Hollywood Black was never going to be a retrospective of Black Cinema in America. It was a declaration of Black history, culture, and creativity. It honors the legacy of Black artists and opens a path forward for current and future filmmakers.
Inspired by Donald Bogle’s book Toms, Coons, Mulattoes, Mammies, and Bucks: filmmaker Justin Simien (Bad Hair) set out to capture the African-American filmmaking experience in American cinema.
Simien unearths deeply personal accounts from Black filmmakers who asserted their rightful place on our screens. It features interview clips from a host of talented artists including W. Kamau Bell, Steven Caple, Jr., Ryan Coogler, Ava DuVernay, Gina Prince-Bythewood, Issa Rae, LaKeith Stanfield, Gabrielle Union, Lena Waithe, Forest WhitakerW. Kamau Bell, Steven Caple, Jr., Ryan Coogler, Ava DuVernay, Gina Prince-Bythewood, Issa Rae, LaKeith Stanfield, Gabrielle Union, Lena Waithe, Forest Whitaker, in a deeply personal and informative four-part documentary-series.
Justin Simien spoke with Creative Screenwriting Magazine about his examination of cinema from this radically Black perspective.
The idea for the series began when he was asked to put together a collection for The Criterion Channel. “I wanted to take advantage of all of the interest around Black stories that was emerging out of the George Floyd protests and created an all Black collection for them,” he says.
Justin Simien
During his extensive research phase, he came across movies he hadn’t seen before or heard of. They weren’t properly restored for viewing and he was getting “angry and riled up, in a good way.” This cinematic treasure trove must be shared.
Simien struck up a conversation with Emmy-winning documentary producer Jeffrey Schwartz and became interested in documentary filmmaking despite not having a background in the medium.
Justin leveraged his TV deal at Lionsgate and reached out to Donald Bogle to secure the book rights and put a deal together at Lionsgate. That deal fell through and they set up the project at STARZ. When that fell through, they went to EPIX. Eventually, the project ended up at MGM+.
The Birth Of A Documentary Series
Simien wasn’t entirely sure how to plan Hollywood Black. He wasn’t sure how many episodes there would be and who was available for a filmed interview.
“It really important to highlight Black culture, which we’re beginning to understand is the foundation of popular music, jazz, and rock and roll. I was starting to feel like it was also the foundation for cinema.” In 1915, D.W. Griffith made the silent drama film The Birth Of A Nation. Justin Simien saw this as the birth of Black cinema.
He also saw the minstrels taken back by Black people and made cinema a type of “filmed vaudeville.” Both media relied on the same tropes and stereotypes. In 1920, Oscar Micheaux made Within Our Gates which is a “statement reaction film” about racial tensions in the Jim Crow era.
Black filmmakers were trying to get their stories heard and films made, but they were appropriated into the studio system and often excluded from it. Simien considers the process to work like a swinging pendulum, where Black filmmakers were given the tools to make movies, but later have them taken away, like clockwork.
In terms of the turbulent history of Black Hollywood, they made hay while the sun shined.
Issae Rae. Photo courtesy of MGM+
“We felt the most encompassing story was to tell a comprehensive history, but we don’t want it to be a survey. We want to drop down into individual stories and get modern perspectives on it.”
We wanted a mix of peers who could relate to the struggles
The series contains an eclectic interview mix of historians, academics, starts. “We wanted a mix of peers who could relate to the struggles. Even if we weren’t talking about a struggle that was in our own decade, or even in our own lifetime, we had lived experience that confirms that what Hattie McDaniel and Oscar Micheaux were talking about.”
Justin Simien describes himself as a filmmaker who happens to be black. But his intention for Hollywood Black is clear. “It’s hard to even comprehend the history of cinema without the Black point of view, which is so often missing, buried, or erased altogether.”
Wresting Control Of Our Narratives
Justin Simien wants Black filmmakers to “author and control their own cinematic stories.” Some have broken through and some are trying to get there. These stories a cultural force in their own right.
Sidney Poitier used his acting stardom to eventually direct and contribute to Black screen culture. Simien also mentions Charles Lane, William Reeves in Black History. Daughters Of The Dust (1991) was the first movie directed by a Black filmmaker, Julie Dash to secure a theatrical release.
“Bert Williams is a figure that doesn’t always get attached to this story and is easily removed, chopped off from the top, and falls through the cracks.”
Regrettably, not all modern Black filmmakers like Spike Lee, Tyler Perry and Jordan Peele could fit into the filming schedule, so they used archival interviews for Hollywood Black. Justin Simien would have loved to give more time to filmmakers like Zora Neale Hurston who was the first black female filmmaker. “Her documentary films form some of the foundational understanding of what some of the early enslaved people who were newly-freed, were up to, and what they were thinking.”
Omar Epps. Photo courtesy of MGM+
He could have made an entire movie on the three films that Motown made “as one of the pioneering Black-owned businesses making motion pictures.”
“When I think about queer cinema, and specifically, Black queer cinema, which often falls in the cracks deserves a lot more time.” When there’s limited time, difficult choices must be made.
What Is Black Cinema?
“I think a black film that means a lot to black people for some reason, for any reason,” declares Simien. They are the target audience.
“What I love about Black people and Black cultures, we will take things, whether they were meant this way or that way, and we will own them and cherish them in our own unique and individual ways.“
