Dutton directed Against the Ropes, the movie starring Meg Ryan. Ryan plays a boxing manager, and her character is loosely based on James Toney's old manager Jackie Kallen. I've got a lot of respect for Dutton, not only because he's so serious about his craft, but because of what he was able to do with Roc and the half-hour sitcom format. His work there places him in rare company...Bill Cosby, Debbie Allen, and Tim Reid are the only ones I can think of off the top of my head who've been able to instill a great deal of humanity and pathos into a half-hour meant to make people laugh.
There's a deep tension that his comments about hip-hop reveal. Acting is a rough job. You've got to deal with rejection after rejection, putting your heart and soul on the line for bit part after bit part, hoping that someone will recognize someone else in you. Of course it's ten times hard for black actors, who have another set of issues to wrestle with. While most sane folks recognize the types of inter-racial politics played in Hollywood is often nasty and brutal, what Dutton's words reflect is the hidden kernal within black life. There is often as much tension and competition for scarce resources within black spaces as there is between black spaces and non-black spaces. Now to be fair, I think Mos Def has got serious acting chops. And it's damn hard to take your eyes off of Tupac in the few movies he was able to make before his murder.
I wonder which side the NAACP would take here?
I enjoy being here on this great site. It’s really a pleasure reading through.
Posted by: jenny | July 14, 2004 at 01:57 AM