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‘This is not the era of the Minstrel Show’: Billy Dee Williams sparks online outrage after saying he doesn’t mind if actors do blackface

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Billy Dee Williams

Actor Billy Dee Williams shocked his fans by expressing his opinion on actors wearing blackface, which is considered unacceptable in today’s climate and regarded a mockery of African Americans.

Williams is best known for his roles in the movies “Star Wars” and “Lady Sings the Blues.” He joined comedian Bill Maher’s podcast “Club Random with Bill Maher,” where they discussed British actor and film star Laurence Olivier wearing blackface in the 1965 film “Othello.”

The history of blackface dates back to minstrel shows in the mid-Nineteenth century, when white actors darkened their skin with shoe polish or a burnt cork, exaggerated their features, and wore tattered clothes to portray black people.

Billy Dee Williams’ comments about actors wearing blackface are sparking outrage online. (Photo: @therealbillydee / Instagram)

According to the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture, it was the first minstrel to introduce he imitated slaves living on southern plantations and portrayed them as lazy, ignorant, cowardly, or hypersexual.

Maher smoked marijuana while Williams, 87, sipped a glass of wine and a Colt .45 during the interview. Williams admitted that Olivier was also criticized for being “physical and doing things with his voice,” but when he saw Olivier as Othello, he thought it was funny .

“When he did Othello, I cried with laughter,” Williams recalled. “He stuck his ass out and walked around with his a—, you know, because black people are supposed to have big butts. …I thought it was hysterical. Love it. Love it. I love this kind of stuff.”

After Maher said actors couldn’t afford to wear blackface today, Williams pushed back and said that as performers, they need to have the option to play any role they need.

“If you’re an actor, you should do whatever you want,” he said. “As an actor, whatever you think you can do, you should be able to do it.”

Hollywood Unlocked shared clips from interview on Instagram, and fans welcomed Williams’ comments.

“He got old and now he just talks like that.” recorded one fan. “Sir, this is not the 19th century,” one other added. “Man, please… stop already. This is America!!!!”

“It’s crazy how old heads have gone soft in the face of disrespect towards their community. This is not the era of minstrel shows, nobody should feel comfortable in that shit. he replied one fan, while others joked that “the Dem Colt 45 beers impressed him the most.”

Other fans were just completely happy to learn that “What We Have Here?” the creator was still with us, but some weren’t surprised considering Williams “did an interview a few weeks ago where he said he was a brown actor, not a black actor.”

During Black History Month this February appeared on “The View,” where co-host Sunny Hostin asked about his experience working in Hollywood as a black actor.

“So you actually came out, as Whoopi (Goldberg) said, in an industry where there were very few people of color on TV and in movies,” she said, before Williams interjected, “Everyone is a people of color.”

Sunny replied, “Yes, well, a black man,” to which Billy corrects her, stating, “Well, a brown-skinned man.”

It’s almost secure to assume Williams was also interested in Robert Downey Jr., who wore blackface in 2008’s “Tropic Thunder.”

The film faced backlash at the time over Downey’s character, Kirk Lazarus, a cocky Australian actor dedicated to his craft who insisted on wearing an afro while adopting brown skin for the role. Producers defended the use of blackface in the film, saying it was satire – a form of humor that uses mockery to criticize human stupidity or views equivalent to racism.

Downey claimed that along with his performance, for which he received an Oscar nomination for best supporting actor, he wanted to show “tropes that are wrong and have been perpetuated for too long.”

The film’s director and star is also Ben Stiller defended this in X, stating that he “makes no apologies for Tropic Thunder. I do not know who told you that. Since its opening, this film has all the time been controversial. I’m proud of it and the work everyone did on it.

‘This is not the era of the Minstrel Show’: Billy Dee Williams sparks online outrage after saying he doesn’t mind if actors do blackface


This article was originally published on : atlantablackstar.com
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LaMelo Ball Charlotte turns heads as she arrives at the game in Scooby-Doo’s “The Mystery Machine.”

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LaMelo Ball, LaMelo Ball Charlotte Hornets, LaMelo Ball Mystery Machine, Scooby Doo Mystery Machine, Scooby Doo, theGrio.com

CHARLOTTE, N.C. (AP) – Say what you’ll about Charlotte’s LaMelo Ball, but there isn’t any denying the 2022 NBA All-Star has a mode all his own.

The Hornets point guard turned heads on Thursday night when he I drove as much as the Spectrum Center for the team’s game against the Detroit Pistons in a colourful Hummer a reproduction of Scooby-Doo’s “Mystery Machine” – only rather more expensive than the one Shaggy and Velma rode in the kid’s cartoon.

Ball, a lover of enormous dogs, promoted the release of his Scooby-Doo x Puma MB.04, which might be released on November 27.

Ball wore vivid, multi-colored Puma shoes during warm-ups after which become vivid orange shoes for the match.

After the Hornets won 123-121 in extra time, Ball said he liked how his rental equipment was dressed up.

Ball, nonetheless, stopped in need of saying he might try to purchase one, joking, “I already have a Hummer, so I wouldn’t even bother.”

This article was originally published on : thegrio.com
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Angelina Jolie’s disturbing performance in new interview sparks criticism Years after health problems caused her face to sag

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Angelina Jolie promotes her next film, “Maria”, in which she plays the role of the famous opera singer Maria Callas.

However, for some fans, the press was more about Jolie’s health and appearance than her work in film.

On November 21, Jolie sat down with Michael Strahan for an interview on “Good Morning America” ​​to discuss her fear of using her real voice to sing opera for the role and the enjoyment of motherhood. However, in the course of the chat, some fans claimed they noticed Jolie’s face looked different than usual.

In the newest interview, Angelina Jolie expresses concerns about her health. (Photo: Gilbert Flores/Variety via Getty Images)

One person was cited by Express US for this story he said“It looks rough.”

Another commentator on Page Six he wrote“Ok, I just read that her face looks different because she stated that she developed hypertension and Bell’s palsy, a condition that she said caused her face to droop to one side. I assumed she looked like she had a stroke, in order that explains it.

Debates about Jolie’s sickly appearance erupted when fans noticed visibly large veins on her arms during separate red carpet appearances. Even those that knew her health were still shocked and anxious by her photos.

Jolie first revealed that she had the disease in 2017. In an interview with Vanity Fair she said he said she discovered she had hypertension and Bell’s palsy in 2016, the identical yr she filed for divorce from Brad Pitt.

So when she was diagnosed with the disease, she said she wasn’t sure what could have caused it. “I can’t tell if it’s menopause or if it’s just the year,” said Jolie, then 42. “Sometimes women in families put themselves last until it manifests itself in their own health.”

However, she also said that she is trying to pay more attention to her health. “I actually feel more like a woman because I make wise choices, I put my family first and I am responsible for my life and health. I think that’s what makes a woman complete.”

Last yr, the “Maleficent” star opened up again about her condition, revealing that it was caused by the stress of ending her relationship with Pitt.

In an interview with The Wall Street Journal, she said he said“My body reacts very strongly to stress. My blood sugar levels go up and down. Six months before the divorce, I suddenly developed Bell’s palsy.

According to National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke“Bell’s palsy is a neurological disorder that causes paralysis or weakness on one side of the face. It occurs when one in every of the nerves that control the facial muscles becomes damaged or stops working properly, which may cause the facial muscles to droop or sag.

This article was originally published on : atlantablackstar.com
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“The Honorable Shyne” is a hit. This is why I wanted to tell this story. — Andlandscape

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One of the primary reasons Andscape culture author Justin Tinsley and I were tapped to co-executive produce was our backgrounds as music journalists. The documentary chronicling Moses “Shyne” Barrow’s rise to fame, imprisonment, and re-emergence as a political leader suits firmly into our wheelhouse, as his best rap years got here within the early 2000s – right at the center of our hip-hop fandom. I donated my time helping with the documentary, which was a top ten show in its debut week on Huluas a likelihood to help tell the story of hip-hop. I got here away from the project with an understanding of a man in conflict, at odds with himself and his past, and wanting to forge a path forward.

Shyne’s story illustrates the American dream: a poor black immigrant comes to America and from nowhere becomes one in all the largest rap stars. It is also a story about how the American criminal justice system and music industry chew up and spit out so many young Black people. To carelessly follow Shyne’s story is to consider him as just one other young black man who fell into a bad situation and never recovered. After all, his rap profession was effectively derailed when in 2001 he was sentenced to ten years in prison for the 1999 shooting at Club New York in Manhattan. But what inspired me about Shyne’s story was his refusal to let this devastation define him.

In 2021, I hung out in New Orleans with former No Limit rapper McKinley “Mac” Phipps, who had just been released from prison after spending 21 years in prison for a murder he denied committing. As I listened to Shyne’s story, I considered Mac. Both were avatars of a system that tested rap as much because it tested individual men. Mac’s story was about how hip-hop lyrics may be used to accuse someone within the face of overwhelming evidence of their innocence. Similarly, Shyne’s trial created a sensation about hip-hop’s relationship to violence in a city hungry for head on a plate.

Both Shyne and Mac emerged from prison as completely different people than once they entered. In Mac’s case, it was the period of time he spent at home, during which he transformed from a teenage rapper into a man after 20 years spent in confinement. For Shyne, his transformation got here from faith when he converted to Orthodox Judaism in prison. When I have a look at people like Shyne and Mac, I wonder how they’ll survive being locked in a cage, and their answers are inspiring.

While Shyne’s rap stories are what drew me to this project, it’s his journey as a man that makes me proud to help tell his story. And we actually get to see that journey after he raps the ultimate bars of his rap profession.

Shyne got here to the film wanting to discuss his lowest moments – the time after his release from prison in 2009, when he lashed out, frustrated at seeing a latest crop of rap stars emerge within the void left by his absence. He was rudderless. As rudderless as anyone may be who has lost a decade to a prison system that wanted to destroy him. And much more, since it was closed when the superstar’s fame was on the tip of his fingers.

The raspy-voiced rapper could have let these mishaps define him, but that is where Shyne’s story resonates with everyone, whether or not they’re a rap fan or not. Shyne’s second act, the one through which he finds purpose in community and family, where he uses his innate charisma and true genius to turn out to be a political leader and motivational speaker.

I cannot discuss Shyne’s reappearance without mentioning Sean “Diddy” Combs. Combs, the disgraced hip-hop mogul who signed Shyne to his label Bad Boy Records and helped launch his profession, is the elephant within the room throughout the documentary and in Shyne’s life. So lots of the artists who emerged under Diddy – from G Depp and Mase to The Notorious BIG – suffered terrible consequences. Shyne’s name was all the time on the list because he spent ten years in prison. And yet, Shyne’s approach to healing and moving forward is as inspiring as his ability to overcome what he sees because the sabotage of his life and profession.

These are lessons I didn’t expect to learn from the stories in regards to the hip-hop star from my childhood. These are inspiring moments that can be of interest to those that haven’t yet turn out to be inquisitive about the Brooklyn, or somewhat Belizean, rapper featured within the documentary. These are the points that make me proud to be a a part of telling Shyne’s story.

DavidDennis Jr. is a senior author at Andscape and the creator of the award-winning book “The Movement Made Us: A Father, a Son, and the Legacy of a Freedom Ride.” David is a graduate of Davidson College.

This article was originally published on : andscape.com
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