Me and Spike Lee

A culture is never fully realized until it can tell and control its own stories. When the Roman Christians came to where my people lived, once they got beyond Hadrian’s Wall, the blue-painted warriors and the long, pointy swords, one of the first things they did was to replace our stories with theirs. Medicine women became witches. Priests became wizards. Water horses became the loch monsters. Neither loch monsters nor water horses are real, but that’s besides the point.

One of JRR Tolkien’s stated goals in writing The Lord of the Rings was to restore the English mythology, stolen by the Romans, but he still replaced priests with wizards. He was a pretty cool wizard, but that’s besides the point.

One year, Spike Lee advertised for a summer screenwriting program he was putting on in New York. I wrote in for an application and filled it out. They asked for a headshot. It’s the movie business, so that’s not unusual. I didn’t think anything of it. I had one from Grillis Photography, who was doing most of the theater/film headshots in Mississippi at the time, so I sent it in with my application and my writing samples.

Actually sending in writing samples was a huge deal for me. The last time I’d submitted a writing sample to anyone who wasn’t a teacher was to my Uncle Tom when I was thirteen years old. The idea of spending six weeks in New York was a big part of what prompted me to venture out.

When I got my rejection letter, it said, “Thank you for your submission. Spike Lee’s 40 Acres and Mule Summer Screenwriting seminar is designed for writers of color to tell their stories.” Not being a screenwriter of color, I wasn’t invited. I also wasn’t offended.

It was, at the time, very difficult for filmmakers of color to get their stories told. Spike Lee and some of his protégés, like John Singleton, were having some luck, as long as their proposals didn’t require much in the way of budget.

Since I wasn’t going to New York, I went to Hollywood instead. I saw about twenty plays, spent a lot of time with Uncle Forry, did all the studio tours that didn’t involve roller coasters, and ate as many crabs as I could find.

Over the summer, a girl I had been seeing who worked for one of the hospitals decided to work at Tiffinay’s Cabaret instead. There’s a thing in America where young women have to choose between barely surviving on starter-job wages or taking their clothes off for bikers. She chose the latter. I did my best to maintain our relationship, despite that, but it finally ended when she told me her estranged husband was coming back. “You’re married?” That’s happened to me twice. There should be a law.

Lance Goss had a heart attack. Brent Lefavor and everybody who knew anything about Theater at Millsaps filled in. I was doing a play for Brent Lefavor called “Who’s Happy Now?” My friend Larry Wells was the star, along with Christine “Gabby” Swanne.

When I told Larry about what happened with Spike Lee, he was pretty mad. He pointed out that it’s illegal to reject my application because of my race. Technically, he was right. If I had gotten a lawyer and made a stink, I might have won, but what would I have won? I would have made enemies in the industry, and whatever money I won would go to the lawyer. Either way, I still wasn’t getting any help with my writing.

I wasn’t actually angry, though. I had expected them to say, “your writing sample sucks, don’t bother.” But, they didn’t. Maybe they didn’t read it at all. Maybe they saw the picture of my big ole white head and just said “fuck off dude.” Somehow, I don’t think it was like that. They were polite, but they had a vision of what they were trying to do, and I just wasn’t eligible to be a part of it. There certainly have been millions of opportunities black guys had no chance at because of their big ole black head.

The narrative that black filmmakers have always been completely shut out of the business isn’t entirely true. Noble Johnson, whose most famous role was as the Native Chief in King Kong, was also the most popular and successful writer/director/actor in what was known at the time as “Midnight Ramblers.”

Even outside the South, most black folks were forbidden from entering white theaters. Sometimes they could sit in the balcony. In the movie “The Help,” there’s a shot that shows black Jacksonians entering an imaginary balcony at the Capri, but in Jackson, the theaters that had balconies didn’t allow black patrons during regular hours.

“Regular hours” is the trick, though. After midnight, many theaters would open their doors to non-white patrons. To fill a bill at these after-midnight shows, Hollywood produced black stories with black actors written by black writers and directed by black directors. Often, they were shorter than white films, maybe three or four ten-minute reels rather than eight, but they were legitimate films telling legitimate black stories, and Johnson was their most popular attraction.

I go to the movie
And I go downtown
And somebody keep telling me
"Don't hang around"

It's been a long
A long time coming, but I know
A change gon' come
Oh yes, it will

A change did come. As part of the Civil Rights Act, you would no longer discriminate against people of color in places of public accommodation, like movie theaters. When black people became able to see the same movies at the same time as everyone else, there was some concern about what would happen to all these black actors and black writers. Faced with a situation of “evolve or die,” they evolved and became what we now call “blaxploitation cinema.” Some of those films are actually pretty good. I especially like the Shaft and Blackula movies.

I never got to meet Spike Lee, and I never got to find out if my writing was good enough or if they just rejected me for being white without even reading it. Most people who write know what it’s like to be rejected, to feel rejected, and to fear rejection. Maybe they were kind enough to read it anyway, and they passed me on to the next step in the selection process, which was to see if I was black or not.

Sometimes I feel kinda black. You’d be surprised how often I know a ton more about black history than most young people who are living it. I know who Noble Johnson was, for instance, and what he did.

Ultimately, though, it’s extremely important for people to know how to tell their own stories from their own perspective, and that’s what Spike Lee and 40 Acres and a Mule Productions were doing. They just weren’t doing it with me.

Noble Johnson