Great American Family CEO: Candace Cameron Bure does not speak for us
Bill Abbott became CEO of Great American Family network in 2021, after holding the same position for 11 years at Hallmark. His exit from Hallmark came after he and the network were criticized for a lack of diversity and inclusion (claims Abbott said at the time weren’t “fair”), and a complete bungling on their part over an ad during Holiday Season 2019 that featured a same-sex couple: the ad aired, conservative snowflakes complained about it not being “family friendly,” Abbott pulled the ad, then brought the ad back after getting wider backlash. So Abbott’s takeaway from that experience was to run a new network where he could cater solely to the conservative base. That’s all Candace Cameron Bure had to hear! Last year she joined GAF as Chief Content Officer and declared how thrilled she was that GAF would focus on stories with “traditional marriage at the core.” Now Abbott has done an interview with Variety — wow, the magazines are really having to scrape the bottom of the barrel due to the actors strike — in which he says, “Don’t be silly, our Chief Content Officer doesn’t speak for us!” Prepare yourself for some epic word salading:
Candy doesn’t speak for the network (except she totally does): “It’s like the disclaimer you see at the end of a movie or a series that says, ‘The views reflected here are not necessarily those of the company,’” Abbott said. “Candace has such a high profile that when she speaks, she’ll speak on a lot of topics, and she has a wonderful podcast that is fantastic. But when she speaks on that, she’s not speaking on behalf of Great American Media.”
OK, so then what does Abbott have to say for the network? When asked more pointedly if the network planned or wanted to incorporate LGBTQ stories into its programming, Abbott responded with politician-level vagueness. “I think that’s a very good and fair question,” he said. “I don’t think when we set out to do any type of movie we cast it first. The first thing we think about is a great storyline or great characters or an emotional journey. We’re not seeking to do anything or not do anything, and we take every day as it comes.”
‘Faith-and-family’ folks don’t have agendas! “This business is so challenged across the entire industry right now — with the streaming model and with the linear decline and all the other pieces — that we’re just looking to celebrate great stories. We don’t have an agenda either way. It’s not in the faith-and-family playbook to have agendas that are either pro or anti. We want to entertain and inspire and be uplifting and consistently provide an experience that is high quality — that is our most important objective.”
Actually, it’s that they have too much on their agenda: LGBTQ programming will “certainly be something to think about,” Abbott said, but “I think right now, we’re just so focused on profitability, being successful, doing the right thing for our shareholders… We have so many things on our agenda that we need to stay focused on the core part of the business right now and then down the road, as our world grows and changes and becomes different, then we’ll see.”
It’s really not that complicated once he spells it out. Candy is Chief Content Officer for Great American Family, but that doesn’t mean she speaks for the network, she speaks on a podcast and has such a high profile that people listen, but really they have no agenda they just take each day as it comes and are trying to make money and can’t think about adding LGBTQ programming because “streaming” and “linear” and they have too much on their agenda already! Get it?
So Abbott has gone from defensively saying “that’s not fair!” in response to inclusivity questions in 2019, to diplomatically saying “that’s a fair question” in 2023. But make no mistake, the only thing that’s changed is the language he uses with the press. They have no intentions, whatsoever, of developing inclusive content. They just know they can’t explicitly say that. And I don’t know about you, but I got subtly sinister vibes from his last comment about waiting to see how things evolve before considering LGBTQ content. I feel like the subtext is “we won’t have to worry about deflecting these questions soon, we’ll be a fully white, cis, Christian nation in the very near future.” Maybe I’m just still reeling from the new speaker of the House.
Photos credit: JPI Studios/Avalon, Getty and via Instagram
