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Transcription: [00:00:00]
{SPEAKER name="Toni Cade Bambara"}
--in color. You wanna run that by me once more?
[[cross talk]]
{SPEAKER name="Louis Massiah"}
No, well-- I'm s--I shouldn't--This is Pearl's question to answer.
[00:00:07]
{SPEAKER name="Louis Massiah"}
It would have been in so much like one drop of blood in Pinkie and all those other sort of Hollywood films.
[00:00:13]
{SPEAKER name="Louis Massiah"}
It's really fantasy. I mean the mulatto, is fantasy, in like--uh, "Steamboat", that's--or it was--"Sh--
[00:00:20]
[[cross talk]]
{SPEAKER name="Toni Cade Bambara"}
"Showboat."
[[cross talk]]
{SPEAKER name="Pearl Bowser"}
"Showboat."-
[[cross talk]]
{SPEAKER name="Louis Massiah"}
"Showboat", right.
[00:00:21]
{SPEAKER name="Louis Massiah"}
Is--is a complete--bizarre. It's a non-existent entity.
[00:00:27]
{SPEAKER name="Louis Massiah"}
Whereas, you know, the black--the mulatto folks, or whatever, in the the Micheaux films are real people.
[00:00:36]
{SPEAKER name="Louis Massiah"}
I mean they're more real [[laughs]] people, and --
[00:00:43]
{SPEAKER name="Toni Cade Bambara"}
What is it about Julie, in "Showboat", that's fantasy?
[00:00:46]
{SPEAKER name="Louis Massiah"}
Uh, um.
[00:00:47]
{SILENCE}
She's so s--, she's --
{SPEAKER name="Pearl Bowser"}
Exotic. She's--
{SPEAKER name="Louis Massiah"}
She's exotic.
[00:00:55]
{SPEAKER name="Louis Massiah"}
She doesn't have any real roots. She's not particularly Black.
[00:01:03]
{SPEAKER name="Louis Massiah"}
It's like a-- Number 1, it's a white actress, which is bizarre.
[00:01:09]
{SPEAKER name="Louis Massiah"}
And, there's very little that I can relate to her as a--
{SPEAKER name="Pearl Bowser"}
Woman of color.
{SPEAKER name="Louis Massiah"}
Woman of color.
[00:01:19]
{SPEAKER name="Louis Massiah"}
{SPEAKER name="Toni Cade Bambara"}
While Micheaux women are, or Micheaux people, men and women, are people of color.
[00:01:26]
{SPEAKER name="Louis Massiah"}
I mean, that's-- They're not acting then. That's who they are.
[00:01:30]
{SPEAKER name="Toni Cade Bambara"}
But when you say, "That's who they are," what do you mean, in terms of the part, the character they are playing on the screen?
[00:01:37]
{SPEAKER name="Louis Massiah"}
Um.
[00:01:38]
{SILENCE}
Do-- It's sort of-- I-- I-- In "Pinkie" or in "Showboat",
[00:01:47]
{SPEAKER name="Louis Massiah"}
I guess I have to ask you. Do you believe that's a person of color? That Julie's a person of color, or Pinkie's a person of color?
[00:01:56]
{SPEAKER name="Toni Cade Bambara"}
But she has no identity. She has no identity.
[[cross talk]]
{SPEAKER name="Pearl Bowser"}
She has no identity.
[00:01:59]
{SPEAKER name="Louis Massiah"}
Even with the, um, with the black mother in "Pinkie." I mean, does that--
[00:02:04]
[[cross talk]]
{SPEAKER name="Toni Cade Bambara"}
But the-- "Pinkie" has, um-- I would rather talk about imitation of life.
[[cross talk]]
{SPEAKER name="Pearl Bowser"}
--"Imitation of Life." "Imitation of Life."
[[cross talk]]
{SPEAKER name="Louis Massiah"}
--"Imitation of Life".
[00:02:10]
{SPEAKER name= "Louis Massiah"}
Who's the-- That's uh,--
[[cross talk]]
{SPEAKER name="Pearl Bowser"}
Freddy Washington.
[[cross talk]]
{SPEAKER name="Toni Cade Bambara"}
Yeah, Freddy Washington, and uh--
[00:02:14]
{SPEAKER name="Toni Cade Bambara"}
One's done with a black actress, in the earlier version, and the later version is white. Yeah.
[[cross talk]]
{SPEAKER name="Pearl Bowser"}
the later version it's Susie Comack.
[00:02:22]
{SPEAKER name="Toni Cade Bambara"}
What gives the mulatto, as you will, character, in the sense of identity, is the mother,
[00:02:34]
{SPEAKER name="Toni Cade Bambara"}
and the connectedness in terms of origins of the child, and the mother's rootedness-- rooted, being rooted in the culture.
[00:02:44]
{SPEAKER name="Toni Cade Bambara"}
I don't know about Richard, but she looks like, but uh, the character that she plays is a believable black woman.
[00:02:53]
{SPEAKER name="Toni Cade Bambara"}
Even makes-- I forget the actresses name who plays--
[00:03:02]
[[cross talk]]
{SPEAKER name="Pearl Bowser"}
Louise Baker. No. Oh.
[[cross talk]]
{SPEAKER name="Toni Cade Bambara"}
No, No. The one who plays the daughter. Watson.
[00:03:07]
[[cross talk]]
{SPEAKER name="Louis Massiah"}
In which one? "Imitation" or the "Pink--
[[cross talk]]
{SPEAKER name="Toni Cade Bambara"}
No. The two versions of "Imitation of Life".
[00:03:11]
{SPEAKER name="Pearl Bowser"}
Freddie Washington or Susan Coleman.
{SPEAKER name="Toni Cade Bambara"}
Susan Coleman. Right.
[00:03:14]
{SPEAKER name="Toni Cade Bambara"}
uhm, it makes Susan Coleman believable, but I mean you- you- you- I guess I make that connection because I haven' t seen both. you have a kind of a continuity there
[00:03:28]
{SPEAKER name="Toni Cade Bambara"}
but that that just that word, the mulatto. When you look at these movies and you see so many characters who look in that specific definition.
[00:03:43]
They're light skinned or fair are they mulattos are they all mulattos? if they're all mulattos then, uh, what's the story?
[00:03:52]
I mean there's no, there no tension and there's no narrator there. But if the characters are defined in terms of their
[00:04:05]
p- what's the word?
[00:04:19]
{SPEAKER name="Pearl Bowser"}
Backstory?
[00:04:10]
{SPEAKER name="Toni Cade Bambara"}
Yeah, the backstory, right. Then the character becomes more than that, that one dimensional face on the screen, which is light.
[00:04:25]
Or half white or however you wanna describe it. Do you think that Micheaux, I mean, justifies calling the characters either in "Within Our Gates"
[00:04:39]
or "God's Stepchildren" or "Symbol of the Unconquered" Do you think it, somehow or the other, diminishes the character by calling
[00:04:53]
her or him a Mulato. I don't know what the term is for a man, is a man also a Mulatto? Because that seems to me one dimensional.
[00:05:03]
It's only a reference to color in a kind of, um, I wanna say political but that's not, that's not the right term. It kind of reduces the character to one dimension.
[00:05:24]
{SPEAKER name="Louis Massiah"}
Right. Mulattos such a difficult, y'know, construct anyway, I mean, y'know, race, black and white, is, y'know, the race construct,
[00:05:35]
y'know, because of history and necessity, y'know, we've made real. As opposed to African ancestry and European ancestry,
[00:05:46]
In race. But Mulatto becomes even, is more difficult because, y'know, the 60s in some ways freed us from that concept in some ways
[00:06:03]
It's not... I don't think- or most folks I know don't think, hey this person is a mulatto. Even though someone
[00:06:16]
Even though someone, they have one European American parent, and- one white parent and one black parent i guess that's the incorrect term.
[00:06:23]
{SPEAKER name="Toni Cade Bambara"}
Who's term is that?
[00:06:27]
{SPEAKER name="Louis Massiah"}
What?
[00:06:29]
{SPEAKER name="Toni Cade Bambara"}
Who's term is that? Mulatto? I mean, is that-
[00:06:31]
{SPEAKER name="Louis Massiah"}
It's-
[00:06:33]
{SPEAKER name="Toni Cade Bambara"}
It's certainly not a term used-
[00:06:35]
{SPEAKER name="Pearl Bowser"}
It's not our term.
[00:06:36]
{SPEAKER name="Toni Cade Bambara"}
It's not- yeah
[00:06:37]
{SPEAKER name="Pearl Bowser"}
We did not invent biologically nor figuratively.
[00:06:42]
{SPEAKER name="Toni Cade Bambara"}
Is it- in- in one sense the term itself kind of negates that individual in terms of his or her identity, whereas
[00:06:59]
there are many instances, in, just looking at Oscar Micheaux films, in which the community embraces, the so-called Mulatto, I mean, what- in Hollywood terms would be called
[00:07:12]
the Mulatto figure. I mean, and embraces the character not as different but as-
[00:07:21]
{SPEAKER name="Pearl Bowser"}
One of many.
[00:07:23]
{SPEAKER name="Toni Cade Bambara"}
One of many. Yeah, yeah. and that whole idea of getting over, right, I mean, it's, it's not the tragic mulatto.
[00:07:33]
It's the response to, 'well if you can manage to work in the system that will only allow you if you have this particular look
[00:07:42]
and you manage to get over, it doesn't take away anything from me' You almost congratulate it cause, you've gotten over-
[00:07:51]
[[crosstalk]]
{SPEAKER name="Louis Massiah"}
[[?]] It's like- Illusions, really [[?]] which is y'know, absolutely no tragedy there whatsoever.
{SPEAKER name="Toni Cade Bambara"}
right right, you applaud it.
[[crosstalk]]
{SPEAKER name="Louis Massiah"}
Get over it, yeah it's fine.
[00:08:01]
{SPEAKER name="Pearl Bowser"}
Get over and express solidarity as well.
[00:08:04]
{SPEAKER name="Louis Massiah"}
Right.
[00:08:05]
{SPEAKER name="Pearl Bowser"}
I mean Mineon[[?]] does not get over alone, that is to say she's not doing it out of self, purely, self advancement.
[00:08:15]
One of the first things we hear her talk about is her suggestion to the producer during this wartime period
[00:08:25]
that they make films about Native American warriors. So she was interested always in expanding her use of skin privilege.
[00:08:34]
And When Ester [[?]] character comes in the woman, in the booth, in the dark, behind the screen, Mineon expresses solidarity with this woman
[00:08:46]
Even though in that set up, the tradition has been, looking at "Singing in the Rain", for example, the tradition has been to humiliate
[00:08:57]
is for some woman to become humiliated, as in "Singing in the Rain" when the stagehands raise the curtain on Jene Hagen
[00:09:07]
and we can understand that she doesn't have the voice, it's Debbie Reynolds. But of course, in reality, behind Debbie Reynolds is Victoria [[?]]
[00:09:06]
In a booth, in the dark, behind the
Transcription Notes:
Micheaux - Oscar Micheaux
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Reopened for Editing 2023-05-03 15:02:11