http://www.yahoo.com/entertainment/kasi-lemmons-black-representation-hollywood-julia-roberts-harriet-tubman-160014197.htmlThis story keeps coming up in the news and I don't know why. I mean, the attempt to foist this version of Harriet Tubman on us was a middling success. It wasn't a box office failure by any means, but it wasn't a film as widely embraced as I think Hollywood was expecting it to be. I'm skeptical of this Julia Roberts story and felt it was just put out there to create false outrage and drive black people and our 'allies' to the theaters to support the Harriet film.
Harriet also didn't do that well awards season and wasn't the film that got Cynthia Ervio her EGOT or even unanimous acclaim among us; she got that mostly from Hollywood, but not the black American masses. I wonder how she will attempt to get the Academy Award next, or if Hollywood will move on from her to someone else to another favorite. Even the Hollywood favorite Issa Rae's The Photograph isn't heating up the box office either. So there seems to be some issue with Hollywood putting out widely accepted black celebrities these days that they didn't have in the past. And I have to wonder if some of that is because of the focus now on non-American blacks/immigrant/first generation immigrant blacks who don't have that connection to black audiences here and don't, or refuse, to cultivate a relationship, or just assume a one-sided one based on skin color and the downplaying of ethnic/cultural differences.
