See THEY'VE GOTTA HAVE US

You need to see this series about diversity  and the long, long attempts by black talents to break through the high and thick color barriers in the entertainment industry. This struggle is not just here in the U.S. You'll hear from talent in Great Britain too. Now on Netflix, the name of the series is THEY'VE GOTTA HAVE US. Artists in it who tell their stories and give their comments include Harry Belafonte, Whoopi Goldberg, Laurence Fishburne, Don Cheadle, director/actress Kasi Lemmons, director/writer Barry Jenkins, John Boyega and the late Diahann Carroll and John Singleton. I'm pretty sure this series premiered in Great Britain last year. A buddy in London sent me a clip and I was eager to see the whole show. You'll see a representation of British talent giving comments. Earl Cameron, who did some breakthrough British film work, is now 102. The celebrities you'll see in the first hour are candid and revealing. This is history you need to hear.

Look at the 20 current Oscar nominated actors. Last year, there were marvelous film performances from Eddie Murphy, Da'Vine Joy Randolph and Wesley Snipes in the warm and wise comedy biopic, DOLEMITE IS MY NAME.  

                                                       

     

In the Southern California horror thriller, US, there was a powerful dual role performance from Lupita Nyong'o. In CLEMENCY, Alfre Woodward is riveting as the prison warden dealing with men on death row and a marriage that losing its life. One black person is nominated -- Cynthia Erivo for HARRIET, the story of American hero Harriet Tubman and directed by Kasi Lemmons.

To get work, to get seen, to break stereotypes and be included. We are trying to make changes and be part of the conversation -- not just be talked about.  As I write this, I'm watching GOOD MORNING AMERICA. It's Friday. The Oscars are Sunday. ABC's entertainment news anchor, Chris Connelly, just did a segment covering a new study on diversity on screen and behind the camera. He interviewed Cynthia Erivo, the lone black actor up for an Oscar. I don't mean this as a slam against Connelly. However, this is the 3rd year in a row I've seen him, a white gentlemen, talk about Hollywood diversity, or the lack thereof, at Oscar time. In the past, he did not mention some major Black History made in Oscar nominations. It's my opinion that there should be a black/Latino veteran entertainment news contributor with him at Oscar time to add some extra substance, awareness and color to his diversity segments.

The Hollywood credo was "Black Stories Don't Sell." Black filmmakers were disadvantaged by it. That credo also handicapped black actors seeking agents. If black actors were not sought for work as much as white actors were, agents were unenthusiastic about signing black talent -- figuring they could make a larger 10% commission off a white film/TV performer. It's been a struggle for black actors and filmmakers to keep their history, their stories, their skills from being overlooked, ignored or treated as disposable. Today, it's imperative we defy all that and tell our own stories. Here's a look at THEY'VE GOTTA HAVE US. The first hour takes us from Hattie McDaniel winning a breakthrough Oscar for 1939's GONE WITH THE WIND to the colossal box office success of BLACK PANTHER.

The first episode is one-hour long and Harry Belafonte opens it with his sage observations about race in the Hollywood system. He praises the late Joan Fontaine (above) who played his love interest in the 1957 20th Century Fox film, ISLAND IN THE SUN. Fontaine, an Oscar winning star, got racial hate mail for showing a romantic interest in Belafonte onscreen.

Diahann Carroll gets candid about her affair with Sidney Poitier.

Director Norman Jewison. He's not it but this info is relevant. His IN THE HEAT OF THE NIGHT won the Oscar for Best Picture of 1967. He want to a film version of the Pulitzer Prize winning play, A SOLDIER'S PLAY to be retitled A SOLDIER'S STORY for film. Hollywood studios turned Jewison down saying "Black stories don't sell" and his project had a predominantly black cast. He worked for way less than his usual fee and got the money to shoot it. (Jewison also directed THE THOMAS CROWN AFFAIR, FIDDLER ON THE ROOF and JESUS CHRIST SUPERSTAR). Robert Townsend was in the 1984 military drama movie and he talks about it.

Back in 1997, after an interview, I asked Spike Lee if he'd like to direct something like BATMAN. He said, "I'd love to direct a BATMAN movie. But Warner Bros. would never let me." Keep that in mind when you hear the actors talk about working with Spike and making 1992's MALCOLM X for Warner Bros.

The memorable Oscars moment when we all discovered that the real winner of the Best Picture Oscar was  LA LA LAND MOONLIGHT was, in a way, symbolic. Damien Chazelle, the young writer and director of LA LA LAND, was the new "It" guy of movies. Critics were raving about his musical. Meanwhile,  I noticed that Black Twitter had started buzzing and praising a new indie film called MOONLIGHT. The buzz and praise began to build thanks to black/Latino critics whose names were not in large newspaper ads next to rave review quotes about LA LA LAND. Black Barry Jenkins, co-writer/director of MOONLIGHT, was not getting the TV exposure that white filmmaker Damien Chazelle got. Then came Oscar night.

MOONLIGHT snatched the Oscar for Best Picture of 2016. Barry Jenkins is another filmmaker who was told black stories don't sell.

THEY'VE GOTTA HAVE US -- enlightening, infuriating, accurate. Check it out on Netflix.