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The Root Review: 'Mooz-lum,' a New Spin on an Old Tale
Mooz-lum, a thoughtful new drama written and directed by first-timer Qasim “Q” Basir, manages to dress the age-old story of father-and-son conflict in new garb. It opens with a warm scene between an African-American Muslim father, Hassan (Roger Guenveur Smith), and his son, Tariq (Evan Ross), in prayer, but that domestic tranquillity is quickly lost.…
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George Washington and His Runaway Slave
“I am free now and choose to remain so.” These are the words that haunt the new exhibit, “The President’s House: Freedom and Slavery in Making a New Nation.” Now, directly in front of the famous Liberty Bell and Independence Hall, the President’s House is the first and only federal site designed to memorialize enslaved…
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The Root Review: 'Night Catches Us'
The Black Panther Party in its twilight, circa 1976. Gone are the breakfast programs, dashikis, megaphones and big Afros, as well as the gun-toting, black-leather-clad militants. In the wake of the formidable black nationalist movement are both ruin and rumination. Single black mothers trying to save a community, former Black Panther members turned vigilantes, and…
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Black Feminism, Tyler Perry Style
Leave it to Tyler Perry, a man best known for playing Madea, a modern-day Mammy, to try to redefine black feminism for the mainstream. Perry admits that he didn’t know much about Ntozake Shange’s choreopoem, For Colored Girls Who Considered Suicide When the Rainbow Is Enuf, but that didn’t stop him from taking on this…
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Mad at 'Mad Men'
In Mad Men, AMC’s seminal series on the 1960s advertising scene, all the women are white, all the blacks are men and, well, the rest of us non-male colored folks are housekeepers and Playboy bunnies. At least, that’s what one would think watching the show lauded by The Washington Post as “TV’s most feminist show.”…
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Movie Review: Waiting for Superman
Salamishah Tillet is a rape survivor and co-founder of A Long Walk Home, a nonprofit that uses art to end violence against girls and women. She is also an associate professor of English studies at the University of Pennsylvania and the author of Sites of Slavery: Citizenship, Racial Democracy, and the Post-Civil Rights Imagination. She is working…
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Ethiopian Jazz: Thrilling Music That You Should Hear
During the second half of the 20th century, cosmopolitan Ethiopians were delighted to see jazz giant Duke Ellington receive their country’s Medal of Honor from Emperor Haile Selassie. At the same time, by contrast, a Berklee College of Music-trained Ethiopian jazz legend, Mulatu Astatke, who fused jazz and funk with his country’s folk and Coptic…
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August Wilson's Leading Lady: An Ode to Viola Davis
On Sunday the American Theatre Wing’s Tony Awards will air on CBS. Despite the recession, audiences continued to flock to theater, especially to see shows that featured Hollywood hot-list actors as Cate Blanchett, Scarlett Johansson, Liev Schreiber, Jude Law, Catherine Zeta-Jones and Denzel Washington. But this year it is the lesser-known Viola Davis, nominated for…
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Black Girls Are Still Enslaved
This Saturday, mogul Russell Simmons and civil rights leader Al Sharpton are expected to deliver speeches at the “Stop the Violence” rally in Trenton, N.J. This rally is a direct response to the revolting news that seven men, ranging in age from 13 to 20 years old sexually assaulted a 7-year-old girl in Trenton’s Rowan…
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Requiem for Martin Luther King Jr.
Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. has rightfully been celebrated as one of the most important political leaders of the 20th century, but he doesn’t get the credit for his significant influence on African-American music. Most music lovers and civil-rights-history buffs know that James Brown, the “Godfather of Soul,” headlined an unforgettable concert in Boston on…
Black News and Black Views with a Whole Lotta Attitude
