FCF: Is the Black woman too intense for the Black man? The viral video Black Marriage Negotiations reiterated media’s obsession over Black Women’s relationship status. The conversation across the board seems to be around Black women desperately searching for Black love but complaining how there are no good Black men. I know I reconsidered dating outside the race especially after watching Tyler Perry’s film For Colored Girls. Frightened by that kind of Black love, I immediately ran to sign up for the online Jewish matching making site Jdate. I met this man who was clearly not afraid of a good time and although the relationship ended after him not wanting to bring me home to his mama, I realized that dating outside the race also has its issues. However, the key take away here is not only did me and Habad have a damn good time at the West Indian Labor Day Parade but that I took the first step towards love and not race. Should the question that we be asking ourselves, is my search for Black love or any specific love keeping me from love ...or from getting laid. I know one thing’s for sure…it’s complicated. I’m Funnel Cake Flowers your Urban Chameleon news reporter from Tickles.TV
Wednesday, March 30, 2011
Funnel Cake Flowers comments on our obsession with "BLACK LOVE"
Monday, November 8, 2010
For Colored Girls: A Messy, Miserable Melodrama
Not really, and there isn’t a drop of coonery in For Colored Girls. What Tyler Perry did do in writing and directing his own version of Ntozake Shange’s 1975 classic For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide When The Rainbow Is Enuf is best described as a gentle butchering: he leaves the skeleton intact but replaces the heart of the original with a heavy dose of “no good black man” melodrama and some film-making gymnastics.
Shange’s original choreopoem features an intentionally stripped down aesthetic and a cast of seven women each represented by a different color. Through poetry and dance, the classic play voices the challenges and joys of black womanhood by addressing issues such as race, rape, abortion, falling in love, and learning to accept yourself, brown skin and all. Perry’s interpretation replaces the anonymous women with a cast of characters whose experiences are occasionally expressed through Shange’s poetry but are primarily presented via a heavy-handed storyline that makes For Colored Girls more of a two-hour long soap opera than a work of art. Most of the events come straight from Shange’s work, but Perry updates the story with a male supporting cast, some moralizing about HIV and religion, and of course, a brother on “the down-low.” Yes, fans of the original, you officially have permission to roll your eyes.
The film begins with one of my favorite poems, “sing a black girl’s song/bring her out/to know yourself/to know you/but sing her rhythms/carin/struggle/hard times/sing her song of life…” Before long I realized which notes this film erases from our song: the blissful ones. There is no Toussaint. There is no hopscotch. The joys of a first sexual experience as told by Shange’s poem “graduation nite,” are reduced to a first act aside. Perry’s version of a black girl song is more funeral march than praise dance. Instead of a well-rounded and inclusive interpretation of Shange’s work, Perry deftly manages to suck out most of the joy and hope that made the original so vibrant and true. His is a hat trick that almost impresses as much as it insults.
As expected, Shange’s eloquent poems about love, loss, and self-reliance are the best part of For Colored Girls, but their integration into the storyline is jarring and even silly at times. Imagine your standard musical but insert poetry instead of songs and there you have Perry’s solution for turning the choreopoem into a dramatic film. Theater adapted to film is always a tall order, but it’s hard to take a monologue seriously when an actress abruptly adjusts her countenance and, with a quivering lip, delivers a monologue in out-of-place language over a dramatic instrumental that ramps up for the poem’s duration and then abruptly disappears to make way for everyday scripted dialogue. A handful of these are well done, but it’s too easy to groan when a character suddenly catches the “Shange Holy Ghost.” This patchwork approach does a disservice to Shange’s words, which are still magical and remarkably descriptive today, even at over thirty years old. Perhaps, with some adjustment, Perry has created a new art form, but probably not.
Fortunately, the cast makes For Colored Girls watchable even when the film-making is bumpy. Kimberly Elise, Phylicia Rashad, and Anika Noni Rose all put forth excellent performances and every single woman in the cast acts her behind off – even problematically so in the case of Janet Jackson, who caricaturizes the cold career-woman in a way that made me wonder what ever did happen to Penny after she got over her mother’s abuse and moved out of the projects. In spite of the gratuitous tear-jerking story line (promotional tissue packets were even handed out at the screening I attended), For Colored Girls is easily the best Tyler Perry film I’ve watched, with strong attention to visuals and some powerful scenes. But how did a play about black female identity and empowerment turn into a movie about how hard it is to rise above all of the nonsense that men put us through?
For Colored Girls leaves black women battered and communing with God and each other exclusively after we’ve travelled the rough road that some scoundrel brother has laid out for us. Meanwhile, the original passages illustrating the beautiful bits of black-girl-ness are omitted, humorized, or broken apart and scattered into barely recognizable pieces throughout the film. Of those included, the final poem “laying on of hands,” is too little, too late, and too cinematically similar to the final scenes of Waiting To Exhale to work well in For Colored Girls.
Not only does Perry’s tendency to deal in miserable stereotypes take charge in the adaptation, the women of For Colored Girls are an even worse lot, each of them victims of their own poor decision-making in the pursuit of male love. His reputation for black male bashing through stereotypes will likely take the blame for the cavalcade of one-dimensional no-good Negroes in the film – abuser, rapist, cheater, liar, murderer – but most of these characters also existed in the original without ever appearing on-stage. The difference between the two is that Shange’s women were propped up by joy, while Perry’s are driven by their need to escape sorrow.
Perry largely glosses over the persistent issues of race, sisterhood, and how plain old happy we are to be Colored Girls in the first place. That happiness, not the evil that men do, is what made For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide When The Rainbow Is Enuf a groundbreaking collection of poetry and the voice of black female identity for generations of women. In that sense, the film accomplishes the very opposite of what admirers of the original work find so powerful. Thanks to Perry’s interpretation, we are again being told – this time in a twisted version of our own words – what defines us.
by Thembi Ford
To read more from Thembi visit What Would Thembi Do?
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Tuesday, November 17, 2009
Precious
The film critic
In going to see Precious this past week I was so disappointed and uninspired I wasn’t even moved enough to write up a review. However after reading multiple different reviews both praising and bashing the film, I finally came across one that almost word for word articulates how I feel about this film.
by Summer M.
Oprah Winfrey and Tyler Perry said Precious was awesome and that everyone should go see it. Since I am the most obedient of Negroes, I saw it last Friday. If Flavor Flav is the world’s greatest hype man, this duo is officially the world’s greatest hype machine. I found Precious slightly underwhelming, uninspiring, and lacking much of what makes the novel, Push by Sapphire, so powerful. Sorry, Ms. Winfrey. I had no “A-ha!” moment.
My reaction to and assessment of the film, however, needs context. With relative ease, I could probably come up with a book list of black women’s fiction about incest–The Bluest Eye, Corregidora, etc. In other words, I have discussed, read, written, and thought about the issues the film presents visually perhaps more than the average moviegoer. So I’m willing to concede that my expectation, my threshold might have been a bit higher than the people (talking loud as hell) in front of me. Still, I think what I found troubling about the film worth mentioning. Lee Daniels & Co. had the envelope; they just didn’t push it. (Was that too heavy handed?)
A quick synopsis: It’s 1987. Precious Jones is 16 years old, illiterate, living in Harlem with her abusive mother, and pregnant with her second child by her father. The film begins with her being suspended from school, only to wind up in Each One Teach One, an alternative school where, with the help of her teacher, Ms. Rain, Precious works towards obtaining her GED, literacy, and the agency to tell her own story. Part of me thinks that Perry and Winfrey are so enthusiastic about this film because they believe the pathology articulated in the film is an inherent component of black women’s condition. But I can’t really prove that. I can only infer. Though Precious is somewhat faithful to the novel, it fails in several key ways.
First, the film lazy is at times, and doesn’t work hard enough at situating the viewer with an era that many of us forget or were too young to remember. It’s Harlem. It’s the 1980s. Crack has started to decimate black neighborhoods like Harlem. Len Bias has just died of a cocaine overdose, and the goverment has consequently changed the way drug offenders are prosecuted which, in turn, disproportionately affects blacks. The Cosby Show is the number one rated show on television, but instead the filmmakers opt to seemingly satiate their executive producer by having their main character pepper a pivotal scene with several “What would Oprah do?” lines. At other times, the film is weirdly anachronistic. Bobby Brown’s “Humpin Around,” which wasn’t released until 1992, serves as soundtrack to one of Precious’ imagined photo shoots. We see Oliver North, but that’s one of few blatant reminders of the Reagen era, and that’s unfortunate, because Precious’ mother, Mary Johnston (played by comedian Mo’Nique), would be considered a welfare queen as described by Reagan during his presidential campaign in the 1970s–an image that was reinvigorated in the 80s. I make this latter point especially because Mary and her daughter Precious–who I don’t find grotesque, as David Edelstein describes–are kinds of stereotypes. But I don’t think Sapphire, and later the filmmakers, employ these types out of laziness. Rather, I think these seemingly flat and distorted images place the work in the context of the time it was published, the 1990s, when black artists like Spike Lee and Kara Walker were using stereotypes to make a larger commentary about blackness at the end of the 20th century. But without proper contextualization, that observation can’t be made and the conversation can’t be had.
Second, though the film is faithful to the book by casting both Precious and her mother as they were described, it’s quite liberal in its portrayal of other characters, which results in several light skinned and/or mixed race characters working as Precious’ middle class saviors. For example, Ms. Rain is described in the book as having dark skin and dreadlocks. In the film however, she’s portrayed by Paula Patton, who not only gives Precious the gift of literacy, but opens her home to Precious when she finally runs away from her mother’s uptown apartment. This wouldn’t be such a problem and could be chalked up as a casting quirk if the other “good” characters weren’t also light skinned–and judgmental.
For instance, in an effort to show a positive black male figure, the film takes a minor character in the book, a presumably Puerto Rican EMT, and turns him into Nurse John (played by Lenny Kravitz) who cares for Precious while she’s in the hospital convalescing after having her baby. Of course, he later cashes in on the capital he earned by vigilantly sitting at her bedside by asking Precious to hook him up with Ms. Rain (or her partner, I couldn’t really discern). What’s more disturbing than that, however, is the moment when Precious asks Nurse John, sitting next to her bed eating a bowl of fruit, why he doesn’t like McDonald’s. He responds by saying that he goes to an organic grocery store and refuses to eat “crap” like McDonald’s. The moment is alarming, for it neither advances the film in any way nor adequately allows the viewer the opportunity to interrogate the classist assumptions in Nurse John’s line. The implicit claim in the statement, of course, is that Precious and her classmates choose to eat McDonald’s instead of organic fruit because, of course, there are so many organic grocery stores in Harlem circa 1987, thus making Precious’ unhealthy diet of fried chicken and pig’s feet a choice–and her fault. How very Obama era Reagan era of you. Perhaps I should reassess my first problem with the film.
To add further insult, when Precious asks Ms. Weiss, played by mixed race poster child Mariah Carey, about her racial identity, the social worker skirts the question and opts to buy her client a cherry Coke. Again, the conversation is odd, goes nowhere, and does nothing but subtly validate the skin privilege that Precious is so invested in. Although JoAnn’s door knocker earrings were a nice touch, I didn’t want the only indicator of this time pre-Wesley Snipes 80s era to be a plethora of attractive and nice light skinned folks onscreen. I saw so much yellow I began to feel like a coward; I swore Vanity made a cameo. Such filmic decisions do nothing but reify overused symbols: all the bad guys are shrouded in darkness, sweat, and presumably funk (see The Bluest Eye), while our fairer heroes are bourgie, clean, and always drenched in light. That said, way to go finding the light skinned chick from Head of the Class to play Ms. Rain’s partner. Who knew she was still around?
Third, though I appreciate the decision to make Mary Johnston less monstrous by giving her a monologue slightly different from the one we read in the book, I thought the brief appearance by the grandmother damaging, because her only screen time showed her shaking her head at her daughter. Such small gestures seemingly validated the viewer’s judgment of Mary. Further, it implied that Mary’s abusive and destructive behavior was not a result of her own history (of abuse), that she somehow became monstrous without precedent, without context. Indeed, Mary’s meeting with Miss Weiss and Precious is rendered in a slightly more forgiving light than we see in the novel, but by then the damage has been done. Perhaps viewers lack the capacity to have empathy for both a fat, poor, black girl and her mother. I shouldn’t hope for so much.
Still, the film is significant. I’m not sure it makes audiences uncomfortable enough–the physical abuse seems more terrible than the incest; I don’t know if we understand Precious’ visions of an alternate self as trauma-induced and not daydreams, but I think it’s incredibly important that we see someone like Gabby Sidibe onscreen. I appreciated Mo’Nique’s rather nuanced performance. (Admittedly, I cringed when she seemed to overact her way into a “red gumball” moment during the above mentioned scene.) Though I’m conflicted about having contributed monetarily to empires (Winfrey’s, Perry’s) that seem to have monopolistic and narcissistic impulses–was the Precious come to Jesus moment not a page out of the Tyler Perry playbook?–I understand that one of few ways films like Precious continue to get made is by supporting them while they’re in theaters. I worry that the (light-skinned) savior trope overwhelms the real message of the story: that of perseverance, endurance, and the incredible power in being able to articulate one’s own story, on one’s own terms. I do, however, respect the film for the conversations that will and should be had about all too common issues that are consistently ignored. Precious (hopefully) inspires folks to read the book (before seeing the movie). After seeing the film, I find it imperative that we push to know Precious ourselves.
source from www.blackyouthproject.com
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Wednesday, November 4, 2009
Russell Simmons Posts Open Letter to Bill Cosby
Russell Simmons posts an open letter on Global Grind to Bill Cosby in regards to how he's addressed the younger generation. I know that Cosby in recent years has been what some have deemed as "off the hook" on how he's gone off on young people but I have to say I kinda feel him. Kinda. Sometimes extremist are needed to help tip the perspective scale the other way especially when you're up against influential rappers like Lil' Wayne who puts out songs like "Whip it Like a Slave". Although Bill Cosby may be too harsh I think Russell in this letter maybe too soft. What do you think?
p.s. I personally love all this iconic/mogul Black on Black controversy : Tyler vs. Spike, Simmons vs. Cosby because as much as people have commented about not liking what they perceive as one Black person "tearing another one down" I on the other hand think it demonstrates diverse perspective with in our community which is a good thing. One voice does not and should not represent us all. Now if it could only be followed up with diverse influential content in TV and films...
There are a lot of great entertainers who do great things. Bill Cosby is one of them. He has always used his voice to right what he thought was wrong. However, I believe that too often Mr. Cosby has wrongly placed the blame.
Bill Cosby is an example of someone from the older generation who has consistently blamed the poets and asked suffering community members to bare the full burden of guilt for the struggles that they endure. It is certainly not that he and the rest of the elders don't care, because they do. In fact, their intentions are pure and good. All the things they say are actually true. What they don’t understand is that the young people who they criticize did not create their own realities. They did not create the crumbling education system that we school them in. They did not create the drug epidemic and drug wars that have resulted in a dysfunctional family structure. They did not create the health care crisis that does not treat them. They did not create the culture of violence that they fall victim to.
While it is true that each one of us can make a change at any moment, it is equally true that at every minute we are all doing the best we can. If you knew better, you would do better. Therefore, those who care and have resources could/should work to create the kind of support systems that could inspire change. From the preacher who lifts our consciousness and asks us to reach for strength to the politicians and philanthropists who put programs in place to support our growth. When the President brought the Cosby attitude to his NAACP speech a few months ago, I was disappointed. It is nice to tell black people to stand up, but isn’t that really Min. Farrakhan's job? The President's job is to tell them to walk to the program that he placed on their corner. It is our job to instill the inspiration that gets a young person to walk into the program and not stand on the corner.
We love Cosby and all the older types who judge and blame the poets or culture for the sadness that the poets point to from their realities. From a place of love, I am letting the older generation know that they must admit that young people are less racist, less sexist, less homophobic, less prejudice than their parents and far less than their grandparents. Mr. Cosby, you know that your generation is carrying a lot more dirt, you are all just smart enough to cover it up. Old people are quicker to destroy the planet, abuse the animals and promote wars and then act like young people are violent. Young people are more compassionate, giving, promote gay rights, animal rights, human rights, protect the environment and want to end the wars. When they point out the contradictions that come up and say it on a record and say it LOUD, you can’t believe it! The culture and the poetry is a mirror of the realities that they expressing. Instead of criticizing, let us recognize the faults of adults, because until that happens you all will continue to turn off young people from your message and further alienate them from your generation.
I love Bill Cosby. Who doesn’t? I love him so much that is why I am writing this blog. But this is not just about Mr. Cosby. I know that tomorrow there will be headlines that read “Russell Simmons attacks Bill Cosby.” But let’s be clear, this is a call-out to all the adults who are judging more and listening less to the beautiful, progressive voices that come from our young people…Bill Cosby just happens be on the front line. This is about two generations reconciling...I guess because of my age, you would say that I am stuck on the other side, but I will always recognize that young people can use support instead of judgment. We need to have the hard conversation and both sides need to listen – if you need an office to do it in, my door is always open.
with great love
all things are possible
-Russell Simmons
Friday, October 30, 2009
Let there be light: Madonna
I know this joke has been made before but I would love to see the day when a Black mogul like a Tyler Perry adopts a bunch of white children from Eastern Europe or even Kentucky could be interesting.
Madonna has promised electricity to a village in Malawi, the impoverished southern African country where she runs a charity organisation and from which she has adopted two children.
Speaking in Mphandula, some 50 kilometres from Malawi's capital, Lilongwe, the singer said on Thursday: "I know you work in darkness. I will bring you electricity."
Madonna's Raising Malawi charity already has donated $US500,000 ($556,359) for a childcare centre in the village that feeds and educates 3,000 orphaned children.
Madonna arrived in Malawi on Sunday accompanied by her four children. On Monday she broke ground for her $US15 million ($16.69 million) Raising Malawi Academy for Girls.
About 500,000 children in this nation of 12 million have lost a parent to AIDS.
Monday, October 26, 2009
Tyler Perry Responds to His Work Being Coonery
In an interview last night on 60 Minutes Tyler Perry responds to Spike Lee's remarks about his work being coonery. I have to say after watching the entire interview I decided to try and back off a little on Tyler as it is clear that he is creating work that relates to HIS experiences (not mine) and should be able to. The problem is because all Black people are grouped together by skin color we even forget that we are individuals and that one person should not have to be responsible for representing the entire race. Now what would be great is if we could have an equally successful mogul as Tyler representing ANOTHER perspective of people of color. Then maybe the rest of us could breath and not be so worried that white people think the images being put out by one powerful Black man reps us all....can I get an amen?
Wednesday, September 23, 2009
'For Colored Girls' Who Don't Like Tyler Perry
He's just not good enough for Ntozake Shange.
Getting his hot little hands on Ntozake Shange’s 1975 play For Colored Girls who Have Considered Suicide When the Rainbow is Enuf was coup of the year for Tyler Perry. Not only will he produce and direct the upcoming film version, the King of Coonery will also write the adaptation of what may be the most important work about black female identity ever. Ask any black woman, especially the artsy/moody/self-aware type, about For Colored Girls … and she will respond with a wistful look and fond memories.
I was Lady in Blue in a high-school production and have told more than one sorry dude, “insteada being sorry all the time, try being yourself,” quoting the Lady in Red (but playing it off like I came up with it on my own). This is classic material, and now we can expect the intentionally stripped-down aesthetic of Shange’s work to be replaced by style choices that only a closeted gay man could make. Even worse, Perry has announced that he’d like to cast the likes of Oprah, Halle Berry and Beyoncé to tackle the play’s issues, which include love, rape, abortion and relationships.
Beyoncé??? Please pass the Xanax.
How did we come to such a low point in black entertainment? Sadly, money always talks. Did you know that Tyler Perry’s films have grossed about $319 million in seven years, while Spike Lee’s have grossed $372 million in 23 years? When you account for the inclusion of rather mainstream flicks including Inside Man ($88 million) in Lee’s canon, Tyler Perry is really in black folks’ pockets at an alarming speed. We’re going to see his movies in droves, and I just cannot figure out why.
Maybe it’s easy for whole church buses to go see a Perry flick after Sunday service. Maybe we’re just happy to see black folks on-screen no matter what they do. Or maybe we don’t have the sense of a billy goat when it comes to choosing meaningful entertainment—I just don’t know. But the end result is the proliferation of a parade of empty, stereotypical characters, humor so dry it could sop up Jermaine Jackson’s hairdo and the persistent depiction of black women whose lives are not complete unless they can find and hold onto a good black man. When we begged for greater representation on-screen, this is not what we had in mind.
Can I go back to Beyoncé and the meds I’ll need to watch her act again, especially in such a groundbreaking piece? It’s hard for me to even write about it because my thumbs have spontaneously become paralyzed into the down position. I haven’t forgotten Beyoncé notifying the world that she’s not black, she’s Creole, which is the exact opposite of the For Colored Girls ... message. Let’s also not forget that Beyoncé cannot act. I’ve given her too many chances to demonstrate that she can, and after watching her try to squeeze out tears while trying not to look directly into the camera, I’ve concluded that the only role she’d excel in is an adaptation of Pinocchio—on camera, the girl looks like she’s made of wood. Her clumsy speech pattern is the stuff that gets folks flunked out of The Juilliard School. There’s something about how her tongue sits in her mouth—it’s too big, it’s too wide, it’s too strong, it won’t fit. Why is this happening again? Greed. Not just greed for money, but for recognition.
Whether or not Beyoncé ends up in the film, Perry has a special talent for creating the illusion that otherwise credible black actors don’t have enough talent for mystery dinner theater, so I have to consider anything he controls creatively a lost cause. However, as executive producer in a joint venture with Oprah Winfrey, Tyler Perry sat in the audience for Precious, a film highly praised by critics at the Sundance Film Festival. (You may have heard the buzz about excellent performances from Mariah Carey and Mo’Nique.) As the audience ooh’d and ahh’d at how creatively stunning it was, Perry scratched his chin and said, “Hmmm. I want me some of this.” So now what should be a landmark moment in black female cinema directed by any of the renown black female directors out there—Kasi Lemmon (Eve’s Bayou), Gina Prince-Bythewood (The Secret Life of Bees), Debbie Allen (no explanation needed) or Nzinga Stewart (who was originally slated to direct the film)—is instead sure to fall flat under Perry’s control.
What’s saddest of all to me is that, as much as we can expect Perry to butcher Shange’s work, won’t so many of us feel obligated to see it anyway? Will we bite our tongues and watch, even if just for the sake of criticism and cultural commentary? Or will we consider ourselves lucky to absorb the prose and poetry of For Colored Girls … on the big screen for the first time? Should we patronize questionable black films just because they’re intended for us or should we boycott what we suspect is garbage? This is a persistent quandary that those of us interested in thoughtful black entertainment continue to face. Just what is a black woman to do with such a mess? When I ask myself these questions, I’m reminded of Shange’s Lady in Green: “bein’ alive, bein’ a woman, and being colored is a metaphysical dilemma / I haven’t yet conquered.” After 34 years, at least that much still rings true.
source from The Root
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Tuesday, September 22, 2009
Will Precious Contribute More to Our Precious Problems?
The soon to be released film, Precious, based off the novel Push by Sapphire is making the festival rounds with the backing of Tyler Perry and Oprah Winfrey. The film stars a young teenage girl living in Harlem with her dysfunctional family; impregnated twice by her father and physically abused by her mother who is played by Mo’Nique who (I can’t even front) is giving it to us from the trailer. The film also stars Lenny Kravitz, Paula Patton and Mariah Carey who lawwwwwd I cannot believe she allowed herself to be seen with out soft gel lighting and a Photoshop airbrush.
However, I can’t say I’m hyped to see this film. Maybe it’s because I wasn’t abused as child or maybe I was abused and don’t need Precious reminding me or maybe I’m just sick and tired of 99% of the few mainstream Black films released being connected to poverty and dysfunction. There are about eleven genres of film (action, adventure, comedy, crime& gangster, epics & historical, horror, musicals, science fiction, war and drama) and Black films for the most part cover only one of those genres, the same poverty stricken, dysfunctional- let me uplift myself with either the lord or a bustin’ a rhyme- drama.
Since media contributes as one of the largest influences over people’s perception do we really need Precious? A writer friend of mine had me chuckling as someone attacked him for not supporting the film, emphasizing a point Oprah apparently made, which had something to do with that, "Never again will we ignore Precious." In which my friend replied, “Oh no we know exactly who precious is, my problem is that white people think we’re allllllllll Precious.”
In all fairness I wouldn’t have a problem with Precious if there were other kinds of films released that showcased broader experiences of people of color. Out of all the Vince Vaughn and Seth Rogen movies you mean to tell me we can’t we get at least one regular romantic comedy out this piece?
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Thursday, April 30, 2009
Wait, House of Payne and Meet the Browns Are Two Different Shows?
The same way there is a Food and Drug Administration there just has to be some kind of Coonery of the Black People Admin out here. Don’t you know it wasn’t until watching the tele last night (this coonery attack has me talking British) that I saw a commercial announcing that Tyler Perry’s Meet the Browns and House of Payne will be running back to back on TBS when it dawned on me that these are actually two DIFFERENT shows!?
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO.
How much coonery can we take! And can somebody please explain what the difference is between these two shows?
Anybody? Anybody?
The Ninjas are winning yall. (that's our replacement for the "N" word) Black people we must stop them! What do we have to do out this piece? Stuff like this makes me want to boycott chicken, take a pilgrimage to Mecca and pray eighty times a day. I’m so flustered.
Can anybody suggest how to stop this madness?
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Tuesday, April 28, 2009
African vs. African Americans
I was recently engaged in an online discussion posted on The Black Snob regarding the hostility between Africans and African Americans, “Why Can't We be Friends?” The Snob mentioned that conversation came out of last week’s annual Harvard Kennedy School Black Policy conference that took place in DC that she opened up for larger discussion on her website. The stereotypes if you’re not familiar are that African/ Caribbean people believe African Americans to be uneducated and lazy having no concept of the world outside the US borders and African Americans view Africans as aggressive, pushy and living in jungles (uuuhhhm ok). I find this debate fascinating and absolutely ridiculous at the same time but more than anything sad because it only reveals that we have so much more work ahead of us. One commentator wrote:
Black folk are the TRUEST Americans..
because we have fought FOR this country. I just don't mean in every military conflict from the Revolutionary War on..
I mean, at the root of progression in this country, over the course of centuries - to live up to its actual creed, is a pile of Black bodies.
And, after Black folk did all the heavy lifting, here comes everyone else, to get the benefits, including Black immigrants that have the audacity to look down on American Black folk.
Hmmmm, now where does this commentator think the Black bodies came from? This is why folks like this be killing me- loud and wrong. We will be the first to bring up some “We shall overcome” and quick to remind white people of their historical discrimination against us but won’t call each out when we do it to each other. Having all shared a common thread of our enslaved ancestors you would think we would be more unified but that’s the irony of slavery- we are so broken from each other and riddled with self hate. You know what they say when you say something hateful about someone else it usually means you hate yourself- and too many hateful comments in our community exists whether it’s about wearing natural hair, someone’s big lips, round nose and or skin tone.
On a different note I sometimes wonder if people of color are even meant to be unified. Thembi from What Would Thembi Do? made a great comment on the blog that it's assumed we all fall within one category because we are of color. However as a result of our ancestry being broken up, languages lost, culture forgotten and spirituality tested and depending on where we landed we’ve had to put our selves back together as individuals and therefore have too many conflicting ideas of how we should exist as a race. It’s just too bad that we still have too many of our own plagued with the “self hate” syndrome to handle these differences progressively. Let’s just face it as Chris Rock says the war on Black folks and Niggas continue.We probably just have a few more generations before the ign’nt are gone and the progressive can thrive …and then who know maybe no more Tyler Perry, Madea movies! (Okay that last part was extra but valid)
What do you think about this war on our selves? Please share some hope.
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Tuesday, April 7, 2009
Tyler Perry Chitlin or Progressive?
I still don't know how I feel about Tyler Perry. I can't even lie that brotha pissed me and my husband off so badly with the release Dairy of a Mad Black Woman. Just at the point where home-girl Kimberly Elise pushes Steve Harris into the bathtub from his wheelchair as I think I recall it--we got up and walked out. We were done. To this day still can't tell you how that movie ends. Now it might have something to do with the fact that we are totally those snooty people that just because we have a BFA in acting, performed every Shakespeare, Molière, Tennessee Williams and August Wilson play and have mastered the following articulation exercises three times fast:
Then about a few years later we found our selves at the movies with no other choices other than a white boy comedy, an under whelming drama about white people or a Tyler Perry movie (interestingly enough same choices years later)-- we opted to watch Black people just 'cause sometimes you need a break from alllllllll the stories about white people. The Tyler Perry movie at the time was Why Did I Get Married and we actually were pleasantly surprised on some, "Ok Tyler, Ok." But then two weeks ago he fucked our heads up again after Netflixing Meet the Browns starring a miscast Angela Basset and that horrible Latino sidekick. We were back on some Tyler you chitlin' m*thafucka! Now you might say to us- two out of three stop hatin' on this Black man and move on from him if it's not your cup of tea but WHAT OTHER OPTIONS DO WE HAVE!? All the progressive and emerging Black filmmakers from the 90ties have either gone chitlin' (cough cough Eddie Murphy) or AWOL after years on the battlefield trying to convince Hollywood that there are other kinds of Black people besides drug dealers and basketball players. Eddie come back to us honey! Boomerang?! Coming To America?!
But then Tyler Perry flipped it back on us with the other Netflix movie in our queue , The Family That Preys. We were thoroughly impressed and had to commend him on actually showcasing four Black women four different ways in the same movie. Not to mention extra brownie points for not overwhelming us with the presence of church (Black people do actually sometime solve problems with out prayer- although yes we are very spiritual). So the verdict on Tyler Perry movies is we are staying away from the ones with Madea-- can't handle her, oh god and this latest one that stars Rudy from the Cosby's looks like an atrocity. I saw one shot of her in the trailer playing what appeared to be a hooker/crack head and said, "No." But if this it to mean that a progressive movie is to follow then I say bring on the chitlin' grease that the masses seems to like to bake more of the chicken that people like us can digest.
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