• by Adam Buckman , Featured Columnist, Yesterday

A new, two-part documentary on the history of African Americans on TV brings fresh perspectives to stories that have already been well-told, but can certainly stand to be told again.

The doc -- titled “Seen & Heard: The History of Black Television,” premiering Tuesday on HBO and HBO Max -- covers the black experience on TV from the medium’s early days to the present.

The show surveys the history of black TV from the atrocious portrayal of African-Americans in “Amos & Andy” on radio and then TV, through the tentative breakthroughs of the 1960s, then the Norman Lear sitcoms of the 1970s, “The Cosby Show” and its spinoffs in the 1980s, “Arsenio Hall” and “In Living Color” in the 1990s, and up through the first decades of the current century.

Stories of the black TV experience that have long been familiar to most of us are nevertheless retold and re-illuminated with new depth.

This is a documentary of extremely high quality. Produced by Issa Rae’s production company, Hoorae, it was co-produced and co-directed by documentarians Giselle Bailey and Phil Bertelsen. 

They have made a very rich film for which they evidently left no archival stone unturned. The movie contains a mind-bending array of TV clips and old interviews that must have taken considerable effort to unearth and then assemble.

As a result of their diligence, the past comes alive in interviews past and present with both the living and the dead.

In the latter group, we hear from the late Esther Rolle and John Amos of “Good Times,” Redd Foxx from “Sanford and Son” (being interviewed by Barbara Walters), Malcolm-Jamal Warner (who died this year) of “The Cosby Show” and Nichelle Nichols of “Star Trek.”

She starred in the pioneering role of Lt. Nyobi Uhura, an officer on the bridge of the Starship Enterprise. 

At one point when she was considering leaving the show for a role on Broadway, Martin Luther King himself persuaded her to stay for the sake of millions of Blacks for whom she was a rare role model on television.

Interviews with the living range from Oprah Winfrey and Tyler Perry to Jimmie Walker, “JJ” of “Good Times,” Debbie Allen, and many more.

One of the subjects that comes up repeatedly in the discussions about the slow evolution from exclusion to inclusion of blacks in TV -- both behind and in front of the cameras -- is the tension that sprang from the fact that the pioneering black shows were written and run by white men.

In an interview late in his life, even Norman Lear admitted that he often took the side of his network overseers when he was under pressure from outspoken cast members such as Esther Rolle and John Amos of “Good Times” to steer the show in directions they felt would better reflect the experiences of their black audiences.

Interview subjects in the documentary point out that the battle for acceptance and inclusion on TV was waged behind the scenes. 

Portraying black lives on screen was one thing. But for many, true inclusion, if not parity, could only come when blacks became the producers, directors and writers of their own stories.

While previewing “Seen & Heard” on Monday, I did not agree with every assertion it made. But nor did I have to agree with everything it said to get a great deal out of it.