by Rafael Gallegos
Daily Lobo
The Southwest Film Center again proved that it is a cutting edge arts organization this past weekend. Presented were two very powerful and inspirational films, "Strange Fruit" and "Black Theatre: The Making of a Movement."
The advertisement for the hour-long documentary "Strange Fruit" pictured a young and vibrant Billie Holiday - the siren who made the song "Strange Fruit" famous. Entering the theater I was under the impression that I was in for a film about the singer whose life was controlled by her heroin addiction.
To my surprise, the documentary focused on a radical Jewish man - the real author of the song. Holiday is often mistaken as the songwriter, but Abel Meeropol was a school teacher in the Bronx who set his poem about lynching to music and created what was to become what is often considered one of the most poignant songs written. Meeropol was a member of the Radical Teachers Union and had communist beliefs. His life was far removed from the atrocities happening in the South, but he still had the insight to expose the world to lynching.
The documentary was highly effective. Composed mostly of still photographs and a handful of interviews, "Strange Fruit" was very simple. The most memorable moments were interviews with Meeropol's adopted sons whose birth parents were Julius and Ethel Rosenberg.
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Meeropol, who wrote under the psuedonymn Lewis Allan, was a man of uncompromising ideals. His song helped ease black and Jewish tensions and made the public aware of many injustices. The documentary ended with stills reminding us of Jasper, TX and Matthew Shepard, powerfully stating that lynching and hate crimes still occur.
Also playing at the Film Center was "Black Theatre: The Making of a Movement," a highly informative documentary. Ossie Davis and Ruby Dee launched in with a poetic verse on the black experience in the theater, "It's humor, it's drama, it talks about yo mama." And, as the film suggests, a sense of humor is historically prevalent throughout the "cultural experience" found in black arts.
Revolutionary ideals were what the movers and shakers of the movement had in mind. Though maybe not seen this way today, revolutionary in this sense denotes portraits of black people as real people, not caricatures.
Amiri Baraka, Ed Bullins, Fred Wesley, David Turner Ward - all writers of the black theater movement - and Roscoe Lee Browne, Glynn Turman and James Earl Jones - actors of the movement - were just some of the interviewees. Their passion and intelligence drove them as they talked about the movement.
The film was made in 1978 and the tone of the movie was almost nostalgic for the recent past, but it was also a call to action for unification of the arts and the business of arts. Although the theater was mostly housed in tiny spaces, there was some integration of "uptown and downtown."
The film was very New York-centric, as it should have been. After all, the most important work was done in New York City. Works like Jones' "Dutchman" and Ntzake Shonge's "For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide When Even the Rainbow is Not Enuff" are two pieces that came out of the movement to widespread critical acclaim. As the documentary reminds us, the movement was not just for blacks by blacks, even if that was the intent.
Though the movie occasionally felt like a lecture on the history of black theater, I think the intent of the film was to be informative. I certainly learned a great deal. The problem was that I was the only person in the theater.
We students take gems such as the Southwest Film Center for granted. Next week is Chris Marker's "The Last Bolshevik" and Alexander Sokurov's "Moscow Elegy." Better yourself by attending.
