TV less shy of sexuality's former gray areas

Associated Press

College professor Erica (Helen Shaver), a former man who used a sabbatical for a sex-change operation, is a regular character on "The Education of Max Bickford," starring Richard Dreyfuss, left. Associated Press 'The Education of Max Bickford' 7 p.m. Sundays, CBS (KGMB)

The conservative American Family Association alerted its members, and CBS got a handful of protest letters. But no advertisers expressed concern, and moral watchdogs have been quiet.

"I think the lack of comment is an indication that there is an acceptance," said Nicole Yorkin, a creator of the drama. "It's not something they see as so shocking or horrifying that it requires a great deal of discussion."

Erica is not the only one.

Television story lines that probably would have provoked morality debates only a few years ago have passed by unnoticed, either because the public has become used to them or the country is preoccupied with more important news.

Four years after Ellen DeGeneres' sitcom coming-out party was front-page news, a doctor played by Laura Innes on "ER" is quietly coming to terms with being a lesbian. The story began last spring and is continuing this fall.

And less than a decade after former Vice President Dan Quayle complained about Murphy Brown delivering a baby out of wedlock, an unmarried character on "Friends" — television's most popular show — is pregnant. Her friends even turned the idea of marriage into a joke.

"People are jaded," said Ed Vitagliano, spokesman for the American Family Association. "You can see just about everything on national television that this just doesn't seem so new."

Vitagliano's Tupelo, Miss.-based organization has all but thrown in the towel.

"Our basic perspective is that Hollywood is a lost cause when it comes to promoting traditional views of marriage and sexuality," he said.

Erica's acceptance is even more remarkable considering it airs on one of television's busiest nights, Sunday, on CBS, the network that generally has the oldest, most conservative audience. It starts at 8 p.m., during what used to be known as the family hour.

Dawn Prestwich, co-creator of the series with Yorkin, said she was a little nervous presenting the character to CBS. To her surprise, network executives not only approved it, but encouraged the producers to make Erica more prominent.

A woman, Helen Shaver, was cast as Erica. "Bickford" creators said they didn't seek an actor who had been through a sex change because there weren't many to choose from.

Shaver took the role, she said, because it was well-written and offered the chance to work regularly with star Richard Dreyfuss. She researched the part by reading books and talking to people who had undergone a sex change.

The Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation notes that some previous depictions of such characters were used for temporary shock value. They were crime victims, objects to be pitied or shown trying to fool others about their sexuality. GLAAD considers Erica's casting a breakthrough that can help people struggling with their sexuality.

The American Family Association resists this, calling Erica "he" in the magazine it sends out to 200,000 subscribers.

"No matter how many surgeries a person has, their chromosomes determine their sex," Vitagliano said. "Once you've kind of detonated the male-female model, anything goes."

Still, the American Family Association considers Erica more of a distraction than an outrage. Vitagliano said her presence is "weird" in a show that otherwise has much to recommend it: he praises the program for the com-plicated, yet tender, relationship between Bickford and his daughter.

The character has attracted little attention because it's not really a controversy in society, said Robert Thompson, director of the Center for the Study of Popular Television at Syracuse University. Murphy Brown and Ellen became issues, but by the time they went on the air, many in American society had come to grips with single motherhood and homosexuality, he said.

Thompson said "culture war" attacks on Hollywood aren't likely to resonate post-Sept. 11 because they echo the criticism Islamic fundamentalists have of American society — and domestic critics don't want to be associated with the enemy.