Activist, Comedian Dick Gregory: Spike Lee is a Punk and a Thug
- Post 14 January 2013
- By News One
- Hits: 2401
Legendary social activist, comedian and author, Dick Gregory, weighed in on the controversial Quentin Tarantino film, "Django Unchained," and he did so in explosive fashion.
In an interview posted to YouTube, Gregory says that the movie spoke to him in ways that no film had in all his years on earth. He then calls out Director Spike Lee for criticizing a film that he’s never seen, saying that if anyone has created movies that are disrespectful to our ancestors, it’s Lee himself:
I’ve seen “Django Unchained” 12 times. Never in the history of Hollywood, have they ever made anything that freed the inside of me. The inside of me. I’m 80-years-old, I saw cowboy movies, wasn’t no Black folks in cowboy movies. I’m looking at a Western, plus a love story. To those of you all that see it, you’ll never see a love story about a black man and a black woman where it wasn’t some foul sex and foul language, huh. And Spike Lee can’t appreciate that. The little thug ain’t even seen the movie; he’s acting like he white.
So it must be something personal. And all them Black entertainers that know Spike Lee, how you gone attack this man and don’t be attacking them … and then say everyone’s a fool but me. [Talking about] ‘it offended my ancestors, but when you did ‘She’s Got To Have It’ and some of those other thug movies you did…you took Malcolm X and put a Zoot suit on him…did that offend your ancestors, punk?
It’s a game, man. So whatever he’s mad about is something that happened way, way a long ago. Thank God it didn’t work [to stop the movie from being successful].
When the interviewer asks Gregory if he has a problem with Tarantino’s excessive use of the word “n*gger, he said that he absolutely did not and that no other culture insists on the white-washing of their painful past in this country like Black people:
We talking about history, man. It happened. Nigger happened.
Gregory goes on to talk about the history of “the dozens,” slave rebellion and racism in Hollywood.
Read more http://newsone.com/2139601/dick-gregory-spike-lee/
Comments
Raw is raw and you don't put any chaser in your words. I've seen DJango Unchained twice and I picked up more points from Tarantino the second time around that I missed in my first watching. I say All Black Folk need to see the movie and we need to talk about the Slavery Experience White Folk took Our Ancestors through. The Dialogue is needed now more than every to educate Our Young Black Men and Women.
Additionally, WE must tell Our Story via film, plays, spoken word, books, and any other communication device. We must tell Our Story and the debate will not be about Tarantino's Story, it will be about Our Story in a teaching way. Even with DJango Unchained, We must Teach Our Black Legacy as it relates to the perspective given us by director Tarantino. It's all good as long as We Tell Our Story! Ok Spike?
To My Brother Dick, whom I respect on all levels: your comments are well taken. But, the Zoot Suit was part of the Biography and though it was country it was a fact of Malcolm's past. On the other hand all of D'Jango was based on fiction.
A young black man said that he saw it twice, once with a young black audience and the theater was 'electric' with lots of energy and laughter and then with an older white audience and there was no energy. i am looking forward to seeing the movie.
Dick Gregory is one of the true icons of entertainment, much like George Carlin, he started as a 'button down' stand up and then really became a trend setting and ceiling breaking entertainer, but it cost him lots of exposure.
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