For those who had “earned” white status by the latter part of the twentieth century,1 they began to appear as mainstream America n crimefighters, especially on television, given the expanded time and space the medium affords. The 1970s showcased more diversity that included a starring turn for the Greek American Telly Savalas in the CBS show, Kojak (1973–1978). The role was reprised in a limited USA Network series in 2005, this time with the African American Ving Rhames in the role of Det. Theo Kojak; the surname was retained, which is actually Polish but interpreted as Greek in the original show to match Savalas ’s ethnic background. Whether embodied by Savalas or Rhames , and in keeping with the prevailing norm of a Hollywood cop, Kojak regularly breaks the rules, although one reviewer noted that the 1970s version “had a little more respect for the law” than the reboot.2
Another blend of ethnic identities was evident in Columbo , which aired as an episodic series and as TV movies from 1968 through 2003 (on NBC, then later on ABC), and starred the Jewish Peter Falk as the fumbling but shrewd Italian American detective, Frank Columbo. Another memorable Italian American cop, the “maverick” NYPD detective , Tony Baretta, was featured in Baretta (1975–1978)—this time portrayed by the Italian American Robert Blake (born Gubitosi). The above characters’ ethnicity was still regarded as incidental rather than purposeful until Frank Furillo , the Italian American captain in Hill Street Blues , discussed in Chap. 3. Matched by the actor’s ethnicity, Daniel J. Travanti’s Italian-ness drew notice on occasion, with his girlfriend often referring to him as “pizza man.” In a more telling exchange with his Latino lieutenant, who was complaining about prejudice from Anglos, Furillo offered, “I’m not exactly Anglo” either,3 referring to his community’s hard-fought battle for acceptance as normative (white) Americans.
Jewish cops too become more commonplace on television, including one half of the 1970s television duo, Starsky & Hutch (1974–1979), with Paul Michael Glaser portraying David Starsky . Similar to the characters mentioned above, there were few markers of any ethnic “difference.” Hill Street Blues , discussed in earlier chapters, also included two Jewish cops , Henry Goldblume (Joe Spano ) and Sgt. Mick Belker (Bruce Weitz )—the former depicted as an intelligent and deliberate member of Furillo ’s inner circle, while the other was an explosive undercover cop —and both with flashes of their “difference” incorporated into some plots and exchanges of dialogue. Hal Linden , as the Jewish captain in the ABC comedy series, Barney Miller (1975–1982), embodied a pragmatic but empathetic boss whose run-down precinct of hard-working detectives amicably co-existed despite their cultural differences. The show featured other Jewish cops , including the over-the-hill Det. Phil Fish (Abe Vigoda ), who delivered sardonic asides like a Borsht Belt headliner; and Det. Arthur Dietrich (Steve Landesberg ), who regularly mixed his intellectualism with a dry wit. These characters’ portraits of ethnic difference too were not central but peripheral to their makeup, made manifest only in the occasional Christmas-timed episode, but otherwise indistinguishable from other normative (white) male cops on TV.
Another of the era’s Jewish cops was Det. John Munch (Richard Belzer ) from the NBC series, Homicide: Life on the Street (1993–1999). Munch was among the key players within another large ensemble cast—a tapestry of cynical but involved detectives who chip away at their grim cases within a battered Baltimore , which Barry Levinson , the show’s executive producer, describes as “divided by race, religion and class, as are many cities in the United States.”4 Munch was intense and sarcastic, more devoted to conspiracy theories than to any one of his four wives. His character also remarkably “crossed over” to appear in ten different network shows, most notably SVU for fifteen seasons.
Although Munch ’s Jewishness was never a particularly salient part of his characterization, more a vaguely cultural marker, until the episode, “Kaddish.” When asked about his faith in one scene, he offers, “The only thing I have in common with Judaism is that we both don’t like to work on Saturdays.”5 The story makes clear, however, that Munch knows Jewish burial laws, a couple of Yiddish words, and even more about prayer. In the episode flashbacks to his high school days reveal his crush on a female who is now a homicide victim. It forces him to reckon with his identity, which includes having been bullied in his youth while dreaming of becoming a detective like Johnny Staccato—the hip, jazz-playing private detective and namesake of the NBC series from the late 1950s. During the victim’s shiva, Munch refuses to participate in a minyan, which involves a group of ten Jewish adults needed for specific prayers. When the victim’s daughter presses him, he claims not to remember the mourner’s Kaddish, a hymn that praises God on behalf of loved ones who have passed. Later, after finding her picture in his yearbook, he catches up with the other mourners, prayer book in hand, and pulling a yarmulke from his pocket before joining them in the ritual service.
Homicide also featured African American male detectives who surpassed the usual limiting stereotypes , including Lt. Al Giardello (Yaphet Kotto ), who once chastised the acerbic and gifted Det. Frank Pemberton (Andre Braugher ) about needing to be more of a team player, adding, “This is not a black thing. This is a blue thing.” If Homicide had a weakness it was its all-male universe for the first five seasons, as its lone female to that point was written out of the series. Melissa Leo , who portrayed Det. Kay Howard , claims she was terminated over disagreements with writers about her character’s lack of growth, growing weary of serving as the foil for the squad’s more three-dimensional males. The series remains one of TV’s most critically acclaimed crime shows, winning three Peabody Awards in the late 1990s for “its ongoing record of distinction and achievement,”6 but also struggling to find wider acceptance with a stronger viewership. As Levinson explained at a 2018 reunion of the show’s cast and creators, its legacy and influence on subsequent shows is unmistakable, with its focus on characters, especially how they worked together and paid a price for the type of work they do.7
Looking for a Contemporary Charlie Chan
Asian Americans remain a profoundly underrepresented group among homegrown crimefighters. Dozens of films in early Hollywood had featured the fictional, Honolulu-based, Chinese detective Charlie Chan , most notably portrayed by Swedish American actor Warner Oland in “yellow face.” The character, beloved by some and considered racist by others, left a lasting impression that has made it difficult for Asian American characters to overcome. Chan’s skills as a clever detective were often overpowered by his steady stream of “pseudo fortune-cookie aphorisms,” notes Yunte Huang , who explains that Chan was based on an actual Hawaiian cop, Chang Apana , a type of “cowboy” cop who used a “rough-riding paniolo” (or whip) that spoke “louder than any law or gun.”8 For a nation that enacted the 1924 Johnson-Reed Act, better known as the Immigration Act 9 that put harsher quotas on non-white immigrants , early Hollywood responded by limiting Chan’s gifts to exotic and ages-old “Oriental ” wisdom, leaving out any aggression that might remind mainstream viewers of the “yellow peril,”10 which such legislation and public fears had embraced.
Further complicating matters is that the two major Asian cop characters in Hollywood productions in recent decades both have their roots in Hong Kong action cinema . Jackie Chan portrayed Inspector Lee who buddies with LAPD Det. Carter (Chris Tucker ) in the Rush Hour franchise (1998, 2001, 2007, and a fourth film in production), with cultural clashes highlighted as part of these films’ appeal. In one scene, Carter and Lee spar over whose father has the most impressive cop credentials, with Carter claiming, “My daddy’ll kick your daddy’s ass all the way from here to China, Japan, where ever the hell you from and all up that Great Wall too.”11 The other Hong Kong action star, Chow Yun-Fat , portrayed the immigrant cop , Nick Chen , in The Corruptor (1999), also serving as sidekick to rogue NYPD detective , Danny Wallace (Mark Wahlberg ). The film also includes the rogue’s familiar line, but one that elicits an insightful response as Wallace tells his father in one scene, “The ends justify the means, Pops,” to which his father replies, “The ends is bullshit. The means is what you live with.”12
Lucy Lui , a Chinese-American actress, is among even fewer available Asian American females in Hollywood. Lui portrayed a uniformed cop character in Southland but who is disgraced for having lied to Internal Affairs to protect herself after shooting an unarmed civilian who pointed a toy gun at her. In the Charlie’s Angels films, Lui portrays the tough “angel,” Alex Munday , who shows off her mastery of the martial arts—a go-to skill for an Asian American working in Hollywood.13
Barney Miller , discussed above, also included a comic portrait of a Japanese American cop, Det. Nick Yemana (Jack Soo ), whose wisecracks often exposed the vacuous nature of stereotypes but also hide their darker harm. In one exchange, a precinct visitor notes Yemana ’s wit, adding, “I didn’t know Orientals had a sense of humor,” to which Yemana responds, “Are you kidding? We invented gunpowder.”14
Although the CBS show, Hawaii Five-0 (1968–1980), was primarily a vehicle for its lead white male detective, Steve McGarrett (Jack Lord ), the show also featured several Asian American actors, including Kam Fong Chun as Det. Chin Ho Kelly (once a real Hawaiian cop); and another Hawaiian, Gilbert Lani Kauhi (also known as Zulu ) as Det. Kono Kalakaua . Without the glamorous locale and “natives” to lend a touch of the exotic, though, the show was a routine police procedural . A reboot of the show debuted in 2010 and is still in production; and despite the passage of thirty years, it remains a vehicle for its two white male leads, Alex O’Loughlin as McGarrett and Scott Caan as Danny Williams , originally portrayed by James MacArthur as McGarrett ’s second in command. The reboot debuted with the additional Asian American characters , with Daniel Dae Kim and Grace Park reprising the roles of detectives Kelly and Kalakaua , respectively, but both actors left the series in 2017 amid charges of pay inequities and the “whitewashing ” of storylines. The highly publicized departure became part of the #OscarsSoWhite controversy and prompted Kim to post a Facebook message that noted, “The path to equality is rarely easy.”15
Another issue for Asian American actors and their characterizations is the misunderstanding of the vast diversity behind the blanket term “Asian,” which may include nations stretching from Turkey to Japan.16 It is a region Edward Said once described as having been categorized by Western colonizers as exotic, mysterious, backward, and deceptively cunning—a broad, racist approach he dubbed “orientalist .”17 To further compound matters is that actors with Indian backgrounds are often classified as South Asian and find work in Hollywood “passing” as Middle Eastern or Latino/Latin American characters. One high-profile example is Priyanka Chopra , who was born in India but emigrated to the United States at age 13; she starred as Agent Alex Parrish in the ABC series Quantico (2015–2018), in part having earned international fame as a major star of Bollywood films, known for their lavish musicals set in the Indian metropolis of Bombay (now Mumbai).18 Quantico is a series about agents-in-training at the FBI Academy in Quantico, Virginia, and is told in flashbacks after a terrorist attack traces back to a sleeper agent hiding among the recruits. The series includes a diverse cast of characters rarely seen on US television, and although somewhat contrived for their “differences,” include a gay male, a Mormon male, a Latina , and a set of twin Muslim females (both played by Yasmine Al Massri )—the hijab-wearing sister among the first to be suspected as the mole. It was an interesting experiment that premiered to favorable reviews and decent ratings, but with melodrama soon overwhelming the crimefighting, sinking ratings eventually ended its run. 19
Native Blue: Transforming America’s Original Frontier Other
Since Native Americans were once considered the nation’s primary “enemies,” charged with resisting its Manifest Destiny , it follows that few males or females with ties to continental tribes have embodied crimefighting heroes in Hollywood stories. However, a set of films that originally aired on PBS—later available on DVD and livestreaming, and with Hollywood legend Robert Redford serving as executive producer that present a native-based perspective of tribal police worthy of including and examining more closely here. They are based on the best-selling mysteries by Tony Hillerman with Officer Jim Chee (Adam Beach ) as a young uniformed officer in the Navajo police force and whose partner is the more experienced Lt. Joe Leaphorn (Wes Studi ), a college-educated urban detective who had been working in the big city and now back on the reservation due to his wife’s illness and desire to return home. While Leaphorn has difficulty adjusting again to tribal life, Chee struggles to be both a good cop and a good Navajo—the former mired in logic and evidence, the latter dependent on rich native spiritual and cultural legacies. Rather than choose to be “blue” at the expense of his Navajo identity, Chee attempts to integrate the two.
In the first film, Skinwalkers (2002), a murderer is posing as a skinwalker—a supernatural being in Navajo culture . After three elder medicine men are killed, Chee and Leaphorn find clues that involve arrows made of human bone and footprints that turn from animal to human; Chee recognizes other cultural clues that only confound a doubting Leaphorn who seeks plausible explanations less rooted in what he considers native “superstitions.” Chee , who is learning to be a healer, uses his Navajo ways in addition to his police training to successfully expose the reservation’s new doctor as the murderer. Chee learns that Dr. Stone (Michael Greyeyes ) was raised by white parents in Santa Fe and now wants revenge on the medicine men who failed to treat his biological father, who became gravely ill after being exposed to lead poisoning from a nearby paint factory.
The second film, Coyote Waits (2003), tracks the murder of a Navajo cop , with Chee getting injured while trying to rescue his colleague from a burning squad car. After being put on medical leave, Chee remains saddened and stumped by the nature of the crime, which like most mysteries includes tracking several suspects until the real killer is revealed. Among the suspects is an elderly Navajo hired by an ambitious scholar to help locate the bones of Butch Cassidy, rumored to have escaped capture according to Navajo stories—a discovery that could earn the scholar fame and riches. A subplot features a Vietnamese family struggling to make a new life in America, which encourages Leaphorn to share his experiences about feeling like an outsider, having been “a Navajo in an ocean of white people” while in college.20
In the final film, A Thief of Time (2004), an archaeologist is poaching pots that she believes hold the secret to the ancient Anasazi culture. After she disappears, other poachers and their accomplices turn up dead, pointing to a suspicious pair of rival scholars most interested in the pots for what they can yield on the black market. While Chee and Leaphorn eventually solve the murder mystery, the film also glimpses the “theft” of cultural artifacts found on native lands, which are sold to private collectors or cultural centers with few if any tribal affiliations.
Hillerman explains that his novels were rooted in a respect for Navajo culture , including “their value system,” one in which Redford wanted replicated in the films, incorporating realistic and contemporary Native American life, and “not in some imagined way … or some bad Hollywood movie that just always characterized Native Americans as monosyllabic villains.”21 Rather than an either-or proposition, the two cultures are shown to work in concert. That integration was made possible by hiring predominantly Native American actors and crew, including director Chris Eyre, who first earned critical acclaim for Smoke Signals (1998).
Like other screen cops, the “blue” in Chee has him pressuring a defense attorney for an address she is not authorized to share, later reprimanded by his boss who complains that Chee “doesn’t play by the rules.” He also loses his temper with Ashie Pinto (Jimmy Herman ), after the elderly Navajo refuses to answer Chee ’s questions. Pinto continues to speak in Navajo about the need to “restore harmony,” which Chee scoffs at, finally losing patience and physically attacking Pinto . Leaphorn chastises Chee for so aggressively trying to get Pinto to cooperate, asking, “So you’ll beat it out of him … is that what they taught you? Is that what I taught you?”22
In other smaller moments of the films, being Navajo plays a crucial part in the storytelling, including Chee ’s ability to speak the language, which enables him to approach witnesses and suspects with more facility than Leaphorn . In the final showdown in Skinwalkers , Chee reminds Stone that as a doctor and a healer he should honor “the sanctity of life,” while Stone lumps Chee in with his contempt for medicine men, charging that Chee is another of “the stick waivers” and “a dying breed.”23 Although Chee demonstrates his talents as an investigator and eventually tracks down Stone , he also experiences strange visions from a “bone bead” lodged in his skin, about which a healer had warned; he also sees images of a skinwalker during his struggle with Stone , who is ultimately shot and killed by Leaphorn .
As Chee evolves into a competent cop, he also grows as a healer, shown praying over bodies, even instructing his cat “to eat what you kill,” another nod to traditional beliefs. At the end of Skinwalkers , Chee completes a sand painting for Leaphorn ’s wife to help her cope with her illness. In Coyote Waits , he repeats the ritual to help both his colleague’s widow and Pinto , with Chee showing compassion to the elder who eventually admitted to having killed two men in a drunken stupor. Janet Pete (Alex Rice ), the defense attorney who had returned to the reservation from the East Coast, shows her ability to balance being a lawyer who relies on evidence with her faith in Navajo practices, including a medicine man’s remedies that she vouches helped her father cope with diabetes. As she grows closer to Chee , she also observes, “Wow, a medicine-man cop. Illogical, contradictory, how wonderfully Navajo.”24
None of Hillerman’s eighteen other novels featuring Leaphorn and Chee have been adapted for films, with his daughter Anne Hillerman now having published several best-selling books using the characters but also adding a female protagonist, Officer Bernie Manuelito , who is married to Chee . A further commitment to diversity on Hollywood’s part could make for imaginative and progressive films by adapting more of these stories.
Latinos: America’s Largest Invisible Other
The omission among screen cops and crimefighters that is the most flagrant, though, is that of Latinos, given the statistical changes to both the nation’s population and within law enforcement agencies. What the US government defines as Latino now accounts for 17 percent of the population, but is more complicated when race is factored in, as nearly 66 percent self-identify as white, while the rest list other races—since multiracial is not always an option on the census questionnaire.25 For the 2020 census, the government plans to continue asking about a Latino identity in terms of racial difference . Moreover, the draft of the new questionnaire goes a step further than most previous efforts to list specific categories for white, including English, Irish, German, French, Italian, and Polish ancestry—many of these once only contingently white , as previously discussed. Since the government changes the categories for every decade’s census since census-taking began in 1790, it makes it difficult to chart actual shifts in the ethnic-racial makeup of the nation. It also shows a stubborn resistance to treating Latinos as anything but a persistent Other, given the insistence on differentiating such an ethnicity in racial terms as well.26 Some observers liken it to the “one-drop rule ” used for centuries to determine black identity with the same punitive outcomes.27
This confusion is replicated in counting Latinos within US law enforcement agencies, which however complicated the measurement, shows a steady growth in Latinos being hired as cops and other law enforcement agents.28 As the former NYPD Det. Edward Conlon noted in 2004, “officers named Gonzales will become the kind of cultural cliché in the next century that patrolmen named Murphy were for the last two.”29
When it comes to Hollywood storytelling, the problem is even more acute. A 2017 university study found that Hollywood had made little progress in on-screen diversity , with white actors continuing to account for nearly 71 percent of the speaking roles, which was not remarkably different than estimates a decade earlier.30 Stacy L. Smith , who conducted the study, concluded that an “epidemic of invisibility” was still negatively impacting minority communities .
For Latinos, the picture is even more startling.31 While African American and Asian characters approximate their share of the nation’s population, only three percent of speaking characters in films for 2016 were Latinos—even though they comprise roughly six times that number as Americans.32 Moreover, activists charge that those Latino speaking roles that did exist were dominated by characterizations of drug dealers, criminals, and rapists. This overwhelmingly negative portrait has political consequences such as providing cover for President Trump ’s harsh rhetoric against Mexicans and other Latin American immigrants —an animosity that began the day he announced his candidacy and that apparently resonated with a significant portion of the American electorate.33
These numbers about acute under-representation fail to make sense unless the potency of existing myths and prejudices is taken into account.34 It is especially illuminating considering that Hollywood fixates on cop stories about the NYPD and LAPD, the locales of so many cop shows and films—both departments including sizable numbers of Latino cops and detectives. Moreover, as once was the case for Italian American males cast as gangsters, 35 what roles there are for American-born Latinos and those born in Latin America are persistently rooted in harmful stereotypical roles that date back to early Hollywood: chief among them the criminal, dark-skinned, Spanish-speaking intruder; and the irrepressible Latin lover—the latter as obsessed with sex as the already beleaguered black male but capable of seduction rather than supposedly acting on baser instincts.
In crime shows and films, all of the above Others are shown learning lessons about being “blue,” which is then expected to subsume all other allegiances, including those rooted in race/ethnicity, gender, and, more recently, sexual orientation . That is not to say that the minority cop ’s struggle to assimilate is a purely Hollywood invention, as non-white cops frequently complain of having to straddle two worlds but who concede they eventually succumb to the dominant white (or blue) norm. The problem with the screen version of such a struggle is that this “different” or non-mainstream perspective is nearly always of secondary importance—only their loyalty to a white partner or to the department is of narrative importance, reflecting the enduring importance of what Toni Morrison’s described as the marginalizing effects of the “white gaze .” Very few crimefighter roles tackle the problem of living with a hyphenated identity from the Other’s point of view, choosing instead to focus on the triumphant outcome of assimilation or acceptance of mainstream views, especially about matters of justice.36 Although it is natural for humans to type each other in order to distinguish potential friends from foes, it is the practice of stereotyping that is so destructive, as it reduces people to a few (usually negative) characteristics, often deemed fixed by Nature, and which short-circuits an individual’s ability to transcend the limitations imposed by group affiliation, especially if a group is marginalized.37
A few notable Latino cops have appeared on television, again given the broader range of programming opportunities available as compared to film production. Amid the ensemble cast of Hill Street Blues , discussed earlier, is Lt. Ray Calletano (Rene Enriquez ), who is prominently featured in several episodes, including one in which he receives the Hispanic Officer of the Year award. At the ceremony, though, Calletano confronts his department’s institutional racism , first asking why they are serving a mix of Mexican and Puerto Rican food, not having bothered to find out he is of Colombian descent. “I look around a room full of ranking officers and the only other Hispanics I see are waiters and bus boys,” he complains, adding, “As far as I am concerned, you can keep your award.”38 Calletano later becomes a captain of another precinct but faces a mutiny after being dubbed “Captain Taco,” and is eventually relieved of his command. That leads him to resign and join the Latin American Coalition, which advocates legal and political change, including holding the police accountable for unjust actions; it represents an interesting character progression but treated as a minor subplot in only a few episodes.
Another notable Latino cop was the intense, expressionless Lt. Martin Castillo (Edward James Olmos ) in Miami Vice (1984–1989), although his job largely pivoted on reining in his black-white buddy vice detectives, Rico Tubbs (Philip Michael Thomas ) and Sonny Crockett (Don Johnson ), whose Armani suits, pastel T-shirts and unshaven stubble became as vital to his characterization as a 44 Magnum was to Dirty Harry a decade earlier.
Finally, a more recent and impressive Latina cop was included in the ensemble cast of Third Watch , also discussed in Chap. 5, with the plainclothes Sgt. Maritza Cruz (Tia Texada ) depicted as much a cowboy cop as the males but too often shown obsessed with personal vendettas. She ultimately performs a heroic act in her final appearance, strapping on two grenades and sacrificing herself to blow up a street gang. Also limiting her characterization was to serve as the love interest for Boscarelli and competition for his partner, Yokas , with many scenes suggesting a cat fight with badges that only ends when they accidentally shoot each other in the line of duty.
When it comes to films, the list of Latino crimefighters is even shorter. A notable Latino cop appears in Bound by Honor (1993)—also released as Blood in, Blood Out —a film directed by Taylor Hackford about three Los Angeles gang members: two Latino brothers and their cousin, the latter a complicated biracial character. After one of the brothers escapes gang life to become an undercover cop , he confronts the struggling cousin who sinks deeper into criminality .39 Although the film is rare for putting Latinos front and center, its overall focus is a well-worn tale of gang life.
The only (male) Latino to ascend to lead roles in Hollywood as a crimefighter is Andy Garcia . His first meaty although still supporting role was in Black Rain (1989), in which he plays the sidekick to Det. Nick Conklin portrayed by Michael Douglas . Unfortunately, Garcia’s character, Det. Charlie Vincent , is gruesomely beheaded roughly halfway through the film and disappears from the story.
In Internal Affairs (1990), Garcia co-stars as Raymond Avilla , who eventually catches (and kills) corrupt cop Dennis Peck , portrayed by Richard Gere . As an Internal Affairs investigator , Avilla is not the standard cop hero, representing the usually despised bureaucratic watchdog who exists to monitor departments—routinely treated in Hollywood (and often in actuality) as a “rat” rather than as an agent who performs a public good. An even more important shortcoming in terms of a Latino character is the reliance on stereotypes to imply a larger cultural connection. Avilla ’s emotionalism and quick temper—a Latin stereotype that even Peck exploits, noting, “You know what they say about Latin fighters, Raymond, too fucking macho [and] won’t back pedal when they have to.”40 This taps into the Latin concept of machismo that Omar S. Castañeda describes as “complex and multifaceted [but] too often, in Anglo-American interpretations, reduced to self-aggrandizing male bravado that flirts with physical harm to be sexual, like some rutting for the right to pass on genes.”41 Peck also insinuates a sexual tryst with Avilla ’s wife Kathleen (Nancy Travis ), enraging Avilla enough to confront her in a crowded restaurant where he physically assaults her, shouting accusations in Spanish that remain un-translated, as if there is no need to further comprehend this Other’s digression. Having the blond Anglo wife also frustrates a more thorough understanding of Avilla ’s ethnicity, as he is shown to have no other family or community ties.
Garcia’s so-called “Latin looks” and its horizontal connections to other “swarthy” ethnicities has not limited him to only Latino roles , as he first earned acclaim and an Academy Award nomination for his portrayal of the Corleone heir in The Godfather Part III (1990).42 Another of Garcia’s non-Latino cops appeared in Jennifer Eight (1992), with the non-descript Sgt. John Berlin leaving the LAPD to work in a small town in northern California, where he gets embroiled in a murder mystery and falls in love with his chief witness, the blind Helena (Uma Thurman ). Finally, in Night Falls on Manhattan (1997), Garcia is Sean Casey , a New York cop-turned-district attorney, whose Irish name is inherited from his father, while his Latino roots belong to his mother, Maria Nuñez , but as deceased is unable to fill in the blanks of his blended ethnicity.
Part of Garcia’s ability to play normative white characters as well as those marked specifically Latino (or read as “brown”) is rooted in his Cuban background. According to many studies, Cubans as a whole are better placed than other Latinos in American society, but the disparity between those Cubans identified as black from those deemed white creates a complicated and consequential disparity.43 However, similar to other Latino communities, mainstream America continues to interpret the ethnically Cuban as “outsiders,” given their Spanish surnames and cultural traditions still marking them as “foreign.”44 This also ignores how American culture was and continues to be created, with each immigrant group influencing what the nation becomes, while absorbing the cultural pastiche that is forever in the process of becoming. As such, Cubans, individually privileged or not, remain largely cast and interpreted as not yet white enough.
Arguably, many Latinos, including Garcia , do not wish to exclusively portray Latino characters , given the need for creative expression as actors and producers, but also because it would limit their employment possibilities. That motivation for an individual to consent to portraying yet another Latino gang member or drug lord in a film or TV show is understandable, just as it was for Bill Robinson to play “Bojangles” or hundreds of Navajos to sign on to serve as marauding “savages ” in John Ford films—it represented a way to earn a living when few other choices were available. Moreover, despite crossover opportunities for Puerto Ricans to portray Mexicans and Mexican actors to depict Colombians, among other substitutions, the larger point is that most Latino roles remain as predominantly perpetrators of crime and rarely as the crimefighters, unless as supporting players to Anglo leads.
Jennifer Lopez: In and Out of Uniform
Like Garcia , Jennifer Lopez is the stand-alone Latina star, who too has portrayed Italians, as in her hit movie, The Wedding Planner —perhaps to subdue her Puerto Rican difference for mainstream audiences . Lopez, more than any other Latino, male or female, has portrayed the most crimefighters. Her first appearance was as Grace Santiago in Money Train (1995), a transit cop and the love interest of the principle characters played by Wesley Snipes and Woody Harrelson , who compete for her attention. Lopez’s oft-touted pride of having grown up in the Bronx lends her character a degree of street-wise toughness , also demonstrated on screen with scenes of her boxing and firing weapons. At the same time, her body is often positioned in images linked to sexuality and dancing in body-hugging gowns, which are more reminiscent of sexualized Latina stereotypes that Clara E. Rodriguez describes as ranging from the “frilly señoritas or volcanic temptresses” to the “Latin spitfire” and “hotblooded tamale.”45
In Out of Sight (1998), Lopez portrays Federal Marshal Karen Sisco , who falls in love with a clever bankrobber (George Clooney ), whom she is also doggedly pursuing. The film—part comedy, part thriller—stressed romance over crimefighting, and again presents Lopez as a competent but sexualized female cop.
Lopez garnered the lead role in Angel Eyes (2001) about the uniformed Chicago cop, Sharon Pogue , who had been toughened up by an abusive father whom she once turned into the authorities, and which left her estranged from her family. More of the story’s focus, though, is on her feelings for a stranger named Catch (Jim Cavaziel ), who remains a mystery until she learns that they met before at a car accident that claimed the lives of his wife and son; she was the officer who took his statements at the scene and whose “angel eyes” captivated him. Their second meeting occurs when he intervenes in a confrontation between her and a gunman who, having already shot her (a vest initially protecting her), is poised to shoot her in the face and kill her. Catch’s “lost” state, unable to remember the accident or his life prior to it, is matched by her loner status and inability to sustain intimacy; she routinely takes out her frustrations on prisoners, much to the disapproval of her partner—the black male Robby (Terrence Howard ). As the romance with Catch takes over the story, Pogue ’s uniform is replaced with dresses and sexy undergarments; she also appears nude for the obligatory sex scene. By the film’s end, she has softened, learning to accept and reciprocate Catch’s love, which were behaviors previously unavailable to her.
The redeemable but troubled female rogue, Det. Harlee Santos (Jennifer Lopez). Screen shot from Shades of Blue, NBC
More recently, Lopez had the lead role in the NBC series, Shades of Blue (2016–2018), for which she also served as executive producer. Below is a more comprehensive analysis of this series, as it showcases a more contemporary and convoluted interplay of non-normative identities, which clash not only with their own “blue” loyalties, but also with a more complicated and compromised white male rogue. The show tells the story of a corrupt but effective unit within the NYPD that dispenses “street justice ,” taking pride in its ability to tap down as much crime as possible in an otherwise dangerous neighborhood. They not only accept money for paid protection, but also dole out guidelines to their “clients” to help minimize crime, especially related to drug trafficking ; the unit’s goal is to reduce crime rather than to attempt to unrealistically eliminate it.
However, when Lopez’s character, Harlee Santos , is caught in the act of collecting a cash payment from one of her crew’s new clients, Special Agent Robert Stahl (Warren Kole ) gives her the choice of prison or serve as a mole to help entrap her boss, Lt. Matt Wozniak (Ray Liotta ). In the first episode Santos also records a video for her daughter Cristina (Sarah Jeffery ), in which she tries to explain how things have gone so terribly wrong. The full content of the video is revealed at the series’ end once she agrees to testify—not only to own up to her unit’s corruption, but also as a way to stop the more blatantly criminal Intelligence Unit in the department with ties to drug cartels and organized crime .
By season three, the series had amply explored the many “shades of blue” that accompany policing such a rough precinct, often exposing the darkest shades in this unit’s self-styled pursuit of “the greater good,”49 as Wozniak calls it, but which increasingly included murder. Equally tarnished is the FBI ’s Stahl , whose obsession with Santos leads him to plant evidence, murder associates, and eventually kidnap her—their duel ending with her killing him in self-defense. Santos also kills her former boyfriend, Miguel Zepeda (Antonio Jaramillo ), an ex-convict she once framed to put in prison. During an episode in which Zepeda attempts to rape her, Santos lets the act unfold until his head is positioned between her legs, at which point she twists her legs and breaks his neck. In addition to the criminal Intel Unit, the crew’s enemies list also includes corrupt Internal Affairs bosses and a mayoral candidate whose organized crime connections nearly gets them killed in an ambush. Up against those threats, their approach to battling the usual array of street thugs and murderous drug dealers seems almost heroic, although eventually unmasked as too criminal to be sustained.
In the final episode, Santos explains that she can no longer justify her behavior and the series ends with her preparing for prison; unlike most male rogues, she must surrender her badge to become the story’s redeemable hero. While Lopez’s Santos presents a few solid steps forward among female crimefighters , her characterization also indulges in a few female-oriented clichés and familiar stereotypes . In her struggles with her conflicting loyalties and wrestling with whether to remain loyal to her crew or to cooperate with the FBI , she confirms that her main concern is to spare her daughter the pain of discovering her mother’s criminality. It is this maternal drive that represents an all-too-familiar refrain.
Still, given the length and breadth of storytelling laid out in a three-season television series, it is Santos’s perspective that drives the storytelling—a rarity for female characters on small or large screens. Moreover, plenty of scenes showcase Santos as a clear-headed, capable cop with ample know-how and street experience. More progressively, Santos is depicted as a sexualized being who experiences both the pleasure and pain of intimacy. At its darkest, she is the victim of Stahl ’s obsessions, often tinged with sexual menace and physical violence, along with her troubled history with Zepeda . She is also shown choosing lovers for her own gratification and the first to act on a mutual attraction between her and an assistant district attorney, James Nava (Gino Anthony Pesi ), later killed by her enemies.
In only one scene does Santos and her daughter’s Latina difference get specifically highlighted, and it has as much to do with class as ethnicity. Santos is called to her daughter’s expensive, private school after Cristina got in a fight after being teased about her family, with one classmate sarcastically claiming to be a fan of “telenovelas,”50 the popular soap operas of Latin America ; it was meant to disparage Cristina’s “daddy issues … [and] single mom dramas”51 included in news reports. Santos talks the school out of suspending Cristina but tells her daughter not to take the bait put out by “some entitled bitch,” acknowledging that they are occupying space usually reserved for well-heeled white women.
No doubt Santos’s relationship with her boss Wozniak , although not romantic or sexual in nature, demands a sizable share of the spotlight, given Liotta ’s star status. His character is shown running his crew like a Special Forces operation, rooted in his previous tours of duty as a Marine before becoming a cop. Wozniak , though, is no routine portrait of a white male rogue, given how deeply conflicted he is, being both sentimental and savage in equal parts, and capable of cold-blooded murder as well as the ability to shed tears and show real remorse. One of his most novel vulnerabilities is his bisexuality , which nearly costs him his marriage, but also brings him closer to his gay son. Most of all, Wozniak is grief-stricken about his daughter’s fatal drug overdose, including a guilt that often haunts him in the guise of her ghost with whom he has conversations. He explains that her death is what drives his aggressive policing to ensure that none of his “family”52 is harmed on his watch, including Santos and her daughter as well as the rest of his crew.
Finally, such a series allows room to showcase an array of differing portrayals of the Other in blue. Among the other strong female characters is former cop turned FBI boss Gail Baker (Leslie Silva ), Stahl ’s partner Molly Chen (Annie Chang ), and the ambitious but compromised mayoral candidate Julia Ayres (Anna Gunn ). It is another female member of Woz’s crew, though, who is a stand out; like Santos , she offers a complex portrait of a female cop. Tess Nazario (Drea de Matteo ), a tough-talking, capable cop, is shown chasing down and cuffing suspects, bravely going toward danger to save her crew, and surviving a gunshot at the end of the first season. Nazario too is shortchanged from being a more radical challenge by the usual tropes of female representation , having to worry about a cheating husband and kids to raise. References to her children, though, are often fleeting and usually because they clash with her job duties. She complains that one interrogation is taking too long for her to get her son Troy to practice on time; on another occasion, she wastes no time beating up a suspect, griping that she has to pick up her kids at school and has no more time to invest in questioning him. Nazario ’s toughness is also trusted enough by her crew that she often takes the lead in interrogating suspects. In one scene, she barks: “Listen up. I’m bloated, I’m cramping, my shoes are killing me. And my husband is cheating on me and I have to go apologize to the bitch that he’s been screwing … I’m going to kill someone before this day is over.” With that, the suspect promptly gives up information. In another scene, one of her partners warns a would-be assassin, “I won’t torture a woman, but she will.” Nazario then tases the woman repeatedly with little hesitation.
Shades of Blue’s Male Others
Besides Santos and Nazario , Wozniak ’s crew also includes the Jewish David Saperstein (Santino Fontana ), killed by Wozniak part way through the series as the suspected FBI mole. Also, Carlos Espada (Vincent Laresca ), who is the least developed supporting character, while two more interesting African American characters offer intriguing and contrasting portraits of what it means to be black and blue. Marcus Tufo (Hampton Fluker ), a part of the crew for six years, is an aggressive, dedicated soldier who adopts Wozniak ’s us-versus-them mentality . After Saperstein is killed, Tufo is outraged to learn that his former partner was funneling prescription drugs to a former doctor and his accomplice, a priest, who dole out the medicines to needy people in the neighborhood. Tufo confronts the priest who then schools him about how clergy too have to go rogue at times and grapple with gray areas between right and wrong, admitting, “When what’s right doesn’t square with the letter of the law, then there’s a choice to be made.”53 Later, after Tufo ’s world view is seriously challenged, he picks up where Saperstein left off, handing the doctor his number and thanking him on “behalf of many people.”54
Part of Tufo ’s confusion is revealed in exchanges with the crew’s newest member, rookie Michael Loman (Dayo Okeniyi ), who is uncomfortable having to work in an impoverished, crime-ridden precinct dominated by African Americans, often viewing cops as just another source of misery. Loman is introduced in the opening minutes of the series as he accompanies Santos on a call, but hears gunshots coming from inside an apartment, busts open the door, and shoots an unarmed black man—the shots actually occurring in a video game. Santos quickly springs into action, concocting a story to make what happened look like a “good shoot.”55 “I don’t want to be that kind of cop,”56 Loman protests. Santos points out that his badge now makes him part of the unit’s “family,”57 forcing her to protect him and now advising him to view this situation as a “hero who made a mistake.”58 Once Loman is accepted by the crew, he still questions their methods, although too often he fails to practice what he preaches about following rules. On another call with Santos , it is Loman who no longer wants to wait for a warrant, claiming to hear a cry for help that lets him barge through a locked door. Later in the series, it is Loman ’s turn to cover for Santos who has shot a stranger she mistook for Stahl , with Loman now helping concoct a story to help cover up her deadly mistake.
Loman ’s most impactful moments, though, occur when race is at the heart of the matter. When Wozniak tries to make Loman feel better about shooting the unarmed drug dealer, he tells Loman , “I’ve done the same thing and then some … justified shootings, but a killing just the same.”59 Loman counters, arguing, “It’s not the same. You’re a white cop,” with so few of the crew’s arrests being white suspects.60 “We’re picking up people who look like me eight times more than people who look like you,” which he fears makes him a “sell-out,” adding that “these kids scattering in the streets [are] terrified that the police are going to shoot them … someone’s got to show them that being a good cop isn’t the exception to the rule.”61 Wozniak reminds Loman that he killed a man who sold heroin to the very people “you’re trying to protect.”62 Loman rejects Wozniak’s logic, noting, “We don’t get to fight a preemptive war … pop people because of what we think they’re going to do … That’s why they don’t trust us.” Wozniak insists they are “absolutely fighting a preemptive war. That’s what policing is.”63 It is Tufo , though, who makes the strongest case for Loman about the differences between social work and policing when he notes, “If I’m chasing some thug through my old neighborhood, the only color he sees is blue.”64
Along with having Lopez as the main protagonist, Shades of Blue and its supporting players offer a significant exploration of the uncharted terrain of the Other in blue, whether a female, an African American, a Latino/a, or the myriad others who continue to deal with invisibility in Hollywood. This remains especially troublesome as the ubiquitous and influential crimefighter persistently gets to police who has access to American privileges and who gets jettisoned to the margins. As this chapter reveals, it is hard to effectively embody the role of the Hollywood crimefighter when for too long such non-white or not-white-enough challengers have been members of communities still having to prove their credentials as Americans. Despite some pioneers and individual success stories, too many among the ethnic Other continue to be perceived as too different or too “foreign,” and still wearing the scars of the marked and dangerous Other .