UPDATE: The Record Keeper‘s official Facebook page has posted a statement from the General Conference Communications Director Williams Costa: The GC is “stepping back” from the series’ planned February 2014 release date; no new release date has been announced. Read the GC’s statement (Friday, January 24). See also this extended feature on The Record Keeper: […]
Media: Trailers and Tribalism
Trailers These films are due out this year: Anita, a documentary about Anita Hill and her “trial” as a sexual harassment witness during Clarence Thomas’ nomination to SCOTUS in 1994. I have some memories of this period, memories shaped by the 1990s writing boom, narratives about Black American women and their nation, and publications like Ebony and […]
Videos: Gabrielle Union & Dustin Hoffman
1. At the 2013 Essence Magazine Black Women in Hollywood Luncheon this February, Gabrielle Union received the Fierce and Fearless Award. Her acceptance speech is remarkable. (It starts at about 1:03 of 11:32.) “We live in a town that rewards pretending and I have been pretending to be fierce and fearless for a very long time. […]
Orson Scott Card and Art Boycotts
Ender’s Game author Orson Scott Card is in the news again hoping the Ender’s Game movie won’t be boycotted. But his call for “tolerance” doesn’t read like a desire for mutual civility. It’s not even a discussion of his views or their merit. He’s all about the money, snarking about others’ right not to pay […]
Fundraising and Culture
Great post on overwriting cultural messaging from Latina producer and fundraiser Alisa Valdes: How to Ask for Money When You Grew Up Poor It’s no easier for me now than it was then, and it’s no easier for me to ask for things than it is for anyone else, but I’m forcing myself to do […]
Ava DuVernay on Filmmaking
Ava DuVernay on Filmmaking My life is not spectacle. So often when I see African-American performances on screen, it is in the voice of spectacle… There’s beauty in the everyday; there’s beauty in the ordinary. — Ava DuVernay DuVernay is the director of I Will Follow and Middle of Nowhere.