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You Can Watch Creed and Straight Outta Compton Win on Oscar Night If You Watch the All Def Movie Awards
The All Def Movie Awards were taped Wednesday night and will air on The Root’s sister network, Fusion on Sunday night—the same night as the Academy Awards. Produced, in part, as an alternative to the Academy Awards because of the #OscarSoWhite controversy, Russell Simmons and his Def team honored black entertainers, most notably, Will Smith, who…
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The Women of All-Female Black Cast of Broadway’s Eclipse on the Cover of Uptown
It started off as the little off-Broadway play that could. But now Elipse—the play with an all-female, all-black cast that features Academy Award winner Lupita Nyong’o—is on Broadway and getting the attention it deserves. The cast appeared on the cover of Uptown magazine looking stunning. Gurira—one of the play’s writers—and actresses Saycon Sengbloh, Pascale Armand,…
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Birth of a Nation Gets a Release Date That Sets It Up Nicely for Awards Season
Fox Searchlight—the film studio that paid big bucks for indie film Birth of a Nation at the Sundance Film Festival last month—has high hopes for the biopic. The film tells the story of black slave rebellion leader Nat Turner, as played by Nate Parker, who also wrote and directed the film. According to Deadline, Fox…
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The Politics of Fear and Loathing in 2016
Everywhere I turn, I find friends and acquaintances who are not merely concerned, but frightened. A kind of raw ugliness to our national politics, not really seen in the post-World War II era, seems to be in fashion. Nothing has brought this home more forcefully than the success of Donald Trump in recent Republican presidential…
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Hey, Hillary, Bernie, Even Trump: You Should Care About Black Students and College Loan Debt
Morgan State University senior Temprest Myers worries constantly about how she’ll pay back her student loans when she graduates. “I … think about whether I’ll be able to afford a home,” says the 23-year-old broadcast journalism major, “afford a decent car and simple things like groceries.” The St. Paul, Minn., native is working a security…
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Kanye’s Umpteenth Twitter Rant Is About an ‘Idiot’ Producer Who Shaded Ye’s Influence
Kanye West hopped on his most beloved outlet Tuesday—Twitter—to give a producer named Bob Ezrin a piece of his mind. A quick Google search says that Ezrin is a Canadian music producer who has worked with acts like Kiss and Pink Floyd. Apparently Ezrin said that Macklemore was more “musically important” than Kanye, and that…
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Rihanna’s Video Director Clears Up Confusion About West Indian Dance Culture Depicted in ‘Work’
If Rihanna and Drake’s “Work” video doesn’t have you itching to wine your waist in a hot, sticky, hole-in-the-wall reggae spot this weekend, then you’re in the minority. It had people reminiscing about the last time they let loose and sweated their hair out to some Buju Banton; it also had people speculating about whether…
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After Scalia: A Single Supreme Court Justice Can Impede Progress, Influence Our Discourse
As the country and Congress grapple with the sudden passing of Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, a key lesson has emerged from his tenure and his legacy in civil rights cases in particular: A single Supreme Court justice can powerfully influence our national discourse on critical issues of inequality. Through the opinions they write, the…
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The Battle for the Blacks Continues: Hillary Clinton Visits Kerry Washington on Scandal Set
Another day, and another black public figure endorses either Bernie Sanders’ or Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign. On Tuesday, Spike Lee declared his support for Sanders in a radio ad that targeted black South Carolinians. That same day, Clinton visited the set of ABC’s Scandal and took photos with its star Kerry Washington. Washington posted a…
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The People v. O.J. Simpson Recap: It’s a Black Thing
The John Singleton-directed episode of The People v. O.J. Simpson begins with O.J. in jail, reminiscing about being at the club, which included Soul Train lines, excessive pelvis thrusting and lots of coke. Across town at O.J. lawyer Robert Shapiro’s office, the attorneys are eating lox and whitefish on O.J.’s dime. Shapiro starts the meeting…
Black News and Black Views with a Whole Lotta Attitude
