One of the most valuable possessions I own is Hattie McDaniel’s autograph. My great aunt gave it to my grandmother, who left it to me after her death in 2009.
McDaniel won the Oscar for her fine performance of “Mammy” in Gone with the Wind. It was the first time a person of color had won the award and it would take 25 years for another black actor to be honored (Sidney Poitier, Best Actor, 1964).
Such is the history of Hollywood awards from the Oscars to the Golden Globes,It could even be suggested that Hollywood represents the last bastion of Jim Crow in America. Jim Crow was the racial caste system that operated in America between the 1870s and the mid-1960s. Under Jim Crow, African Americans were relegated to the status of second-class citizens. Jim Crow represented the legitimization of racism.
The Oscars started in 1929, almost 15 years after Hollywood’s first motion picture, The Birth of a Nation, D.W. Griffith’s racist film adaptation of Thomas Dixon’s pro-South Ku Klux Klan novel, The Clansman. It was considered as the most anti-black movie ever produced. This was followed by the production of “blackface” movies in Hollywood. These were films in which white performers “blacked up” their faces with burnt cork, and then did minstrel show songs and skits littered with racist and stereotypical content.
No wonder it is difficult for black actors, producers and directors to be recognized for their talent in Hollywood. Consistently, African American people have left a considerable imprint on American culture. Yet there are still few roles for black actors.
Sure, Denzel Washington was named Best Actor for Training Day, but he won for his portrayal of a crooked cop. Yes, Halle Berry won the Best Actress award for Monster’s Ball, but she had to play a flawed woman who had a husband on death row and an obese child she beat incessantly.
The roles played by Jamie Foxx and Morgan Freeman in Ray, and Million Dollar Baby, respectively, were unique, but it still seems that there is a historic double standard regarding recognizing the contributions of African Americans in the film world with the same lens as whites.
–torrance stephens, ph.d.
Dr. Stephens is the publisher of rawdawgb.blogspot.com. You can find his books on Amazon.com and bboth.com
