In June, ABC announced they wouldn’t be renewing The Baker and The Beauty, a Latinx romantic comedy series centered around the love story of a man working for his family’s Cuban bakery and a wealthy celebrity. The show only aired for one season and was canceled due to low ratings—which likely weren’t helped by its midseason premiere and less than ideal time slot (Mondays at 10 PM). Not only is The Baker and The Beauty the second Latinx show that ABC decided not to renew after only one season, but it was actually the last show with an all-Latinx cast on network television. And not only did The Baker and The Beauty have an all-Latinx cast, but the crew was also primarily Latinx, and the show itself was shot in Puerto Rico.
For the past month, fans have been fighting for the charming show to be picked up by a streaming service, hoping that the series would have similar luck to One Day At A Time, which was picked up by Pop TV after being canceled by Netflix. But unfortunately, TVLine is reporting that attempts to find a new home for The Baker and The Beauty have been unsuccessful. It’s not entirely surprising—while One Day At A Time was initially canceled after three seasons, The Baker and The Beauty only got one season, not nearly as much time to build a loyal and large audience.
The cancelation of The Baker and The Beauty is just another example of the tired pattern where networks and streaming platforms fail to invest adequate resources into series by and about people of color, and then are quick to cancel those same series after only one or two seasons when they aren’t as successful as other more widely-promoted and better-funded shows (often with primarily white casts). Investing in the work of creators of color requires more than just getting a show picked up and then leaving its stars and creators to fend for themselves when it comes to resources and network support. When it comes to representation in media, empty gestures won’t cut it for viewers anymore.