Is The Color Purple’ a Black Film? Let’s Debate!

It’s hard to believe it’s been 40 years since “The Color Purple” hit theaters on Dec. 18, 1985. The film, starring Whoopi Goldberg, Danny Glover and Oprah Winfrey, was a screen adaptation of Alice Walker’s 1982 novel by the same name. The book, which follows main character Celie, is a series of letters she writes to God about the hardships and heartbreaks she faces while growing up in rural Georgia, including being raped by an abusive father, entering into an abusive arranged marriage and her romantic relationship with her husband’s mistress. The book won Walker the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, the first ever for a Black woman.

The film received 11 Academy Award nominations, including Best Picture, Best Actress for Whoopi Goldberg, and Supporting Actress for Margaret Avery and Oprah Winfrey, though none of the nominees took home the golden statue. But while ‘the film “The Color Purple” received lots of critical acclaim, it also got its fair share of criticism, including some from folks who take issue with the fact that a dramatic film about a young Black woman’s life was directed by Steven Spielberg, who is neither Black nor a woman.

The conversation sparked a debate between “The Root” writers Lawrence Ware and Angela Johnson, who argued whether this cult classic can actually be considered a Black film. Although Ware is standing ten toes down on the argument that the film isn’t Black, Johnson thinks you can’t describe it any other way.

You can check out our conversation here:  

Lawrence Ware: The 1986 film The Color Purple is not a Black film. Let me explain why.

A movie must have more that connects it to our community other than having Black actors on screen. The Help, Driving Ms. Daisy, The Blind Side…these are all films that feature compelling performances by Black folks and tells a Black story but are written and directed by white people.

For a movie to be considered ‘Black,’ it must have Black people behind the lens who oversee how a story is told. The writer, producers and director are largely responsible for what shows up on screen. So just because a movie features Black talent does not mean they were empowered to have a say about what ends in the movie.

The director is Steven Spielberg. (He is Jewish to be sure, but he is a white one. This is a complex subject. Read this for more information.) The movie is based on Walker’s classic, but she was kicked out of the screenwriter’s chair. It was written by a white Dutch man named Menno Meyjes. And while there are four producers of the film. Only one of them is Black.

A case in point. In the novel, the relationship between Shug and Celie is very different. They were not friends, they were lovers. Spielberg was worried that the lesbian relationship would hurt the films marketability, so he decided to leave it out. That’s the kind of power a director has over a film and why I am hesitant to call a film black when no one from our community has the power to make that kind of decision.

The Color Purple is a great film. It’s just not a Black one.

Angela Johnson: Black influence is all up and through “The Color Purple.”

“The Color Purple” is our film, and here’s why:

For Alice Walker, Art Was Deeper Than Race or Gender

Alice Walker was initially hesitant to sell the rights to her Pulitzer Prize-winning novel for a film adaptation, she admits in her 1998 biography, ‘The Same River Twice: Honoring the Difficult,” that she even came up with an alternative name for the film, “Watch for Me in the Sunset.” Anyone who creates art knows how hard it can be to give over your baby to someone else.

When she saw the film for the first time in a theater, Walker wrote that she questioned everything, including Quincy Jones’ music and the watering down of Celie and Shug’s relationship. However, she understood the marketability argument and eventually made peace with it. But she maintained her influence, insisting that Spielberg and Jones include the kiss shared by the characters in the 1985 film.

Walker went on to write that she trusted Jones’ recommendation to have Spielberg direct the film because she wanted her work to reach those who may not have otherwise read the book. She also admits to getting over the fact that he was not Black, suggesting that art transcends race and gender, writing, “Steven is white, and a man. But he is more than that. As I am more than black and a woman.”

Spielberg May Have Directed It, But Quincy Jones Was Calling Plenty of Shots

It’s easy to understand why some might have a problem with the fact that two white men – director Steven Spielberg and screenwriter Menno Meyjes – were influential in the 1985 film adaptation of “The Color Purple.” But you can’t talk about the film without mentioning producer Quincy Jones, who scored the film and had a hand in selecting stars Whoopi Goldberg and Oprah Winfrey. Jones handpicked Spielberg for the director job after the two worked together on the “E.T.” storybook album. Whoopi Goldberg also defended the ‘E.T.” director’s participation in the film in a 2022 interview, arguing that it was a film she believes he was supposed to make.

“I think if a Black director wanted to do the movie, ‘The Color Purple,’ they had the opportunity,” she said. “If people are pissed off that he did it, they should have stepped up.”

The Cast Was All-In

You can’t deny that the cast of the original “The Color Purple” film is Blackety-black and were true fans of Walker’s novel, which comes through in their performances. Stars Oprah Winfrey and Whoopi Goldberg have talked about how they were not shy about letting folks know that they wanted to be part of the film after finding out that Walker’s book was coming to the big screen.

“When I heard the book was being made into a film, I remember praying, ‘God, please find me a way to get into that movie!” I would have taken any role—best girl, water boy, whatever. So I know it was providence when Quincy, who was visiting Chicago, flipped through the TV channels, spotted me, and believed I could play the character of Sofia in a movie he was co-producing— The Color Purple,” she said.

Alice Walker also notes that the cast had no problem pushing back when they thought Spielberg’s direction missed the mark.

“I cheered inwardly to see Whoopi stand toe to toe one day with Steven and insist that Celie would not age the way he was envisioning her, but would look more like colored women do as they age. A matter of posture and gait, not wrinkles and a white wig,” wrote Walker in her biography “The Same River Twice: Honoring the Difficult.“

The casts’ influence comes through in the delivery of the dialogue, much of which is taken directly from Walker’s novel. Fans of the film can recite most of the quotable one-liners by heart, including “I loves Harpo, God knows I do. But I’ll kill him dead ‘fo I let him beat me.”

You can’t tell me that ain’t Black.