A larger than life Sidney Potier , confronted a bilbous SouthernSheriff, played b y Rod Stiger, “Heat of the Night” playing out.
II
The machinations as seen by these grizzled eyes, were empowered by an invisible “Chief”, calling the “shots” on this Afro American intruder, setting foot on a turf, antagonistic to the needs of the Sheriff and the entrenched boss, calling the shots on the one button single breasted pin stripped suited Northerner (a Justice Department Civil Rights envoy?)
III
Didn’t Eartha Kittt and Ethel Waters “ Cabin in the Sky” come to grips with Jim Crow in their idiomatic callings. Lena Horne’s “Stormy Weather” may have mirrowed the stoicism of the Southern rebs, not wanting to recognize the reality,embraced by the Emancipation Proclamation & the 20th CenturyCivil Rights Acts of L BJ.
Southern hospitality as seen by Margaret Mitchell in “Gone with the wind” Depicting a plantation life style, where flaunting the social mores is beyond reproach , the aristocratic caste system riddled with contradictions, is still playing out; the enduring fictions by Scarlet O’Hara and Rhett Butler living out their lies, all in view of Hattie McDaniel.. Scarlett’s larger than life maid.
IV
George Gershwin’s “Porgy and Bess” gave his interpretation of the minority struggle to transcend their “thirty lashes with a wet noodle”.Civilized living is hard to come by the caste system and sadism, is engrained in the Magna Carta, going back to 1066 and the abolishment of serfdom:, liberation, however still a “Long Voyage Home” (John Ford, “Duke, the Trojan Horse at USC)
Perpetuating the myths, may make life worth living for the few living out the lie, but for the rest, it may make the promise worthwaiting for, even though the Rodney King debacle, andsubsequent Watts riots demonstrate that patience is long waiting. That skin pigment still has a way to go…Bill Sstout, UCLA Daily Bruin editorial, 1945-6.
The city that never sleeps, July 16, 2013
