Los Angeles-set TV shows have begun reflecting the fact that it's "majority-minority city"

The New York Times

"It wasn’t until fairly recently that the city that specializes in pretending to be anywhere else began to play itself," says  Soumya Karlamangla. "We’ve long had portrayals of L.A.’s rich and famous — Beverly Hills, 90210, The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, Entourage — but those, with their limited view of who lives here, were themselves a kind of act. I’m talking about shows that feel more true to reality: reflecting a majority-minority city with a median annual income below $30,000 where, for most people, life isn’t all that glamorous. Some of the earliest in this genre were East Los High, a 2013 Hulu show with an all-Latino cast set in Boyle Heights, and Transparent, the Amazon Prime drama that filmed heavily in Los Feliz, Echo Park and Silver Lake. (I remember bouncing in my seat during that show’s 2014 pilot when it panned to a section of Griffith Park minutes from my apartment.) Now there are dozens of L.A. shows set beyond the moneyed Westside, away from beaches and bikinis. The noncomprehensive list includes Bosch, Gentefied, Never Have I Ever, You’re the Worst, Love, Snowfall, Vida and Insecure. Lorraine Ali, a television critic for The Los Angeles Times, attributed this shift to an explosion of streaming platforms that created more space for new voices and neighborhoods on TV, from South L.A. to Sherman Oaks." As Ali put it: “The problem before was that the industry just kept pulling from within. A lot of these creators making these shows come from these areas because nobody can afford to live on those places on the Westside anymore.”