The hit television shows that have been set in Miami— including “Miami Vice,” “CSI: Miami,” and “Burn Notice” —have involved a lot of murder, drugs, corrup- tion, and general seaminess.HowdoesWilliam D.Talbert III,CDME, presidentandCEOof the GreaterMiamiCon- vention&Visitors Bureau, feel about that?
Terrific. He was assistant county manager for Miami-Dade
County when “Miami Vice” debuted in 1984, and he remem- bers the show’s impact was immediate and visceral. Up until then, the TV show that people tended to associate with Miami was “Jackie Gleason andHisAmerican SceneMagazine,”which debuted inNewYork City in 1962 and moved to Miami Beach two years later. Each episode began by telling viewers that the show was coming to them live from “Miami Beach, the sun and fun capital of the world.” It did “great things” for the destination at the time, Talbert
said, but by the mid-’80s, it was long past time to move out of the Golden Age. “‘Miami Vice’ took our image from maybe an older destination, old people, to [something with] hip, happen-
ing, modern fashion, sports cars, and really great shots of the des- tination,”Talbert said. “There’s always the debate about the crime issue. But, youknow, ‘Hawaii Five-O’ did not hurt Hawaii. I come down on the very positive side about ‘Miami Vice.’”
Positive Images Funny Talbert should mention “Hawaii Five-O.” The 2010– 2011 TV season, now a few months old, brought with it a rebooted version of CBS’s classic 1970s cop show, shot on loca- tion in Honolulu. On NBC, “Law & Order: Los Angeles” moved the New York City–based crime-and-punishment fran- chise cross country, with no apparent effect on its relentless body count.ABC’s “Detroit 1-8-7,” about an inner-city homicide unit,
MIAMI NICE: From “Miami Vice” in the 1980s to “Burn Notice” (above) today,TV shows set in Miami have bur- nished the city’s sense of cool. “You see those images on TV,” said Greater Miami CVB’s William D. Talbert III, “and what we all do is keep the buzz going.”
BOOK ’EM, DMO: Does the crime portrayed on all of the cop shows set in real-life destinations—including the rebooted “Hawaii Five-O”—affect those cities’ meetings business? “There’s always the debate about the crime issue,” Talbert said. “But [the original] ‘Hawaii Five-O’ did not hurt Hawaii.”