Obama-produced biopic explores legacy of civil rights movement leader
A new Barack and Michelle Obama-produced biopic about Bayard Rustin, the civil rights activist who mentored Martin Luther King Jr, will explore how his sexuality has affected his legacy.
Rustin, who died aged 75 in 1987, was one of the key organisers of the 1963 March on Washington – where King Jr made his “I have a dream” speech to 250,000 demonstrators.
But as a gay man with affiliations to the Communist Party, his place in history has often been erased in the decades since.
Bayard Rustin points to a map showing the path of the March on Washington
From the 1940s until the end of the 1960s, Rustin was beaten, arrested and ostracised for his political convictions and sexuality.
“It completely played against him and also a lot of women in the movement as well,” said Euphoria’s Colman Domingo, who is playing Rustin in the Netflix biopic.
“I understand how black folks, at times, we can be a bit conservative. But I think it was all trying to come together to actually do what we believed was right,” he said.
“Yet you have people’s minds, bodies and souls who live outside of that, who are sort of outliers that get denied access in many ways. And [Rustin] was just very much a man of his own creation.”
Jendella Benson, author and head of editorial at Black Ballad – a media outlet and community for black British women – said Rustin was a victim of the respectability politics of the time.
In the US in the 1960s, homosexuality was classified as a psychiatric disorder and you could face being fired from work for being gay.
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“There were all these ideas about respectability, about the right kind of black person to lead us and who is the infallible black person that white people will have to listen to, that white people will have to respect who has done all the right things. And we don’t leave room for complication,” Ms Benson said.
“I think black communities often suffer from this idea of collective responsibility, which can be good, but also can be quite restrictive in terms of if one person messes up, it’s somehow a brush to tar the whole community with.
“And rather than interrogating that narrative, sometimes we play into it.”
A scene from Rustin (L to R), Michael Potts as Cleve Robinson, Aml Ameen as Martin Luther King Jr, Chris Rock as NAACP Executive Director Roy Wilkins, Glynn Turman as A Philip Randolph and Kevin Mambo as Whitney Young. Pic: David Lee/Netflix
Rustin isn’t the first instance in which an activist from the civil rights movement has been sidelined in favour of someone who better fits rigid societal expectations.
Journalist and author Gary Younge documented the story of 15-year-old Claudette Colvin in his book Dispatches From The Diaspora: Nelson Mandela To Black Lives Matter.
Gary Younge
She was removed from a bus in Montgomery, Alabama in the 1950s.
“The civil rights movement [was] going to go with her [as the face of the protest] but she was dark-skinned [and] from the wrong side of town. And then she got pregnant and they dropped her like a hot potato,” Mr Younge told Sky News.
Shortly after, Rosa Parks was kicked off a bus in the same city and became synonymous with the civil rights movement.
Rosa Parks
“I’m proudest of [interviewing] Claudette Colvin [in the book] because I found her and I felt at the time she wasn’t being celebrated in the way that she is now,” Mr Younge said.
Just three years before the March on Washington, the US had its first televised presidential debate. For the biopic’s film director George C Wolfe this made the civil rights movement acutely aware of the impact respectability had on perception.
George C Wolfe and Colman Domingo
“President Kennedy had just won a presidential election because he was handsome and charismatic versus Richard Nixon, who sweated throughout the entire thing.
“So image was very important for black people at the time because they were aware that they were entering the mainstream,” Wolfe told Sky News.
Rustin is streaming on Netflix.
The creator of an AI actress has told Sky News that synthetic performers will get more actors working, rather than steal jobs.
AI production studio Particle6 has ruffled feathers in Hollywood by unveiling Tilly Norwood – a 20-something actress created by artificial intelligence.
Speaking to Sky News’ Dominic Waghorn, actor and comedian Eline Van der Velden – who founded Particle6 – insisted Norwood is “not meant to take jobs in the traditional film”.
AI entertainment is “developing as a completely separate genre”, she said, adding: “And that’s where Tilly is meant to stay. She’s meant to stay in the AI genre and be a star in that.”
“I don’t want her to take real actors’ jobs,” she continued. “I wanted to have her own creative path.”
Norwood has been labelled “really, really scary” by Mary Poppins Returns star Emily Blunt, while the US actors’ union SAG-AFTRA said in a statement: “Tilly Norwood is not an actor, it’s a character generated by a computer program that was trained on the work of countless professional performers – without permission or compensation.”
Responding to the criticism, Ms Van der Velden argued that Hollywood is “going to have to learn how to work with [AI] going forward”.
“We can’t stop it,” she said. “If we put our head in the sand, then our jobs will be gone. However, instead, if we learn how to use these tools, if we use it going forward, especially in Britain, we can be that creative powerhouse.”
Eline Van der Velden said she wanted the character to ‘have her own creative path’
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Ms Van der Velden said her studio has already helped a number of projects that were struggling due to budget constraints.
“Some productions get stuck, not able to find the last 30% of their budget, and so they don’t go into production,” she said. “Now with AI, by replacing some of the shots […] we can actually get that production going and working. So as a result, we get more jobs, we get more actors working, so that’s all really, really positive news.”
Entertainment
Sally Rooney tells court new books may not be published in UK due to Palestine Action ban
Irish author Sally Rooney has told the High Court she may not be able to publish new books in the UK, and may have to withdraw previous titles from sale, because of the ban on Palestine Action.
The group’s co-founder Huda Ammori is taking legal action against the Home Office over the decision to proscribe Palestine Action under anti-terror laws in July.
The ban made being a member of, or supporting, Palestine Action a criminal offence punishable by up to 14 years in prison.
Rooney was in August warned that she risked committing a terrorist offence after saying she would donate earnings from her books, and the TV adaptations of Normal People and Conversations With Friends, to support Palestine Action.
In a witness statement made public on Thursday, Rooney said the producer of the BBC dramas said they had been advised that they could not send money to her agent if the funds could be used to fund the group, as that would be a crime under anti-terror laws.
Rooney added that it was “unclear” whether any UK company can pay her, stating that if she is prevented from profiting from her work, her income would be “enormously restricted”.
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Why was Palestine Action proscribed?
She added: “If I were to write another screenplay, television show or similar creative work, I would not be able to have it produced or distributed by a company based in England and Wales without, expressly or tacitly, accepting that I would not be paid.”
Rooney described how the publication of her books is based on royalties on sales, and that non-payment of royalties would mean she can terminate her contract.
“If, therefore, Faber and Faber Limited are legally prohibited from paying me the royalties I am owed, my existing works may have to be withdrawn from sale and would therefore no longer be available to readers in the UK,” Rooney added, saying this would be “a truly extreme incursion by the state into the realm of artistic expression”.
Rooney added that it is “almost certain” that she cannot publish or produce new work in the UK while the Palestine Action ban remains in force.
She said: “If Palestine Action is still proscribed by the time my next book is due for publication, then that book will be available to readers all over the world and in dozens of languages, but will be unavailable to readers in the United Kingdom simply because no one will be permitted to publish it, unless I am content to give it away for free.”
Sir James Eadie KC, barrister for the Home Office, said in a written submission that the ban’s aim is “stifling organisations concerned in terrorism and for members of the public to face criminal liability for joining or supporting such organisations”.
“That serves to ensure proscribed organisations are deprived of the oxygen of publicity as well as both vocal and financial support,” he continued.
The High Court hearing is due to conclude on 2 December, with a decision expected in writing at a later date.
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