 p.m. PT
