6/01/2004

No Coons & Buffoons

This is exactly what I'm talking about. The HBO film, Something The Lord Made, about a Black carpenter who helped to change medicine, is a much-needed alternative to the foolishness that is Soul Plane. It's not so much about Soul Plane necessarily being a bad thing...I still believe the potential for a really good satire is there. With the right script to make him "get in where he fit in," Snoop could be a good character actor. The problem is the lack of diversity. I just wish Something The Lord Made didn't come on HBO...or that I had HBO so I could watch it. Also, as an aside, while Stanley Crouch is venerating Bill Cosby and Vivien Jackson, as he should in this column, would it have killed him to mention Mos Def's rapping with in the context of non-buffoonery? As I have said before, for me, the fact that a person simply does not like hip-hop lessens any critique they may have. If a person can't admit or doesn't know when it's good, then what difference does it make when they say it's bad?