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- From: Nile Barrabas@dartmouth.edu (Nile Barrabas)
- Newsgroups: alt.discrimination
- Subject: Re: Go see X
- Message-ID: <1992Nov18.215126.3593@dartvax.dartmouth.edu>
- Date: 18 Nov 92 21:51:26 GMT
- References: <92323.081153KRB104@psuvm.psu.edu>
- Sender: news@dartvax.dartmouth.edu (The News Manager)
- Organization: SOB
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- X-Xxdate: Wed, 18 Nov 92 15:50:15 GMT
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-
- Here's an interesting article I found on Clarinet. In case you don't
- know, Gov. Wilder is the first African American to be governor of
- Virginia.
-
- NORFOLK, Va. (UPI) -- Gov. L. Douglas Wilder says the hyperbole and
- interest over director Spike Lee's motion picture about Malcolm X
- puzzles him.
- Wilder said he wonders why people who idolize Malcolm X overlook
- blacks who have achieved real, mainstream power.
- Malcolm X's life and contributions ``are being made more historic and
- adventurous than they really were,'' Wilder said in an interview for an
- op-ed article published in The Virginian-Pilot on Monday.
- ``This is not at all to distract from Malcolm X, but I think (retired
- Supreme Court Justice) Thurgood Marshall was right when he said he never
- knew of anything important Malcolm X ever did and would not miss him if
- Malcolm had never lived,'' Wilder said.
- ``Today you could ask young people who was Roy Wilkins, who was
- Whitney Young, even Thurgood Marshall, and they don't know,'' Wilder
- said. ``But because of the movie and the hype they all know about
- Malcolm X ... and it energizes some people.''
- The movie, ``Malcolm X,'' opens in theaters nationwide Wednesday.
- Lee told the newspaper in an interview published in weekend editions
- that he fulfilled his commitment to show Malcolm ``with warts and all.''
- ``I think it's possible to be angry and hopeful at the same time, and
- my movie is that,'' Lee said. ``People say to me, 'Why are you so angry,
- Spike? You have money. You're successful.' So what. In the end, people
- need hope, and I think that's what this movie gives them.''
- At stake is a $35 million production -- at least $15 million over
- budget.
- ``We as a people have to support this film because Hollywood is
- watching,'' Lee said at the New York unveiling of the film for the news
- media.
- Originally he urged black students to skip school to attend the first
- public showings of the movie. But he backed off last week, calling for
- students to see the movie with their parents.
- Lee was anxious to discuss pre-release controversies, saying he was
- misquoted about granting interviews to only black journalists.
- ``I never said it,'' Lee said. ``I just said I would prefer to be
- interviewed by black journalists, and that was just a ploy to lend a
- helping hand to the brothers and sisters. I'm not afraid to use any
- clout I've got.''
- He is irate, also, that Esquire magazine titled a recent interview
- ``Spike Lee Hates Your Cracker Ass.''
- ``I never said that,'' Lee said. ``That was the title of the article,
- but it sounded like a quote. It made it sound as if it was a quote. All
- the stories about me state, in effect, that I'm a racist, that I'm an
- angry black man and I hate white people.
- ``The media just plays on white hysteria, and they think they'll
- scare people away from this film. I see people every day who said they
- liked 'Do The Right Thing' but they saw it in the safety of their homes
- -- afraid to go to theaters.''
-