Is ambition still a dirty word for female characters? “Hacks” shows how this perception is changing (guest column)

Ambition has almost always been a tricky subject for fictional women on television. When Mary Richards applied for a job as a secretary at a local Minneapolis TV station for “The Mary Tyler Moore Show” in the 1970s, she ended up interviewing for an associate producer position. News director Lou Grant gave her the higher title so he could pay her less, implicitly signaling that women climbing the corporate ladder come at a price. For the show's writers, this was an ingenious way to set Mary on a career path without making her seem overly ambitious and thus less feminine. Mary didn't negotiate and was grateful for the unexpected promotion.

About 50 years later, stand-up comedian Deborah Vance, played by the inimitable Jean Smart, faces a similar dilemma in “Hacks” when she discovers that her dream job, a job as a …