Here is a sign of the times. When a young women comes to you, at some event, or party, and says, " I'll do anything to get into "show biz" can you help me?" Some, not all, but some of us old timers know that this can only end badly. It will end badly for you soon, (law suits, wife leaving you, reputation smashed, did I mention law suit) and for the young women, later. All kinds of alarms go off in your head, and actually for a few seconds your brain goes to red, and then stops working. Time stops and the Devil comes into the room and says, "Who will know?". Tonight nobody, tomorrow everybody, and a few years from now, when you are broke, thrown away, and living on pork and beans, nobody again. You will still be trying to convince people that you were only trying to help, which no one will even try to believe.
But anyway, and this is something I don't do often, I explain that there is really very few, if any, short cuts to success in life. I didn't mention luck, because I believe if you win a million dollars on a scratch card thats luck, to fulfil your ambition it's messy. More work than you thought you could do. More things than you thought you could learn. More anger, and sadness, than you thought you could suck up, and keep going, trough the tears. You want to quit, and then, you want to quit again, and then you want to quit again. People love you, who, you will miss treat. You will make mistakes and then more mistakes, and then one day things will start to fall into place. You will start to feel like you know what you're doing.
Now the real fun begins. This is when your ambitions bumps up against everyone else's. This is when you wonder why everyone is blocking you from, what you believe, is yours.
This is when she stopped me with, " Uuuug, I just was hoping you could set me up with your agent or get me a movie role. You know a step up. Can you help me?
I said, "I just did."
As I said before, I usually don't explain, for this very reason, but old age lends itself to excepting flattery as a due. No, I can't, is my usual and truthful answer. I have to except the fact, that for most, being an Actor doesn't mean the same now, as it once did. Yes, there was the expectation of fame and riches, but because of the work, not just a "get over". Everyone couldn't just walk around saying they were an Actor unless they were working, or had worked as an Actor. They couldn't just say, "I know I can do it, if someone would just give me a chance." But this is the battle cry of a lot of the young black people today. This is why Jesse Jackson Jr. and his wife, are in jail right now. He didn't want to be a Congressman. They wanted to live like a rich Hip Hop Star.
He and his wife fell into the "trap". Yes, other Congress members are stealing campaign money, but it's you the FED's are watching, so they can bust you and say, "See there!" Yes, those Wall Street guys are walking around with a ounce of coke in their pocket but it's not them who are being stopped and searched. Don't you dare think, oh but thats not fair. Whats not fair is, we make it so easy for them to do it to us, because " I'll do anything to......", .fill in the blank
My generation has done some really dumb shit, no question, but we have always worked to make a living. Make a living, support a family, for the most part. Two parent black families are still in the majority despite what you hear, Jim Brown, Bill Russell, sportcasters, entertainers, Sidney, Harry, the Pips, all were supporting there families and the fame came with it. Now it's just about the fame, and my status is, how much money can I just fuck up, for my fans entertainment.
What reasonable human being thought it was a good idea to "rain money" on a pole dancer? What reasonable human being gave status to this behavior?
The President of Howard University wonders aloud why Dr. Dre, would give money to USC and not to his University. Then that same black University wants to stop P Diddy, who might want to give the school some bucks for this honor, from getting a honorary degree, because he dropped out, to make himself, one of the riches son's of bitches in this country, without his Howard Degree.
My point is, what the young girl asked at the party, and Howard's short sightiness is the same form of "give me". She, didn't know any better because this sort of thing was already in place by this and other, very large Black Institution. How do you get caught honoring a Bigot, and not Magic Johnson, as the NAACP recently have. We know Donald gave them a big check, but do they now expect Magic ever will. What's the value of an Honor un-earned. For sale? "I'll do any thing to......."
It always ends badly.
Tuesday, May 20, 2014
Tuesday, February 11, 2014
Auditioning in the Obama Era.
I once had this great Agent, Nancy Greene. One day, full of myself, I asked, "why don't I get auditions for parts that are traditionally "white". She said, "That's all you have been going up for. They're all white parts. If I waited for a black role, you'd never work."
Needless to say, this was very sobering thirty years ago, but is, even true today. Yes, there are "Black Sit-Com's" that the scripts say what race the role is, but only if the character is white. ( I'm still trying to get use to, most of what you say now days can, and will, be contradicted by someone who will always give you the one exception, like it's proof of what you say is wrong. Like you say, "Black men, don't win Emmys for best dramatic actor in a series", and they say, "Well Bill Cosby won." You look at them like what the fuck are you talking about, that was forty some years ago. One! ONE!)
Anyway, still in this day and age, White Actors actually believe that Black Actors are doing as well as they are. Getting the same breaks and compensations. Tell them that's not the case, and they will bring up Will Smith and Samuel L. Jackson. Two rich Black Actors vs the whole NBC Monday night line up...alone, for starters. The Screen Actors Guild know this for a fact, but I wouldn't hold your breath on them striking on this. Since I joined the Guild back in the 1970's there has been a lot of hand ringing, and speech's, and "we ought a", and "in the future's" but no action. Back in the 80's at a place called Sittens, a late night Actor hang out, in the Valley, I heard one white Actor tell another that he didn't get a part because the show had to meet it's quota of Blacks. He believed this bullshit just like the President is from Kenya. The idea of maybe, the producers were trying to make the show look like what America looks like, did not occur to him. As far as he was concern, the producers, to meet a mandated quota, by who knows where, had to hire, who he thought was an inferior being. I mean, the producers were white and they wouldn't, on purpose, not give a job to another white person, would they...no, don't be silly.
Well, what this is all about is, a few weeks ago, in this new Obama Era, I was sitting in the waiting room at an audition, and let me say it a loud, MINDING MY OWN BUSINESS. As usual, the role is for a "frumpy, 70 year old white man". Well, this Actor, White guy, mid sixties or so comes in and sits next to me and says, "Hey you should get this, I saw you as a frumpy, 70 year old white man as soon as I came in". I get his joke. Okay, I'm Black, okay...hardy ha ha.
I say, "I've been getting sides like this as long as I've been in LA. There are just so few roles for middle age Black men."
Wait for it. He turns to me and says, " Why you have to bring race into it. I'm making a joke here and you guys ...it's race, race, race." Did I mention , that I was MINDING MY OWN DAMN BUSINESS. He went on to tell me how this is dividing the country and bring us all down. I hear what he is saying clearly because in the Obama Era it's being screamed all over the place, if you people would only except your inferiority, America's race problem would solve it's self. See, it's our fault. We've ruined everything.
To "show" me, he moved to another seat. He didn't know that I was happy about that. If he really wanted to show me, he should have sat there as I beat him until the police came and took me away. However, I'm too old for that trap, and kinda use to it. Like the guy who wanted to insult me into hitting him on the Golf Course so he could sue me. He had seen me on TV and saw a quick buck.
I have lived all over the country and nowhere is it as segregated as the Hollywood world, but that, is our "Red Carpet Secret".
Needless to say, this was very sobering thirty years ago, but is, even true today. Yes, there are "Black Sit-Com's" that the scripts say what race the role is, but only if the character is white. ( I'm still trying to get use to, most of what you say now days can, and will, be contradicted by someone who will always give you the one exception, like it's proof of what you say is wrong. Like you say, "Black men, don't win Emmys for best dramatic actor in a series", and they say, "Well Bill Cosby won." You look at them like what the fuck are you talking about, that was forty some years ago. One! ONE!)
Anyway, still in this day and age, White Actors actually believe that Black Actors are doing as well as they are. Getting the same breaks and compensations. Tell them that's not the case, and they will bring up Will Smith and Samuel L. Jackson. Two rich Black Actors vs the whole NBC Monday night line up...alone, for starters. The Screen Actors Guild know this for a fact, but I wouldn't hold your breath on them striking on this. Since I joined the Guild back in the 1970's there has been a lot of hand ringing, and speech's, and "we ought a", and "in the future's" but no action. Back in the 80's at a place called Sittens, a late night Actor hang out, in the Valley, I heard one white Actor tell another that he didn't get a part because the show had to meet it's quota of Blacks. He believed this bullshit just like the President is from Kenya. The idea of maybe, the producers were trying to make the show look like what America looks like, did not occur to him. As far as he was concern, the producers, to meet a mandated quota, by who knows where, had to hire, who he thought was an inferior being. I mean, the producers were white and they wouldn't, on purpose, not give a job to another white person, would they...no, don't be silly.
Well, what this is all about is, a few weeks ago, in this new Obama Era, I was sitting in the waiting room at an audition, and let me say it a loud, MINDING MY OWN BUSINESS. As usual, the role is for a "frumpy, 70 year old white man". Well, this Actor, White guy, mid sixties or so comes in and sits next to me and says, "Hey you should get this, I saw you as a frumpy, 70 year old white man as soon as I came in". I get his joke. Okay, I'm Black, okay...hardy ha ha.
I say, "I've been getting sides like this as long as I've been in LA. There are just so few roles for middle age Black men."
Wait for it. He turns to me and says, " Why you have to bring race into it. I'm making a joke here and you guys ...it's race, race, race." Did I mention , that I was MINDING MY OWN DAMN BUSINESS. He went on to tell me how this is dividing the country and bring us all down. I hear what he is saying clearly because in the Obama Era it's being screamed all over the place, if you people would only except your inferiority, America's race problem would solve it's self. See, it's our fault. We've ruined everything.
To "show" me, he moved to another seat. He didn't know that I was happy about that. If he really wanted to show me, he should have sat there as I beat him until the police came and took me away. However, I'm too old for that trap, and kinda use to it. Like the guy who wanted to insult me into hitting him on the Golf Course so he could sue me. He had seen me on TV and saw a quick buck.
I have lived all over the country and nowhere is it as segregated as the Hollywood world, but that, is our "Red Carpet Secret".
Friday, January 31, 2014
THE WEIGHT OF RAIN
THE WEIGHT OF RAIN
Rain is measured in inches, however, it is also reported by how heavy it is raining. When I lived in the world of rain, and changing seasons, Cleveland, Ohio, I would sit on the front porch ( it was also the land of porches), and like most kids , wonder about my place in life. My Grandma Alberta, and my eight year old self, would have long debates on life from two opposite sides of it. One day she stunned me with how I had to "uphold the race". How that weight was on my eight year old back, and I would have to carry it as long as I lived. Whoa! How did I get that Job? Did she mean me only, which she did, but also everyone else who was young and black?
From that awakening, I was now a member of, "God, don't let him be black" club, every time there was a news report of some terrible crime, The sigh of relieve when it wasn't. The deep pain in the center of your body when it was. At eight, I wondering, what did the race do ,that was so horrible, that it needed to be "upheld". A long time ago, did we raid Europe and steal the people, ripped them from their loved ones and take them to Africa, enslave them, rape their women and beat the soul, and spirt, and hope , from the men. Get rich, for centuries, on the back of their slave labor, and once freed, denied them a decent living and existence. No, it wasn't that.
I carried that rain, until I sat on a grassy knoll, on the campus of Fieldstone Academy, in New York City, and listen to Malcolm X speak. Growing up without a Father, and having just a few black men who had very little time, working their two jobs, it was like being struck by lightning, to have this man look at me, and tell me I had VALUE. He looked me dead in the eyes. I didn't have to uphold shit. There was nothing wrong with "me". There was nothing wrong with my skin color, my hair texture, my big lips and broad nose. Nor, was my view of the world and its History, wrong. There was nothing but hard working men and women in my life and they were called lazy? They supported their families with a bunch of nothing jobs and very little hope.
He said that, of course you will think that you are crazy, when every cell in your body is telling you that what they want you to believe, worship, and surrender to, was a lie. So, you worship and believe harder and the pain gets worst, and the crazier you get. Why not get high, some say. But they don't care that you are high, as long as you stay out of the way. As long as you carry the weight of rain and don't rock the boat, they will even sell you the dope,
If you don't feel me yet, its like a man or women, waiting at home, when here she comes in at 3:30am with a story you want to believe with every fiber in your body, and when you do, nothing will be right for you, ever again. Because you will be insane.
Rain is measured in inches, however, it is also reported by how heavy it is raining. When I lived in the world of rain, and changing seasons, Cleveland, Ohio, I would sit on the front porch ( it was also the land of porches), and like most kids , wonder about my place in life. My Grandma Alberta, and my eight year old self, would have long debates on life from two opposite sides of it. One day she stunned me with how I had to "uphold the race". How that weight was on my eight year old back, and I would have to carry it as long as I lived. Whoa! How did I get that Job? Did she mean me only, which she did, but also everyone else who was young and black?
From that awakening, I was now a member of, "God, don't let him be black" club, every time there was a news report of some terrible crime, The sigh of relieve when it wasn't. The deep pain in the center of your body when it was. At eight, I wondering, what did the race do ,that was so horrible, that it needed to be "upheld". A long time ago, did we raid Europe and steal the people, ripped them from their loved ones and take them to Africa, enslave them, rape their women and beat the soul, and spirt, and hope , from the men. Get rich, for centuries, on the back of their slave labor, and once freed, denied them a decent living and existence. No, it wasn't that.
I carried that rain, until I sat on a grassy knoll, on the campus of Fieldstone Academy, in New York City, and listen to Malcolm X speak. Growing up without a Father, and having just a few black men who had very little time, working their two jobs, it was like being struck by lightning, to have this man look at me, and tell me I had VALUE. He looked me dead in the eyes. I didn't have to uphold shit. There was nothing wrong with "me". There was nothing wrong with my skin color, my hair texture, my big lips and broad nose. Nor, was my view of the world and its History, wrong. There was nothing but hard working men and women in my life and they were called lazy? They supported their families with a bunch of nothing jobs and very little hope.
He said that, of course you will think that you are crazy, when every cell in your body is telling you that what they want you to believe, worship, and surrender to, was a lie. So, you worship and believe harder and the pain gets worst, and the crazier you get. Why not get high, some say. But they don't care that you are high, as long as you stay out of the way. As long as you carry the weight of rain and don't rock the boat, they will even sell you the dope,
If you don't feel me yet, its like a man or women, waiting at home, when here she comes in at 3:30am with a story you want to believe with every fiber in your body, and when you do, nothing will be right for you, ever again. Because you will be insane.
Thursday, January 23, 2014
IT'S THE MONEY.
When I first came out to LA in the second golden age of Televison, there was MARY TYLER MOORE, and four camera Sit-Coms. Warner Bros and Universal Studio's had all of the Drama shows on television. David Kelly was still a lawyer and Dick Wolf was just a pup. I would wonder how these old fellows who I was meeting with could be so settled in their ways. "No, son TV is done this way". They were old movie guys who had gotten rich with the small screen formula. America knew who the "bad guys" where. They always wore black hats. They had hair on their faces. They were never, never blond. They were only interested in booze, broads, and money.
Behind these guys were a young hot shot crew of young excecutives and writters, producers who were Rock and Rollers, and had change on their lips and minds. There hair was a little longer and their suits a little tighter and they wore their "hipness" with pride. Some of them even knew a few colored people personally. However, when they did take over, TV stayed the same. "Dig it, TV is done this way." These were the pre WWII kids and they surfed, drove sports cars, and were urban cool, like the detective shows and game shows and soap's about the rich
Waiting in the wings were the rich hippies, the Disco babies, the political aware Limo gang to now, the "hip, urban cool,"we don't care if you're Gay, because we're all a little Gay", bunch. But with little exception, TV STAYS THE SAME. However we do have scores of ways to deliever this sameness to the world, with high teck gadget thingies.
As with Actors and Writers and other Artist I have known, you hear in their early years how they want to change the world and then, a little later, as the world becomes more comfortable for them, another tone. Like the old time network exec's found out, this job pays a lot better than pretty good. The system allowed you to spread the blame around so nothing can really stick to you, and when you leave, you leave with a big bag full of money. So, who in their right mind would want to change that? And now with major corporations taking over the entertainment industry it's even easier. They can make the same show over and over again and just change the name and faces. All the Corp. cares about is the spread sheet. How much did you make this quarter?
I say all of this to say, if Olivia Benson, on LAW AND ORDER, gets raped one more time on that show, and don't quit that dumb job, I will screem!
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