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Authors: Wil Haygood
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that would become a classic. The films also provided work for a coterie of black actors who welcomed the opportunity, among them Calvin Lockhart, Ron O’Neal, Bernie Casey, Julius Harris, Sheila Frazier, Richard Pryor, Pam Grier, and Billy Dee Williams.
Then something mighty strange happened in the world of blacks in cinema. The latter half of the 1970s was barren. Blacks actually began to disappear from film. Years rolled by with large swaths of black talent on the sidelines or struggling to get television work. It seemed, in the land of so-called liberal Hollywood, that even the subject of blacks in movies was taboo. The editors of People magazine thought otherwise. Their 1982 article “Blacks in Hollywood: Where Have They All Gone?” flung the issue out in the open, where it could not be ignored any longer. The article was scathing and blunt: blacks, it charged, were being “whitelisted” from Hollywood motion pictures. (The term, of course, played on the infamous word “blacklisted” used to describe members of the Hollywood community denied work in the 1950sbecause of alleged ties to Communist sympathizers.) Those black actors willing to be quoted in the article were incredulous that after the resounding success of the 1977 television miniseries Roots —which traced a black family’s journey from slavery to freedom in America—they were rewarded with nary a career boost. The Hollywood branch of the NAACP—the very organization that protested the screening of Birth of a Nation during President Woodrow Wilson’s administration—joined the outcry and also became vocal in bringing attention to the plight of black actors.
In subsequent years, there was only slightly more visibility by black filmmakers and actors in Hollywood. And much of that momentum flowed from the independent film movement, specifically Spike Lee’s movies. In 1986 Lee directed She’s Gotta Have It, followed three years later by Do the Right Thing, his seminal movie about simmering race relations in Brooklyn, New York. Lee’s films aside, independent films are often, by definition, not profitable in the terms the big studios expect.
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T HE GREAT AND grand conversations about money and movies hark back to the moguls of the last century. Louis B. Mayer and Samuel Goldwyn both wanted to make profitable pictures. As many in the Hollywood camp are fond of repeating, no business, no show.
When an American movie with a mostly black cast—or even a themed movie where blacks carry the arc of the narrative—comes upon the cinematic landscape, the dialogue heats up. Will the public attend? Will the movie only play in urban areas? There is always the hope for crossover appeal as was the case with Clint Eastwood’s Bird, which starred The Butler ’s Forest Whitaker. If subject matter comes into play, slavery is a topic American filmmakers have uniformly shied from. There was Steven Spielberg’s Amistad, a film about a slave revolt and landmark court case. It was a stirring drama, with gripping performances given by Djimon Hounsou and Anthony Hopkins. Its domestic total gross was $45 million. That is nothing to snicker at, but hardly what a Spielberg film is expected to earn. So many simply concluded the scenes on screen—slaves drowning, shot to death, hogtied—were too tough to sit through. Much the same criticism greeted Quentin Tarantino’s Django Unchained. Nevertheless, that movie went on to be a robust hit and a prizewinner.
Sometimes a black-themed movie is so unique, so surprising, that the Establishment ignores grubby talk of gross receipts. One such movie was Daughters of the Dust, a 1991 movie set in the 1920s in South Carolina. It revolved around a group of women and their musings about migration. The film, directed by Julie Dash, had the sweep of a fever dream. It also did not have a single big-name Hollywood star in it. Aside from its ethereal quality, something else seemed amazing: it was the first movie to gain major
Then something mighty strange happened in the world of blacks in cinema. The latter half of the 1970s was barren. Blacks actually began to disappear from film. Years rolled by with large swaths of black talent on the sidelines or struggling to get television work. It seemed, in the land of so-called liberal Hollywood, that even the subject of blacks in movies was taboo. The editors of People magazine thought otherwise. Their 1982 article “Blacks in Hollywood: Where Have They All Gone?” flung the issue out in the open, where it could not be ignored any longer. The article was scathing and blunt: blacks, it charged, were being “whitelisted” from Hollywood motion pictures. (The term, of course, played on the infamous word “blacklisted” used to describe members of the Hollywood community denied work in the 1950sbecause of alleged ties to Communist sympathizers.) Those black actors willing to be quoted in the article were incredulous that after the resounding success of the 1977 television miniseries Roots —which traced a black family’s journey from slavery to freedom in America—they were rewarded with nary a career boost. The Hollywood branch of the NAACP—the very organization that protested the screening of Birth of a Nation during President Woodrow Wilson’s administration—joined the outcry and also became vocal in bringing attention to the plight of black actors.
In subsequent years, there was only slightly more visibility by black filmmakers and actors in Hollywood. And much of that momentum flowed from the independent film movement, specifically Spike Lee’s movies. In 1986 Lee directed She’s Gotta Have It, followed three years later by Do the Right Thing, his seminal movie about simmering race relations in Brooklyn, New York. Lee’s films aside, independent films are often, by definition, not profitable in the terms the big studios expect.
----
T HE GREAT AND grand conversations about money and movies hark back to the moguls of the last century. Louis B. Mayer and Samuel Goldwyn both wanted to make profitable pictures. As many in the Hollywood camp are fond of repeating, no business, no show.
When an American movie with a mostly black cast—or even a themed movie where blacks carry the arc of the narrative—comes upon the cinematic landscape, the dialogue heats up. Will the public attend? Will the movie only play in urban areas? There is always the hope for crossover appeal as was the case with Clint Eastwood’s Bird, which starred The Butler ’s Forest Whitaker. If subject matter comes into play, slavery is a topic American filmmakers have uniformly shied from. There was Steven Spielberg’s Amistad, a film about a slave revolt and landmark court case. It was a stirring drama, with gripping performances given by Djimon Hounsou and Anthony Hopkins. Its domestic total gross was $45 million. That is nothing to snicker at, but hardly what a Spielberg film is expected to earn. So many simply concluded the scenes on screen—slaves drowning, shot to death, hogtied—were too tough to sit through. Much the same criticism greeted Quentin Tarantino’s Django Unchained. Nevertheless, that movie went on to be a robust hit and a prizewinner.
Sometimes a black-themed movie is so unique, so surprising, that the Establishment ignores grubby talk of gross receipts. One such movie was Daughters of the Dust, a 1991 movie set in the 1920s in South Carolina. It revolved around a group of women and their musings about migration. The film, directed by Julie Dash, had the sweep of a fever dream. It also did not have a single big-name Hollywood star in it. Aside from its ethereal quality, something else seemed amazing: it was the first movie to gain major
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