Mr Thompson said he was particularly surprised at the apparent lack of interest in Salmon who was in Tomorrow Never

Mr Thompson said he was particularly surprised at the apparent lack of interest in Salmon, who was in Tomorrow Never Dies, The World is Not Enough and Die Another Day “He’s attractive and articulate. You’d think he would be used more in publicity but he’s not.”Kwei-Armah is equally astonished at the media’s treatment of Jean-Baptiste, who left Britain for America in search of better opportunities “She received minute publicity,” he said. What makes you into a media celebrity is being on the front covers of magazines and being on breakfast television,” he said. “People in publicity try but find it very hard to sell the black members of the cast ­ they are not seen as sexy or newsworthy, whereas the blonde members of the cast they will run with.”Take the case of Marianne Jean-Baptiste. “There are problems with the marketing of black actors in this country.

All black actors want is the same shot at publicity as the other actors in the show.” That lack of recognition has prompted an unprecedented attack by some leading black actors on what they regard as the prejudiced culture of Britain’s showbusiness media, from chat shows and breakfast television programmes to celebrity magazines, tabloids and broadsheet arts pages.Kwame Kwei-Armah, best known for his role as a paramedic in the BBC drama Casualty, said black actors were being starved of publicity. Nominations for the black Baftas are announced today.Just last week, the BBC said its first black family sitcom, The Crouches, would be broadcast next month. Lorraine Heggessey, controller of BBC1, hailed the innovation, saying: “This vibrant comedy will showcase the talent of some of Britain’s best black actors and introduce new faces to a mainstream audience.”Perhaps, but precedent suggests that putting a mainstream audience in front of talent does not translate into wider recognition ­ not, at any rate, if the talent is black.Charles Thompson, the organiser of the black Baftas ­ officially the Screen Nation Film and Television Awards, backed by The Independent ­ says the reason why black actors are not better known is obvious: “Mainstream actors are recognised because they are consistently used in publicity to promote the film and television shows they are in. Only a few years ago, black British actors knew what to expect when they were offered parts on television or in the movies: a marginal role or, if their luck was in, the opportunity to reinforce a stereotype, perhaps as a gangster or a drug-dealer.
Now, though, that is all changing.

Black actors are regulars on hit TV shows and some are beginning to make it through to Bafta and even Oscar nominations. “I mean, someone they perceived to be a loser.”‘Marion and Geoff’ is at the Assembly Rooms Music Hall, Edinburgh (0131-226 2428) to 17 August. “I heard about an American who watched an episode and said afterwards, ‘God, you really wanna slap that guy!’ I don’t know if Americans could identify that much with a loser.” He stops, cognisant for the umpteenth time of how his words will look on the page. “Right now there’s probably a call coming in for late night bingo on the Granada Men & Motors channel.”He isn’t even certain that a US audience would get to grips with Marion and Geoff.