Passion and Memory (1986) | Rare Black Film Documentary

and if you appreciate award-winning taste you won't want to miss the premiere of a new 13-course series dining in france pierre salinger is your host beginning thursday evening at 7. [Music] presentation of this program is made possible by a grant from the corporation for public broadcasting [Music] [Music] do [Music] that's just her way rosetta i love you hello i'm robert guillaume as a youngster i used to love to go to the movies and like all youngsters i was fascinated by the images and characters i saw there for me there was nothing better than escaping into a dark theater into a world of make-believe but as i grew up i came to realize that in this world of make-believe this world of adventure laughs and happy endings blacks were permitted to play only certain types of roles and characters mostly servants and pullman porters american film became a mirror for american life and the image of blacks reflected in that mirror was often distorted but some blacks using their creativity and imagination transcended these stereotypes making a unique and significant contribution to american film for the next hour we are going to explore the history of blacks in american film by examining the careers of five film stars chosen for the pivotal role each played steppen fetch it though criticized became hollywood's first black star hattie mcdaniel despite consistent typecasting as a maid rose to oscar-winning stardom bill robinson acclaimed as the world's greatest tap dancer was both a broadway and hollywood star dorothy dandridge the screen's hottest black sex symbol of the 1950s sidney poitier with sensitivity and strength he became hollywood's first black screen hero each of these performers have brought an essential element to their creative work passion and our story is as much about the creative passion of these five stars as it is about their memorable contribution to american film [Music] in the early 1930s the best known and most successful black actor working in hollywood was steppen fetchit he was the movie's first distinctive black personality you know there's been a heap argument around town about this year whale and professor marvel now he claims that it's a very identical whale that swallowed jonah well it looks old enough to be there's a look here inside well come on out of there now ain't nobody going to harm you what you doing in there no i would just thought you thought i was mr professor hey say wait a minute here ruth you know i got an idea see what you think of this fleety what do you say you want to get your money out of this don't you sure do what do you say let me take this on the clarimo queen and i'll soon have your money back and and and then we can get duke that appeal lawyer too well i don't see how nobody can kick about that do you go with this yes i worked there please burn you in the mouth and the cali open hello what's your name well i was baptized david begat solomon david baguette what there was we got solomon by attaining george lincoln watson well now listen if you're going with me we're going to stick right to the bible you would join them stephen fetchette was born lincoln theodore monroe andrew perry in 1892 he was named after four american presidents a devout catholic he had first hoped to become a priest but before long he turned to vaudeville and during the early 1920s if you wanted to become a performer vaudeville was the place to get started when i was on the road with him uh i said step let's rehearse we've got to get some live you don't need nothing and i really didn't the minute i would come out and i'd do a short monologue and i would introduce step the minute he'd hit the stage he didn't have to say anything fetchit came to hollywood in the late 1920s the reputation of this suburb of los angeles had already assumed mythic proportions for the american public the name hollywood had become synonymous with motion pictures it had ceased being just a geographical setting hollywood had become a state of mind and fetch it fit in perfectly with the hollywood mentality in 1927 director john stahl was preparing to film in old kentucky fetcher heard there was a part in it for a black handyman and visited stahl's office we were looking for a black in those days negro to play a very important part looked high and low couldn't find the person one day stahl was off at lunch and i was in the office the door opened and then walked this fellow and said i hear you've been looking for somebody and i'm the one you're looking for and i looked up and he it was the one we were looking for i said what's your name he said stepping fetch it i said sit right down there don't go away i went out and got john stahl and said come on quickly the guy that you've been looking for has come into the office and that was his start while on screen he seldom seemed to have any sense fetchit the performer was in complete control of his stylized characterization stepping fetch it really represented a kind of survival technique that we did use and perhaps at that time we were unwilling to look at or unwilling to have shown and it probably didn't come off screen as a survival style because of the people who were using it they were in fact using it for their own best ends and uh so i suppose we reacted negatively to that but but uh i think uh lincoln perry has been much maligned during the same year that fetch it made his screen debut 1927 hollywood's first talking picture the jazz singer was released as the decade of the roaring twenties came to a close hollywood and america went through major changes silent motion pictures were replaced by what came to be known as the talkies and in 1929 the stock market fell the economic landscape was bleak and americans looked to the dream merchants of hollywood for comic relief from the harsh financial realities of the day in hollywood films this much needed comic relief was provided primarily by black servants what were you doing in that closet uh i went uh getting some air oh you go into a dark closet to get air do you yeah you see i'm a man who like to change you there i'll get tired of the regular old ass by 1934 fetch it was already a hollywood legend at a time when contracts for black performers were unheard of fetch it was signed then dropped then incredibly resigned by fox pictures what you doing with my hot water just trying to put some humor back in my feet i even got my whole body just good you are nothing i'm just going to wash dishes with that water i'm killing two stones with one bird will rogers the popular humorist and one of fox studios biggest stars insisted that the studio keep fetchit under contract fetchit appeared in four films with rogers becoming the first black to receive featured billing and have special scenes written into pictures for him [Music] in judge priest directed by john ford they became the first well-known interracial comedy team in film take you i thought i told you to stay away from that bed it got hung up on that too but this old skull i mean what do you mean possum grab it say listen every inch of that is raccoon better be raccoon i took it all for rich yankees they call them [ __ ] well that goes back to uh to uh menstrual and slavery times where they use the word fall black people [ __ ] shine and so forth and so on but uh in fact they'll still use it today if they get a chance but things are quite different now but as i see it's why i'm just glad that the people had an opportunity to be upon the big screen step and fetch it now that's one of the people who makes my skin crawl i never could stand step and fetch it it was to me he was beyond belief as a comedian he didn't he wasn't funny uh true a true stereotype uh the first time i ever saw him i thought to myself uh what is he doing why is he doing this i never saw anybody act like this in my life so i don't really hold much of a a brief for step and fetch it as anything other than an aberration in the history of black performers fetch it led a flamboyant private life story circulated about his six houses his chinese servants his lavish parties his 12 cars what i remember very vividly is my father and others laughing just cracking up on the floor talking about time the seventh country would come down central avenue and his long duesenberg with a lion uh in the back seat sitting up like a little cat a dog and he would have his his bowler on and dressed to the tee just driving down the street fetch it's antics eventually destroyed him during the late 1930s he fell into obscurity studio executives tied of his eccentric personality he often held a production to attend a morning catholic mass and the self-demeaning characters he played alienated him from black audiences no one could have predicted that this actor who gave the appearance of being slow-witted simple-minded and confused would become such a star but during the early 1930s fetchit went far beyond anyone's predictions or expectations and did so brilliantly in his own inspired way he opened studio doors to blacks in hollywood willie best and mantan molin are among those who elaborated on his techniques and gained popularity appearing with fetchit and judge priest was another immensely talented black performer who was initially told by a powerful casting agent she would never reach stardom hattie mcdaniel before 1930 there was no blacks had there was no casting situation central casting didn't handle them so they created one they hired a guy named mr butler we all they call him mr butler so if you want a job black you want a job in this town you had to go to mr butler well nationally he stuck at the people and when hattie went to him he said you two black and ugly ying you're never going to make anything in film you know that kind of thing but she proved him wrong had he mcdaniel like steppen fetch it came to hollywood in the late 1920s born in wichita kansas the fourth child of a baptist minister got to take him in she struggled upward from roles and road companies to appearances on radio and then finally parts and movies she played the fussy boisterous made in film after film using the stereotyped figure to display her remarkable talent and affinity for pure broad comedy i got stomach trouble no happy white child what did he mean he's been feeding you not a dream thing that's your trouble what have you got for supper mr room you stay here us is going to kill the high stepping loose in the yard and a great big bowl of milk gravy and grit and waffles don't you worry not honey heavyset and dark-skinned she had the physical characteristics that hollywood associated with the role of domestics often criticized for playing the part of a maid she answered her critics just as tightly as she might have answered an employer in one of her films why should i complain about making seven hundred dollars a week playing a maid if i didn't i'd be making seven dollars a week actually being one hattie never really wanted to be a mammy as such but she liked being earth mother and there is a difference that's not a put down or an embarrassment to other blacks she was able to transcend the stereotype and the cliche and to give that character the dimension that was inherent in the material in joseph from sternberg's 1932 film blonde venus mac daniel plays a domestic who befriends as well as protects marlena dietry here she investigates the detective looking for ditri hello honey looking for somebody no nobody in particular why well i noticed everybody in the street and thought maybe i might be able to help you out no i wasn't looking for anybody just browsing around thanks just the same just browsing around yes sir boss i can see that just browsing around what did he say carl he says ain't looking for nobody he's just browsing around but he can't fool me no sir that white man's up for something in 1937 mcdaniel appeared in seven films her most interesting role was as rosetta in saratoga the film starred two of the biggest sex symbols of the 30s clark gable and gene hollow it included special scenes to play on mcdaniel's rich humor and infectious charm most important in saratoga hedy mcdaniel's character emerged as a mother figure to gene harlow will you tell mr bradley i'd like to see him i sure will he's got a pencil smudge on your chin honey what happened don't you want to look pretty for mr bradley why should i i'd fix up for him anytime if he was only the right color i didn't marry handy had such a fine rapport with clark gable that audiences frequently lost sight of their master servant roles yeah i know that crap needs a good spanking oh she don't mean nothing mr duke that's just her way rosetta i love you she emerged as the one servant of the era to speak her mind fully this is especially true of the role she played in david o'sell's next gone with the wind hattie is an all-seeing all-knowing guardian of the terror mansion in one of the film's most dramatic moments she reveals her concern for rhett butler after the accidental death of his only child it's mr red i was worried about he lost his mind these last couple of days oh no man they know i never see no man black or white since it's still on any child when dr mead say her neck bro mr red grabbed his gun and run out there and shoot that poor opponent and for a minute i think he got to shoot his set captain and yes and miss scotland she called him a mother but teaching that challenger she said you giving my baby what you killed and then he said miss scholar they never cared nothing about miss buffet they like to turn my blood cold the things they say to one another her powerful performance won hattie mcdaniel and oscar for best supporting actress thus in 1940 she became the first black person to receive a nomination and the first to win an academy award ironically her acceptance speech was written by the studio academy of motion picture arts and science fellow members of the motion picture industry and honored guests this is one of the happiest moments of my life and i want to thank each one of you who had a part in selecting me for one of the awards for your kindness it has made me feel very very humble and i shall always hold it as a beacon for anything that i may be able to do in the future i sincerely hope i shall always be a credit to my raise and to the motion picture industry my heart is too full to tell you just how i feel and may i say thank you congratulations olivia to have one told me this story about when hattie mcdaniel's name was uh uh announced as being the winner olivia havilland got so upset they were both in the same category for supporting actress she was 23 at the time and she ran into the kitchen of the hotel crying and mrs selznick followed her in and gave her a really rough talking to saying that how dare you be upset that this woman has won she's it's probably the only time in her life she'll ever have a chance like this she's reached the pinnacle of her career she's worked for 40 years to do this sort of thing and here you are crying your heart out because you've lost to this woman you ought to be ashamed of yourself so i think that was pretty as olivia javelin mentioned it to me she was it was one of her early learning experiences she called it in all her best movies hattie mcdaniel refused to accept typical domesticity given the racial segregation of the period just talking back was a triumph southern film goers complained that she acted too familiar with her white employers in the 1940s film producers softened the high-spirited mcdaniel screen persona before her death in the early 1950s she left the movies to play the wild and witty-made beulah on radio the enthusiasm black actors poured into their characters seemed often to parallel their own gratitude that at long last blacks were working in films without scripts to aid them and generally without even sympathetic directors or important roles many black actors in american films were compelled to rely on their own ingenuity to create memorable characters butterfly mcqueen ethel waters dooley wilson eddie rochester anderson and lee whipper to mention only a few occasionally during the 1930s black actresses were given parts that allowed them to display their dramatic talents universal's imitation of life cast louise beavers as the mother of freddie washington a troubled young woman who rejects her mother's point of view that blacks have to accept being second-class citizens viola won't you be a good child like you can be darling and do something for your mammy don't say manny look here baby you go down south to one of them high tone colleges where only the high tone goes wouldn't you do that for me honey a negro school ain't nothing to be ashamed of daughter dear meet you across halfway don't be near so heavy cool most joan quit battling your little head sword now from button against stone walls open up and say lord i bows my head he made you black honey don't be telling him his business accept it honey do that for you mammy your mother did the hollywood star making system was in full evidence when it cast bill bojangles robinson opposite america's favorite child actress shirley temple she occupied a unique position in relation to blacks and films of all leading ladies to be waited on by blacks none was more dutifully attended to than little miss curly top in the early 30s she and will rogers were fox studios most valuable assets robinson co-starred with her in four [Music] films their popularity surpassed even fred astaire and ginger rogers robinson came to films after a legendary career as a tap dancer fred astaire called him the greatest dancer of all time the grandson of a slave he was said to have never had a dancing lesson in his life at the age of 8 he ran away from home in richmond virginia and earned his living by dancing for pennies in saloons and on streets he made his debut in show business with a vaudeville act and went on to become a broadway star unlike step and fetch it robinson's on-screen characters were articulate reliable confident and cool very cool well well this is certainly what i call a coincidence yes i know you never expected to see me say look here hi is miss elizabeth oh our health is all right but i think she worries about mr jack you better come home pretty soon what you mean you ain't got no money m-o-n-i-e not only that we most out of f-u-d-e that's too bad look here wouldn't they k-u-n-e-l a little l-o-n-e you know miss lisbeth wouldn't take nothing from him why before she'd do that she'd go to the uh uh uh p-o-h-o-s p-o-h-o-s yeah showing you got no education the poor house oh no yes indeed bill robinson uh of course the marvelous performer who had been very successful on the stage before so he came to film already a big success uh had a a nonchalant way about him and an heir of um uh he had a dignity and he had a a blending quality that holly would like because he would not give offense he was also certainly not the stepping fetcher type whatsoever while robinson and temple were making their first feature film together the little colonel robinson taught her his popular staircase dance routine the resulting scene became famous look here will you go if i show you a brand new way how to go upstairs how could there be a new way to go upstairs now you just white i went to the market for to get some feet and these are tough and i couldn't give up i paid five dollars for a great big hole and the hulk so fat and i couldn't get back robinson's greatest gift as a dancer in the movies was that his sense of rhythm and his physical dexterity combined to convey an optimistic or copacetic air as he tapped across the room his sheer joy made audiences think that life after all was what you made it the real significance of a bill robinson performance was therefore never as much as in what he had to say as in what he came to represent in his films with shirley temple he understood her problems sympathized with them and ultimately made a decisive move to aid her in 1939 as his young co-star matured and they did fewer films together bill robinson's popularity declined he wisely returned to the theater and to broadway stardom in 1943 hollywood brought him back to play the lead in stormy weather by the very nature of its all-black cast fox's stormy weather and mgm's cabin in the sky were exceptions to the rules of 1940s hollywood movie making robinson coined the word copacetic which seemed to mean everything was just fine and dandy but in this scene from stormy weather with cab calloway and dooley wilson robinson's character knows nothing about talking jive why did what do you know pop give me some skin mella don't let your racket jack say this cat ain't helped to the jive stop beating up your chops to him no i ain't got a brain down that's the wrong riff jack say what the w-2 fool's talking about we're talking jive he says he's glad to see and he wants to shake your hands solid righteous crazy in stormy weather a young rising star played opposite bill robinson lena horn elegant sensuous and lovely in her important scene when she sang the title song lena horne's beauty and melancholy brought depth to the lyrics [Music] is keeps [Music] keeps another great beauty and contemporary of lena horns was dorothy dandridge despite the cold war and detached atmosphere of the fifties she infused it with her great intensity and became hollywood's most successful black leading lady for a period that prided itself on appearances hers was a startling presence her physical features like earlier black sex symbols fit the traditional criteria for acceptability light-skinned and beautiful before dandridge nina mae mckinney had been the screen's first black love goddess and freddie washington had symbolized alienation and despair dorothy dandridge to me was probably the loveliest and the most beautiful female that i have ever seen on a screen black white asian mexican or whatever she was just a gorgeous woman and a very talented woman she was the was the woman that i saw as my um the screen image for me of the the epitome of beauty people always think that when you're beautiful you got it made and i will say that in terms of just being a woman period they figure that when you're beautiful you got it made you got everything you could possibly want and it's not true in 1952 dorothy was selected to star opposite harry belafonte in mgm's bright road she played a school teacher learning to cope with a problematic child dorothy revealed a soft radiant screen presence you know miss richards your class is doing very very well um even that boy ct is picking up quite a bit isn't he yes but he's not doing as well as he could see you still have high hopes for him yes very high well maybe you're right there's no harm in hoping dorothy dandridge came to films after a career as a stage entertainer that began as a child the daughter of a cleveland minister and an actress ruby dandridge she performs as a child with her older sister vivian in a vaudeville act billed as the wonder kids at 15 she and vivian along with another girl appeared as the dandridge sisters touring the country with the jimmy lunsford band dorothy dandridge and the dandridge sisters that's uh i met i met all the girls when they came to new york to do the cotton club show and then later dorothy uh married my one of my buddies harold nicholas and she was a great person and a beautiful actress and i never knew that she would turn out to be as good an actress as she did carmen jones based on the famous opera carmen was the 1950s most lavish most publicized and most successful motion picture with an all-black cast the story of how director otto preminger decided to cast dorothy dandridge for the lead reads like a press agent's dream but it's true initially primiger had thought her too wholesome and sophisticated for the role of a [ __ ] but he underestimated the talent determination and creative passion of dorothy dandridge she got herself a hairstyle that looked like a woman a street wise person and she wore a peasant-type blouse with fell off the shoulders and you know if she wanted it to and she wore a black silk skirt i think was satin actually with a slit on the side and uh she went over and we talked it over with her mother ruby and ruby said i'll teach you how to walk the way some of these women walk that are enticing men as their whole interest in life and that was a good contribution also and so we went back and dorothy was dressed in this manner and when we were escorted into his private vast offices otto just spun around premature he spun around his wheelchairs my god you're a carmen [Applause] out of that suit who's responsible for this me job bro take custody of that prisoner prisoner interfering with the war effort destroying government property you heard me remove the prison off that table you go for me and i'm terrible but if you're hard to get i go for you dorothy dandridge it's a very unusual woman she's a beautiful woman a talented woman and uh i suppose she was as frustrated as any actress could be who is black to to have the talents she had and to to look as she looked and not find an open door so that those talents could be displayed regularly and appreciated by the audiences that that she developed in fact in carmen jones and in uh poor game best look i can't let that spooky stuff trip you up signs never lie joe just don't pay no mind carmen yeah like you well there's nothing you couldn't get game for it how you figure that let's look at you a lot more than other gals a lot more what that's your belt i'm twisted i'll fix it still don't trust me huh don't you trust yourself [Music] carmen jones made dandridge an international star her performance earned her an oscar nomination as best actress of the year no black performer before her had ever been nominated in the leading actor category but despite the great fanfare and recognition after her triumph in 1954 she sadly discovered there was no place for her to go very few film offers came her way ladies and gentlemen miss dorothy dandridge [Applause] thank you jerry uh miss dandridge a crisis has arisen and only you can help us out of this juncture oh what happened you know the lyrics to julie yes i think i do you do oh fortune smiles upon us tonight you see someone was to have sung julie which is the third nominated song at this point arrangements were made rehearsals were held and then at the last minute they decided not to let me do it all fortune smiles upon us tonight very good and so the lipton spot i mean the spotlight falls on miss dorothy dandridge as she sings the song [Music] [Music] julie [Music] in the 1950s dorothy was a sex symbol for black america in much the same way marilyn monroe was for white america you could say there were certain parallels between dorothy dandridge's career and marilyn monroe's career only because again they symbolized something that was very difficult for them to extricate themselves they once you get into a mold and the studios and the public see you as a specific type certainly saw marilyn monroe as a specific type as they saw dorothy dandridge because of the role that she created in carmen jones oh i think they were were absolutely the black and white of the situation if you would call it that because marilyn had that same uh longing and search to be loved for herself and not for what she represented as a as a sexual symbol women women are that's a put-down for for a woman it really is [Music] in robert rawson's 1957 film island in the sun dandridge was cast in the first of several interracial love roles but she never was allowed to kiss her white lover on the screen how long would it take you to pack but i two hours i don't know very much either there's a plane leaves for england on friday it's in the car for you all right you don't seem very surprised about going to england together where you go i go she was a tragic mulatto and she she never came to terms with that not really it it's so confusing the color problem in america is so psychotic that uh she was a victim there's no question about it she we used to have big arguments for instance she'd say if i looked like betty grable i would be so marvelous dorothy's last important american film was otto preminger's porgy and bess in 1959 in which she starred with sidney poitier sammy davis jr and pearl bailey as best she put her star qualities on brilliant display again she portrayed a beautiful but tragic heroine a self-destructive woman her troubled marriage that year to jack dennison seemed to confirm suspicions that dorothy had fallen victim to acting out her screen image in real life i told dorothy that i thought it would be a mistake for her to having a relationship with jack dennison his his because his attitude always reminded me of some kind of boy and uh a girl sort of thing where he would give send me my gifts back send me my love letters back and it was cheap gifts little seed pearls i said throw them in this you know trash you know and but he worked uh magic on her totally heartbreaking the marriage ended in bankruptcy and a divorce and thus truly broke her heart and just made her almost incapable of performing when she divorced him he asked for half of everything that she had he wanted half of the sheets half of the silver half of the pelican cases half of everything half of the blankets and you know how he divided he took a scissors and went through and cut them in half the loneliest day she probably ever experienced was a day when she went down to declare bankruptcy and it was terribly sad and i was afraid for her and i started i called her psychiatrist and she had paid these horrendous fees for over eight years and uh i asked him if he wouldn't just call her on his own to do something about it and he said no he couldn't do it he said she wasn't able to pay so to heck with it in 1965 at the age of 42 dorothy dandridge was found dead from an overdose of anti-depression pills in a way never before demonstrated by a black actress working in hollywood she used her own self-contradictions to fascinate movie audiences unfortunately this brilliant and dedicated performer could not find in hollywood the opportunity to display her unique talents along with dandridge sydney poitier is the most significant black actor to gain recognition during the 1950s his career proved more substantial professionally and personally than his predecessors partier came to acting almost by accident is a name that conjures up a lot of things for me because sydney and i go back i guess to the beginnings of both our careers uh there actually was a kind of triumvirate in sydney harry and myself we're very close friends harry being belafonte and um we struggled along in theater in new york and first of all in harlem and little theater and the american negro theater and the harlem mca theater little theater and uh finally began to find our opportunities in those few roles that that would would happen downtown downtown being broadway after minor stage roles sidney poitier came to films and just about took over his first leading role was in joseph manowicz's no way out just dressed easy boy you helped me so that i can help you keep your legs in the same position i just pressed easy stop don't hurt him don't do nothing johnny he didn't do nothing to you he didn't even say anything i was the only one remember doc but i was out of my mind you know getting shot in all darkly johnny alone leave him alone maybe one of he ought to want to see what's happening when a doctor wants an orderly he'll sin for one just in case maybe he's you shut up anything wrong doc he's dead i first met sydney i think it was 1950 at the 20th century fox i was working for daryl zaneck at the time and my impressions of sydney my first impression was i liked him a lot he was terrific we became good friends on the picture we made at this first meeting we've been friends all this time it's almost 35 years now poitiers rise to stardom in the mid-1950s was no accident the civil rights movement was gaining momentum and poitier was the model integrationist the defiant ones was sidney partier's most important film of the 1950s in it he played a black convict handcuffed to a white one as the two escape the law neither man likes the other but before the picture ends a deep friendship has developed for once they have been unchained poitier comes to the rescue of tony curtis not out of necessity but out of brotherly love [Music] come on in 1963 poitier played a black carpenter who befriends a group of nuns poitier's sensitive and brilliant performance in lilies of the field was rewarded with an oscar he became the first black to receive an academy award in the best actor category the winner mr porter is the first negro to win such a high award and the announcement is received warmly by the audience the winner is choked with emotions it is a long journey to this moment i am naturally indebted to countless numbers of people all of them are a very special thank you [Applause] i wasn't at the ceremonies but he came over the next morning we were living over in mandeville canyon in brentwood at that time and he came over the next morning and uh for breakfast and we had a celebration at breakfast and i remember that that was great that was a great win and it was a marvelous performance he did in that too poitier's most powerful role in the 60s was in the explosive 1967 film in the heat of the night his character was cool and calculating dependent on his sharp instincts as a top homicide detective and also sensitive to the bigotry in a small southern town i was visiting my mother i came in on the 12 35 from brownsville i was waiting to go out on the 405. mm-hmm yeah in the meanwhile you just killed yourself a white man just about the most important white man we got around here pick yourself up a couple of hundred dollars i earned that money ten hours a day seven days a week call it can't earn that kind of money boy hell that's more than i make in a month now where did you earn it philadelphia mississippi pennsylvania i just want you to do up there little pennsylvania earn a kind of money i'm a police officer rod steiger's oscar-winning performance demonstrated his skillful ability as an actor to convey a man caught up in the illogic of racism once his character realizes how valuable virgil tibs can be to the investigation he prevails upon him to stay and help this town needs a factory burden corbett come down from chicago to build it i hear they're going to hire a thousand men half them be colored you know what that means probably got him killed that's what mrs koba thinks she wants us to catch her killer no killer no factory well that's a lot of jobs for a lot of colored people can you follow me i'm going home man they're your people not mine yours you made this scene what do you want to do you want me to beg you is that what you have look i've had your town up to here boy it would give me a world of satisfactional horse whip you virgil yeah well my father used to say that by the late 1960s poitier had established himself as one of the top box office attractions in america starting with a western titled buck in the preacher he began directing as a film director sydney poitier's biggest hit came in 1980 with the release of stir crazy a highly successful comedy starring richard pryor and gene wilder though not the first interracial comedy team things had changed considerably since the days of stepping fetchity will rogers in stir crazy the white character was silly in the butt of the joke just as often as the black character it grossed over 100 million dollars for columbia pictures and thus made poitiers the first black director to have a blockbuster hit okay no more hitting did you hear what i just said no more hitting skip all right turn around do you want to stay late tonight i said turn around okay let's get out of here come on silverstein harry i'm freaking scared yeah so long suckers hey harry he thinks he's a horse help me harry feel him do it please he's sick he's he's having to fit see he don't have his poop pills he's got him he's got lost vietnam please mary help me harry yeah this business is filled with luck being at the right place at the right time i think i'm a perfect example and and sid sid has had a certain amount of luck but be but the the trick is to make a certain amount of luck work over a long period to take advantage of what gets your foot into the door and that's what a lot of people can't do and that's something that's i think innately within the person if the person is tuned in enough to know when his foot is in the door and to make it from there then he's on his own and it's up to him so there's no one thing you can say about each individual circumstance each individual circumstance is different but there is a lot of luck and and the ability to take advantage of that luck is certainly what gives a career a long run pointier success is an actor helped to create opportunities for other black performers while sidney cuartier's character virgil tibbs was a skilled conservative police detective working within the system richard roundtree a shaft was a maverick a rebellious private detective who plays by his own rules [Music] this film was one of the first in the genre that became known as black exploitation films gordon parks who in 1969 became the first black artist to direct a hollywood feature film the learning tree also directed shaft in 1971 for financially ailing mgm this box office success helped to keep the studio gates open i've never been offered some of the films that would have been offered to me had i been white let's put it very simply like that i have been one film where the stars were white and that was ron liebman and david selby and super cops the other films have been uh well categorized as black films not that i have anything that's doing black films but i don't want to be involved only in things and during black history month you know what i mean in the early 1970s hollywood producers realized there was a market for low-budget films featuring black talent while many of these films were criticized this period represents the most significant involvement by blacks in front of and behind the cameras in the history of american film well i think it was an unhappy phenomenon the black exploitation period unhappy because of the dead end it led to uh which found us all still unemployed with no uh uh impact or uh effective ability to to move in this industry i hear a lot of people talking about black exploitation and it's a title that i hate it's something that i think people white people have put onto our films in terms of trying to keep it down a level filmmaking is filmmaking period we as artists are all exploited whether we're black or white or female or male we are all exploited that's part of the industry if you don't want to be exploited don't become an actor because all you got to do is take what you have the craft and the human being the qualities that you have and you got to sell it you got to market it you become a commodity that's exploitation so when people talk about black exploitation i get very angry and they start saying well those are films that began and they weren't really that good and anything that was black exploitation didn't work and it wasn't going to sell you got to start somewhere when people start talking about step and fetch it and all the negatives that they have towards step and fetch it i say but he started and he was doing it and when i saw him on television then i said yeah i can do that too at age four i grew up saying i want to be a movie star because i saw other black people on tv unlike the so-called black exploitation films made during the early 1970s sounder was intensely warm and unique an important film that depicted the strength of the black family sicily tyson felt that she had found the role she had been preparing for throughout her career as the wife of a louisiana sharecropper she struggled for her family to survive while not knowing when her husband who had been wrongly imprisoned would return home perhaps ultimately american movies will be awakened and invigorated by black artists the way sports are by black athletes and the way music is by black performers composers and musicians already we have seen richard pryor and eddie murphy sweep the nation off its feet through their comic genius in film and we do know that black performance can transcend even stereotypical material this is a result of the creative passion and commitment they bring to their work if there is anything that the careers of step and fetch it hattie mcdaniel bill robinson dorothy dandridge and sidney poitier teach us it is the importance of perseverance this lesson is conveyed in a scene from sounder between paul winfield and kevin hooks you know when i got this leg hooked i was down in this rock quarry and all of a sudden there was this dynamite blast coming at me with the kind of force to kill ten men well i got out of the way or most of them rock faster than the lightning in god's mind cause i made it up in my head just that quick that i was gonna beat the death that was coming at me that's what i'm gonna do with this trouble in my leg i don't want to beat it ain't nothing left for me to do but to be but that's what i want you to do [Music] [Music] presentation of this program was made possible by a grant from the corporation for public broadcasting

Channel: reelblack

Views: 124,599

Rating: 4.8511529 out of 5

Keywords: Black Film History

Id: ZhoFkxvkPng

Length: 58min 22sec (3502 seconds)

Published: Wed Dec 13 2017