Louis Carr outlines his fall vision for BET as focus on HBCU, storytelling take center stage

Seven months into his tenure as BET President, Carr has already revived ‘ComicView’ and had the highest-rated BET Awards since 2019.

In December 2025, Louis Carr wasn’t a household name, unless you were deeply in the know of ad executives.

He’d been a near-BET lifer, someone who elevated the company’s profile behind the scenes through ad work, navigating how to sell it to advertisers as one of the footholds of Black entertainment and the Black community, generating over $9 billion in ad revenue in the process.

Then, almost immediately, Carr’s name became even more synonymous with BET. He was named President of the company following the exit of former chief Scott Mills. And in the middle of a broad merger that eventually saw BET+ be folded into Paramount+ and months after the sunsetting of two iconic award shows that celebrated hip-hop and R&B, Carr understood the focus of BET had to be from the ground up.

Seven months later, fresh off the highest-rated BET Awards since 2019 and a couple of Emmy nominations for the network, Carr feels like his work as President is only truly beginning.

“I think we have the brand pointed in the right direction,” he told theGrio in an exclusive interview. “We’re operating under the pillars of community, culture, and connection. I think there could probably be no better direction and insight than those three right there, and everything seems to be sort of, you know, connecting and working at this particular time, very excited about it.”

Carr came to BET in the late 1980s. A Drake University graduate, he grew as the brand grew and evolved, becoming a home for news, teen programming, video shows, comedy and more. As NPR recently paid homage to the early 2000s era of BET through this year’s Black Music Month via Tiny Desk, Carr made one of his first swings as President to bring back a beloved series of BET’s heyday: “ComicView.” 

That swing, coupled with the success of the BET Awards in June, is among Carr’s “favorite” moments as head of the network so far. By moving the BET Experience away from the Los Angeles Convention Center to the Beehive campus in the Crenshaw corridor, the BET Experience shattered attendance records. The pre-show shifted to YouTube and Druski as show host “blew it out of the water,” according to Carr.

But resting on laurels is something he’s not prepared to do.

The work has only expanded through upcoming documentaries focused on LL Cool J and Queen Latifah, and former NBA star Robert Covington about his journey from playing four years at Tennessee State to playing a decade in the NBA. In the ever-changing landscape of TV programming and content, Carr isn’t hiding the fact that BET is tapping deeper into the community thanks to expanded resources, particularly in the fall. 

“We’ve got to be intentional about doing more,” he said.

He continued, “When you look at what we’ve done over the last 30 days, ‘ComicView’ came back. We launched a new show with Terrence J called ‘Behind The Image,’ where he interviewed people like T.I. Druski, Keke Palmer. We also introduced our audience to a new show called ‘Lock Patrol.’ We brought back ‘Miss Pat Settles It.’ So we’ve got a lot of things in the pipeline.” 

When asked about a proper announcement regarding the return of the Soul Train or BET Hip Hop Awards, Carr held a wry smile on his face.

“Keep your ear to the ground in the next 30 days,” he said, “Keep your ear to the ground.”

One of the focuses for BET under his leadership is a dedication to sports. In previous administrations, the network leaned heavily into HBCU football and HBCU sports. And its absence was felt, loudly.

In an April essay for ClutchPoints, Randall Barnes argued that with Carr at the helm of the network, it was time to reinvest in HBCU athletics on television.

“A lot of our games were relegated to platforms people didn’t know about or to ESPNU and ESPN3,” he wrote. “HBCU football was not getting the spotlight that it rightfully deserved—not because of celebrities, but because of the high level of play the players have been delivering for years.”

For what it’s worth, Carr and BET have already established deals with Ice Cube’s Big 3 basketball league to broadcast games on Mondays. And in the fall, HBCU basketball will be a chief priority in terms of fall content. 

No matter his time at BET or in media, Carr has stuck to a principle of collaboration, especially as BET continues outreach to bring a generation in that may not have the same fond memories of network programming.

“I am led by this scripture: ‘Old men dream dreams, and young men see visions.'” Carr said. “And people always say, ‘So, what does that really mean?’ I think it means that people have to work together.”

He continued, “There are just so many stories that need to be told about our community and about our contributions to society and to America. I just look at the work that we’re doing, whether it is nominated for an award or whether it’s engaging our community on social media-it’s all this sort of 360 ecosystem that we sort of operate in. And it shows that people see we’re headed in the right direction; I’m proud of it all.”