I will admit a part of me was angry when Ruby Dee passed. Don’t get me wrong everything that had to do with her physically leaving us left me with me the greatest of sadness, but whenever one of our Black unsung pass on my bitterness wells up because I am reminded that they’ll never have in life the platform they deserved within this nation. The unfairness that when a Sissy Spacek or Meryl Streep – deservedly so cause they are geniuses – were crafting careers for the ages, the Ruby Dee’s or Cicely Tyson’s had to settle for less than their worth in this industry. We applaud them for the grace of their resilience but something in me refuses to accept that as some kind of consolation prize for what I feel to be careers that should have been granted so much more. Back when I was in acting school a (white) classmate of mine asked me who was one of my favorite actors, I said “Al Freeman Jr”, he looked at me with bewilderment and asked “who is he?” (chances are a few you reading this just said the same.) The truth is I still have not forgiven this nation for the placism they have continually practiced, that Gloria Foster’s genius was not allowed to be recognized on a large scale until towards her very end in what can’t help but feel like a “slip through the cracks” appearance in The Matrix blockbusters coupled with an uncomfortable irony that her physical flesh extinguished just as her star began to have some recognition – I mean come on, the symbolism there is pretty much shouting at us – are we listening?!
The bile remains in my mouth because the placism is still in practice, the theatre just has a refurbished locale. When a study finds that 76.3% of speaking roles in motion pictures in the US are performed by Whites we can hardly call that progress – especially since other aspects like multi-dimensional content for people of color, non stereotypical representation and diversity in positions such as directing, screenwriting and other technical professions in Film and TV have for the most part gone unchanged. Now I speak about this from experience, from personal account. I have been an actor professionally for over 20 years of my life, it is common knowledge that while anyone can have a “stroke of luck” within this business, what is without a doubt is that if you are of color, any road you will take to reach that height will be traveled in second class, where there are less seats and often times you will be forced to ride in a compromising position. So acceptance becomes as much your life’s work as your actual craft, how much you can “not let it get to you”, “rise above it”, “be 2 times as good” and hope that you will be judged properly and the “best person for the job will get the role”
It’s taken me 20 years of disrespect of not only myself but the countless amount of other actor’s of color to accept not so much in my head but within my fiber that living the existence of “colored actor dictated by whiteness” is a trap. There is a reason why that white acting classmate of mine does not know who Al Freeman Jr is – sadly many Black folk as well – they were never meant too. It has taken me 20 years to fully accept that within the confines of the industry structure I am not meant to have the career I deserve, cause that would mean that the whiteness which shapes the lens of this industry would have to give up something, it would have to be willing to destroy itself, relinquish privilege, wave the white flag (pun intended) and with a repentant spirit surrender itself to something called equal footing, and frankly I learned to not hold my breath at a young age so forgive me if my belief in that as a remote possibility is at a complete zero.
The only acceptance I now find of worth is the acceptance of the evidence presented to me. What do I find when I observe that someone like Wendell Harris can make a film that wins the Grand Jury Prize at Sundance but is immediately pummeled into obscurity by racisms structure because its very existence challenges whiteness in total? Well my mind now goes to a quote by another unsung, Ivan Dixon that my good friend Dennis Leroy Kangalee put me on to recently:
“And I think that is the kind of horror of Black American life that we have accepted that struggle for the dollar instead of struggling for humanity. For honor”
I now know it is time for the struggle for honor. The only proper course. Wendell Harris’s refusal to allow his (unsung) classic Chameleon Street to be stripped of its folk spirit and morphed into a platform for god knows what in some kind of minstrel remake would be in vain if I continue to buy in (side note – tell me time a film by a white filmmaker that won the Grand Jury Prize at Sundance that was asked to be remade instead of being released? Think they would have made that request for Welcome to The Dollhouse or The Brother’s McMullen? My sideways face is major on that one. But I digress). Wendell’s refusal, Dixon’s conviction, Bill Gunn’s lucid “madness” are roadmaps for me, for us. Recently I was told by a now former acting rep of mine that if I wanted to keep a career in the movie business I must refrain from talking about politics, I must keep my internet trail free of opinions on social issues, he warned me that producers and casting people search through actors on-line profiles to see if they are potentially too “controversial” to hire. Now how would I honor Ruby’s spirit of protest if I conformed to these demands? Let this modern McCarthyism define my actions and when to apply my solidarity? There is no honor left in Hollywood – you can debate if there ever really was any – they barely even let their fiery geniuses who are white move with any freedom – read about the career trials of Hal Ashby, Barbara Loden or John Cassavetes if you think I am off base. John Carpenter recently said in an interview that this is currently the lowest time for creativity in Hollywood’s history, so where do you think that leaves myself? Leaves that Asian actress or actor who accounts for 5% of speaking roles in movies in the US? That Latino thespian who is a member of 26% of the movie ticket buying market but only is allotted 4.2% of roles? If one is looking for Hollywood and even our supposed “indie cinema” network to be the place where we will one day display the many shades of humanity of people of color in this nation than I hope drinking artificial sweetener for the rest of your life is a proper trade off for living in reality.
The struggle for honor can happen, right now. We can birth a cinema that makes that humanity Ivan Dixon spoke about a requisite. How do I know it can happen? Cause I can look at the work we have already done, the best of it was when we refused and resisted. There is a reason that Bill Gunn’s Ganja & Hess was the only American Film shown in the Critics Week at The Cannes Film Festival in 1973. It or Chameleon Street’s repression symbolizes their excellence more than anything! They were confiscated because they where signals through the flames. Our only failure then were the times and its limitations. Technology and the lessons of our past give us now an opportunity, we can make the spirit of these works evident to all in way a Julie Dash couldn’t when she made Daughter of the Dust because she had to surrender its release to the mercy of the establishment that didn’t understand it. If you have a computer and some kind of screen now you have the potential for a theatre, it’s really that simple. So officially I relinquish my alliance to that “other” sector, if you ask me what I am, I will respond “A phantom dramatist of the cinema of the undead. Cold bones to remind me that my warmth of flesh is precious and the fire in my heart is something I must always honor by letting its beat harmonize with living things who are unwired to the hive”. It’s simply the natural order of things. Ruby, our “Mother Sister” is watching us, let’s make sure her and all our ancestors struggle for honor will not be in vain – Mtume Gant 8/24/2014
Mtume Gant 