Colored Television

Lenny Gibson is Jane Gibson’s husband. Lenny is a Black abstract painter. He is the secondary protagonist in Colored Television. Lenny does not change very much throughout the novel, except for a concession he makes to Jane at the very end. Lenny and Jane have many differences in values and lifestyles that cause tension between them throughout the novel.

Although Lenny gives off the vibe of a scrappy artist and art teacher, he comes from a bourgeois, upper-middle-class background. As Jane describes it, he “still rose from his seat with the gentlemanly bow of a man who once upon a time attended the Links ball on the arm of a willowy butterscotch girl” (71). (The Links is a social club for Black people similar to the Lions Club or Elks Lodge that holds cotillion and debutante balls.) He seeks to “hid[e] it beneath the guise of a simmering, iconoclastic, neosocialist outsider artist” (71). This background is a point of difference between Lenny and Jane, as Jane grew up in relative poverty. As a result, she puts greater importance on financial success, having had the experience of being poor as a child, whereas he focuses on his artistic integrity. 

Lenny admires his wife and her artistic achievements. However, despite their wedding vows to “stand guard over the solitude of the other” so that they can both work on their artistic careers (12), Lenny leaves most of the parenting work to his wife. When she is unavailable, he does not take it upon himself to cook or clean for their children. He prefers to shut out the outside world by retreating to his studio to work. This points to an unexamined patriarchal streak in Lenny’s character.

Lenny is often dismissive of others’ commercial success, describing Brett as a “sellout” and Hampton Ford as “pitiful.” This leads to tension between Lenny and Jane as she begins to make compromises and decisions regarding Balancing Artistic Integrity and Financial Security to secure monetary success. As she thinks to herself, “Fuck Lenny on his artistically pure high horse” (103). However, by the end of the novel, Lenny concedes Jane’s desire for him to compromise on his artistic vision so they can earn a living. He prints an image of a Black man in the corner of all his abstract paintings. This decision, a form of branding, calls attention to himself as a Black artist—rather than just an artist. This helps his career “lurch forward,” and he sells all the paintings from his solo show. Although this decision goes unexplained in the text, it suggests that even the most dedicated artist must make concessions to the demands of the market to survive.

Hampton Ford is a Black Hollywood television producer charged with bringing “diverse” shows to an unspecified television network. Hampton acts as the antagonist in the novel. On their first meeting, Jane notices that Hampton is two-faced: “From one side, his expression was amused, almost laughing; but from this angle, he looked crestfallen, bereft” (111). This is a reference to the masks of Melpomene and Thalia, or the crying and laughing masks, from ancient Greek theater that represent the performing arts. In the opening paragraphs, Jane reflects on the similarly two-faced nature of the city: “By day it was as hopeful and effervescent as a hummingbird, by night it was terrifying, doomed” (1). Taken together, Hampton is an avatar for the dishonesty that characterizes the television and movie industry in Los Angeles.

As such, Hampton initially presents as warm, and Jane’s work intrigues him. He praises her first novel and skills as a writer. However, it quickly becomes clear that he is an untrustworthy, megalomaniacal bully. He puts down and physically assaults his employees, monopolizes Jane’s time, pressures her into doing drugs, and interacts with her in physically inappropriate ways. Hampton goes on drug-fueled brainstorming sessions during which he contributes nothing of substance. This is crystallized when Hampton calls Jane to tell her a rambling, bizarre story about his afternoon at a Kardashian child’s birthday party and directs her to turn into a television plot. With no ideas of his own, Hampton steals Jane’s work to create a show. He receives an Emmy for Swirl, rewarding him for his duplicity. As a character, Hampton represents.