everything has a reason: the Michael Richards outburst (2006)

Looking at some of John F. Kennedy's speeches, I got that feeling: this was our president.  Today's leaders can only represent half of us, and we seem to have little use for figures evoking bipartisan support: they write books like Chesley Sullenberger, give lectures like Valerie Plame.  Michael Jordan owns the Charlotte Hornets, among other business interests (and he reportedly likes to gamble).  Similarly, Henry Aaron, Cal Ripken and Derek Jeter stick to baseball.  Stephen King was an impressive critic, but seems to have retreated to fiction.  Mark Zuckerberg says, “start a company," Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos run theirs.  Most film stars are actually selective with political comments.

If success is hard, moral leadership might be hardest.  We know the checkered history of famous preachers.  David Letterman stumbled under the mantle of Paar, Allen and Carson.  Mel Gibson kept a lid on his considerable issues until The Passion of the Christ.  EDIT: add Lance Armstrong, Stephen Collins, Bill Cosby, Matt Lauer.

Roseanne Barr made an unlikely bipartisan leader.  A gay-rights pioneer, she became leery of the extremes of the modern Left, and is a Trump supporter.  Certainly, she disappointed her fans, this writer included, with her pathetic tweet.  

EDIT, 12 August 2018: This is why I usually avoid writing about recent events.  Roseanne now says she thought (Obama advisor) Valerie Jarrett was white, as if to excuse (arguably, this makes the tweet worse, an attempt to sneak by a racial insinuation).  As someone who enjoyed Roseanne (1988-97), I'd prefer to assume its star is experiencing mental deterioration, may she find the humility to fall silent. END  

At the same time, it’s hard to wake up every day on-thin-ice.  That truth informs the following piece, written in 2017, mostly about events of 2006.  (I'll return to Roseanne at the end of the post.)
 

Coded Race and the Richards Outburst

Ty Cobb was a charter member of the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1936.  He was also hypersensitive and a brawler, and the center of an anecdote that illuminates American racism.  On May 15, 1912, Cobb climbed into the stands in New York to beat up a disabled fan who’d called him a “half-nigger.”  (This incident seeded the idea of Cobb as virulent racist, a fabrication according to Charles Leerhsen, author of Ty Cobb: A Terrible Beauty (2015).) 

The 106-year-old anecdote seems very American: we’re still violent, racist and baiting each other.  Nevertheless, it benefits from annotation: in 1912, many considered race more essential than skin color or facial features, and the “one drop of blood” rule classed a person “black” if they had any black ancestry.  This attitude factored into American resistance to Darwinian science (the "Scopes monkey trial," creationism), in that Darwin suggests — in these terms — we’re all black.  The racist (of any color) is self-loathing.

The fan’s insult points to a question for media criticism: can a character’s race be coded?  The following recreates my own train of thought, and therefore may not be complete, while parts may have been covered by other writers (although searches yielded little, as noted below).  I'll focus on a single combination: white actors as coded black characters.

A knowledge of science fiction gives an advantage, e.g. Star Trek’s Spock has (traditional) Asian characteristics, layered with Leonard Nimoy’s Judaism (the Vulcan salute derives from rabbinical practice).  In the 1980s, at least one critic compared E.T.‘s appearance to that of starving African children, a then-current image in Western culture.  E.T. launched a cycle in which white leads befriend innocent aliens (Starman) or A.I. (Short Circuit).  Sometimes, a black actor plays the alien: Joe Morton in The Brother from Another Planet, Louis Gossett, Jr. in Enemy Mine, Damon Wayans in Earth Girls Are Easy. 

Any discussion of race and science fiction brings up Star Wars.  It's rarely mentioned that James Earl Jones was originally uncredited as the voice of Darth Vader.  Jones was known in 1977, and has a distinctive bass voice — everyone knew it was him, but he and George Lucas playfully left doubt.  Or maybe not playful, given accusations of racism aimed at the franchise, decades before Jar-Jar Binks. 

This may sound comically conspiratorial, but we get caught up in what was/wasn’t intentional.  Both Jones’s non-credit and the Chasing Amy parody distract from the obvious: Darth Vader is a “black villain,” with the voice of an African-American then known for provocative roles.  Jones played the first black president in The Man, and based-on-truth films paired him with white women: he played the Jack Johnson figure in The Great White Hope (Best Actor nod) and the paranormal witness in The UFO Incident. 

Like the black hat in a Western, Darth Vader at least nods toward an African-American villain, relatively rare in Hollywood’s sound era (if more evident than black heroes).  The end of 1983’s Return of the Jedi reveals a pale wretch, but the tickets and toys had been sold, concurrent to the extended tease that Anakin might be African (note also the CW’s short-lived Star-Crossed, about the Atrians).  Similarly, J.K. Rowling was a billionaire before declaring Hermione Granger black.  

Bo Derek was unknown when cast as an idealized female in 10 (1979), source of comic anxiety for Dudley Moore.  The 10 trailer pushes mystery: as we first see Derek with cornrowed hair, the narration says Moore “doesn’t know … where she comes from.”  Again, the implication is she’s not-quite-white, but in this case it’s tantalizing.  Derek soon filmed Tarzan, perhaps the most racialist English-language classic.

Like James Earl Jones, Boris Karloff was uncredited in the 1931 Frankenstein (the credits have “?” opposite “The Monster”).  Like Derek, Karloff was not well-known.  He was British (born William Henry Pratt) but had adopted a stage name that (ultimately) matched an intimidating creature, in an era when the Slavic enemy was often demonized.  Karloff reportedly had Anglo-Indian heritage — his skin was variously described as swarthy, yellow, etc. — he played the title villains in The Mummy and The Mask of Fu Manchu (both 1932).   

Race is a background theme in any Frankenstein narrative.  As the daughter of prominent intellectuals, Mary Shelley had lifetime exposure to debates about slavery.  Whether they admitted so or not, Europeans had to suspect Africans were their distant relatives.  Whereas Dr. Frankenstein tries to abandon his sudden kin, whites enslaved Africans — both were hounded by judgment.

We’ve had media criticism exploring race (gender, class) for at least 50 years.  It’s hard to know if it’s doing more good than harm.  At times the writer (or reader) oversimplifies, or seems motivated by resentment or overcompensation.  In the remainder I try to locate understanding, if only for one person.

Michael Richards played Kramer on Seinfeld; he’s also known for his racist outburst/rant (in 2006) when confronted by a black heckler at a comedy club.  Richards’ famous role may have been a contributing factor.  Although originally based on a white man (Larry David’s former neighbor, Kenny Kramer), and sometimes characterized as a slacker (nut, "pod," hipster-doofus), TV’s Kramer has much in common with the “coon” stereotype of minstrel-show tradition, as described by sociologist David Pilgrim:
 

“The coon was portrayed as a lazy, easily frightened, chronically idle, inarticulate, buffoon. … The coon differed from the Sambo in subtle but important ways.  Sambo was depicted as a perpetual child … the coon acted childish, but he was an adult; albeit a good-for-little adult.”

(from the site of The Jim Crow Museum of Racist Memorabilia)

Like the coon, Kramer has distorted beliefs and comical fears, and penchants for wild schemes and fresh fruit.  Like the “Urban Coon” subtype, he’s a sharp dresser despite lack of conventional employment.  Admittedly, Kramer is smarter than typical.  Richards:

“The real key came about eight or nine shows in.  I had been playing Kramer as if he were slow-witted … Then I learned to play him as if he were blocks ahead of what everyone’s saying, and I had him.”    

There are various ways this argument may be misunderstood; for one, I am not defending abusive speech.  Granted, I will omit various Kramer traits and storylines, but even among other influences, the parallel seems clear.  I'm assuming any use of the stereotype was unconscious on the part of the white boomers producing the series (it would hardly have remained unremarked, otherwise).    

Like various plotlines, the casting of Richards plays into a race-bending subtext, in that he’s a large man with kinky hair.  In “The Fusilli Jerry,” Kramer errantly receives “ASSMAN” vanity plates, but soon adjusts to the persona.  In “The Wig Master,” circumstances leave him an evident pimp.  In “The Burning,” he’s an actor for a medical school, and is typecast as gonorrhea patient.  Kramer is an effortless seducer, a recovering gambling addict, and afraid of clowns (they wear whiteface).  He favors Cuban cigars; also Hennigan’s scotch, because it leaves no smell. 

Several misadventures involve skin and/or color: in “The Wife,” Kramer falls asleep in a tanning bed, after which he appears to be in blackface.  In “The Abstinence,” his home smoking-lounge damages his skin.  In “The Butter Shave,” the mistake is butter as tanning lotion.  In “The Chicken Roaster,” Kramer can’t sleep due to the brilliant (red) sign of a new Kenny Rogers Roasters.  After switching apartments, Jerry starts behaving like Kramer, but it’s Kramer who’s addicted to the chicken. 

According to Donald Bogle’s standard reference Toms, Coons, Mulattoes, Mammies, and Bucks: An Interpretive History of Blacks in American Films, the foremost screen-actor of coon roles was Stepin Fetchit, who was known for physical mastery —a Richards specialty — and being unfazed by criticism (when in character), also like Kramer.  Bogle notes two 1934 films: in The World Moves On, the character finds himself in the French Army — compare Kramer’s bumbling into jobs in “The Bizarro Jerry” and “The Summer of George.”  In David Harum, the character does dishes while soaking his feet — Kramer prepares salad in the shower in “The Apology.”  

Seinfeld was slow to address Kramer’s lineage, but what’s there connects.  In “The Nose Job,” he needs a jacket from the apartment of his mother’s imprisoned friend.  Elaine pretends to be the man’s daughter, “Wanda Pepper,” while Kramer poses as her fiancé.  The cover is blown when the building’s manager disparages Babs (Kramer’s mother) as “nasty,” a “drunken stumblebum” who’d typically get loud as she “drank Colt 45 from a can.”  (In the U.S., Colt 45 malt liquor is associated with African-Americans, as in ad campaigns with Billy Dee Williams and Snoop Dogg.) 

In “The Switch,” we meet Babs (Sheree North), a bathroom attendant who tells Kramer she has “two years clean.”  The episode ends with Babs discovered in bed with Newman, the unappealing postman.  Per traditional stereotypes, Babs is the sort who’d have sex with non-whites.  Considering all of the above, the buried implication is that Kramer is (part) black.  And regardless of origin, the surname cooperates, by suggesting “creamer,” thus a lightening in color.  (Coffee is a theme for Kramer, e.g., he’s hooked on café lattes.)  Finally, in Curb Your Enthusiasm‘s arc about a Seinfeld reunion (2009), Michael Richards fears he has (fictional) “Groat’s disease”; to raise his spirits, the Kramer-like Leon (African-American actor J.B. Smoove) claims to have Groat’s.  (Of course, the plan goes awry, giving Richards the chance to express anger respectfully.) 

The 1990s was a comeback decade for the coon, inspiring Spike Lee’s despairing Bamboozled (2000).  I’m suggesting neither moral equivalency, nor that Richards was victimized in any way.  Nevertheless, the sampling of a powerful stereotype could cause identity issues for the actor playing Kramer for a decade.  Turning the screw, the character became an icon to a young generation known for hypersensitivity to prejudice.  The actor would have to be the perfect cosmopolitan.  (Kramer’s first name is Cosmo.)  

Novelist Milan Kundera suggested vertigo is the fear of falling meeting the desire to fall.  In 2006, Michael Richards lived a white-American nightmare, but he received compensation: in addition to affirming his own whiteness, he no longer had to fear ruining his career with a racist outburst.  This payoff becomes more tempting if the career is essentially over. 

Given an imperfect memory, I recall one critic citing a coded black character: in Planet of the Apes as American Myth, Eric Greene discusses the title character in Edward Scissorhands.  (I was unable to find references to Kramer in this context.)  Apparently, for our talk of racism, we make the essentialist assumption that a white actor always plays an (entirely) white character.  We diminish the reefs; American race-consciousness is fathomless. 

afterword (2018)

  

I’ll attempt an updated conclusion, while planning to address these matters at greater length.  Also, please note that for various reasons, comments are disabled on this blog. I apologize to any who might otherwise have left (civil) comments. 

In his classic Wayward Puritans, Kai T. Erikson explained that a society gets the deviant behavior it expects.  Sometimes, we overreact: troubled by Quakers (1650s), the Puritan fathers banished these dissenters “on pain of death.”  The policy was “an invitation to disaster, for nothing could so satisfy the Quakers’ call to persecution as a chance to suffer on the gallows for the sake of conscience.”

This dynamic, definition-of-deviance vs. behavior, evolved because it strengthens the community, assuming a consensus majority.  The Puritan authorities prevailed, of course, until later centuries.  Today, we are precisely divided, as between those who consider Roseanne’s tweet deviant, and those more troubled by (what they consider) the overreaction. 

Like Michael Richards, Roseanne became wealthy and famous playing a working-class individual with poor boundaries.  As with Richards, we can assume some degree of identity whiplash.   Roseanne’s career wasn’t over, of course, she’d made a comeback.  In any case, she’s a 65-year-old, on medication, has profusely apologized, and she deserves a second chance.  (EDIT: No, she probably doesn't, in the absence of real contrition.) 

Our excess condemnation stems from the overarching myth addressed by Steven Pinker in The Blank Slate: “the idea that the human mind has no inherent structure and can be inscribed at will by society or ourselves” (page 2).  And in his preface: our “refusal to acknowledge human nature is like the Victorians’ embarrassment about sex.”  This becomes “the mentality of a cult,” with one inevitable result being “a ‘politically incorrect’ culture of shock jocks … emboldened by the knowledge that the intellectual establishment has forfeited claims to credibility in the eyes of the public.”

The mistake made by scientific writers, including Pinker, is to presume logic can ever hold sway, society-wide.  History suggests societies run on myths, not facts or logic (perhaps for the same reason no driver expects a terrible accident: reality is too much).  Even when we remold the community to be fairer than in the past, we must compensate with new myths ... or a stealthy return to old ones. 

Like good utopians, Americans are constantly declaring the end of old myths and customs, but with a fatal inability to agree on new (or newly strengthened) ones.  Our usual self-evaluations — tolerance, freedom, free markets, voting — don’t work here because essentially negative (don’t infringe on my rights), and too nearly-global to serve as national/cultural identity.  The syndrome helps explain the runaway wealth gap: even as traditional values fade, we value money. 

As Pinker implies, we are neo-Victorians, with speech taking the place of sex, and those with poor (verbal) impulse-control the “perverts."  This exchange leaves American racism as our primary existential threat.  Cracking down on speech is understandable: unlike systemic racism, we can (often) identify the guilty.  But it doesn’t seem to help, indeed, it may not be coincidence that mass incarceration paced political correctness.  As Van Jones comments in 13^th (1:22:30), criminal justice reform will trigger substitute abuses.  

There is nothing audacious about false hope.  We’re in bad trouble, and no one is coming to bail us out.      

   

Planet of the Apes (1968) 4 of 4

** this review contains spoilers (for one of the most-spoiled films) **

In the 1960s, the rules known as political correctness were in process, which makes some of the classic films of the era problematic for today's hypersensitive viewers.  For example: the original Planet of the Apes, one of the best films of the decade.

As Eric Greene establishes in his book Planet of the Apes as American Myth, this first film was less specifically racial than the series would become.  It begins with Taylor's (Charlton Heston) cynical, timely wish for something "better than man."  Unfortunately for him (and like co-star Roddy McDowall in the Twilight Zone episode of the same name), he finds that "people are alike all over" -- even when they're apes.

The film arguably satirizes liberals of its time: the apes are hairy, wear leather and live in commune-like villages.  Though divided by species and corresponding behavior (gorilla, chimpanzee, orangutan), all disdain humans, who therefore parallel old-line conservatives, with both (considered) bypassed by evolution.  

"You may not like what you find." 

Greene's book, brilliant as it is at times, is an index of how far we've fallen since 1968.  He ties himself in knots trying to lift the films and counter their dim view of humanity.  A good leftist and multiracial in heritage, Greene feels white people are almost entirely to blame (and not just historically), with reverse racism a (suburban) legend.  He answers white paranoia with equally far-fetched, utopian multiculturalism.

The recent Planet of the Apes reboot (Rise and Dawn) is similarly contorted. Rise wasn't bad, but Dawn is pointless: whereas the original films have no real heroes, Dawn founders as good and bad people interact with good and bad apes.  With the satire muddied, we might wonder why we're watching apes in the first place.  I suspect these neo-Apes films exist because younger viewers realize there's something of value in the originals, but prefer softened versions.

Fantasy is a natural for race themes; both racial tensions and fantasy concern our attraction to/fear of the other.  The early 20th century had tales of lost worlds and races culminating in King Kong (1933), viewed by some as an allegory of slavery.  Ralph Ellison answered H.G. Wells by claiming "the invisible man" as metaphor for the black experience.  If the original Apes film-cycle equates black people with apes, it's only because the white imagination has always done the same.  The fiction of speaking apes allows an interrogation of racial anxieties.  Given approaching white minority, perhaps a film will reverse the scheme.  (Some might enjoy seeing the current president as an orangutan, orange comb-over included.)

Planet of the Apes opened 3 April 1968, the day before Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated.  I'm not sure I've read a review that mentions this, probably because it might be misunderstood, but it must have made the transgressive film an especially dislocating experience.

As the narrative begins, the desiccated corpse of the human crew's sole female implies -- it's over.  The white -- uh, human race is over.  Taylor shouldn't mind, given his cynicism, but the story will reduce him to Biblical grief.

"She was going to be the new Eve."

Over the five-film series, it's revealed the ape power structure doesn't disbelieve human intelligence, they just want to cover it up.  This branches into struggles over evolution, speech, and literacy (both ape and human).  All of it seems to prefigure the furor over Barack Obama being "articulate" and then the "birther" conspiracy-thought.  With Obama's intelligence unavoidable, the matter of legitimacy got bumped to matters of birth and record-keeping.  Some think of the original film as embarrassing artifact.  It could've been made yesterday, if we had the courage of Arthur Jacobs, Franklin Schaffner, Michael Wilson, Rod Serling, Charlton Heston, Roddy McDowall, and Kim Hunter.

The above-named were over 40 in 1968.  Baby Boomers were more optimistic, but motivated by the fact every generation drifts back to the norms of that prior: we become our parents.  For Boomers, this meant intolerable hypocrisy.  Even as the Civil Rights Movement seemed to triumph, white Americans fled en masse to the (white) suburbs, and American men were sent to fight in a seemingly insignificant Asian country.

At home, a rebellious generation attempted to blow up the timeline with sex-drugs-rock-n-roll (and to a lesser extent, with bombs).  It didn't work, they had kids, and bent to whisper: "When you grow up you're going to make the world such a better place."  Making the world better means change, and so the new apes films must be different from the originals.  It feels like change.  

The Invasion (2007) 2 of 4

** contains increasingly severe spoilers, as noted **

This is the fourth film based on the 1955 Jack Finney novel The Body Snatchers.  The first two (and better two) were both called Invasion of the Body Snatchers.  The third was Abel Ferrara's 1992 Body Snatchers, which has its defenders.  I suspect this 2007 version will also become a cult favorite, especially if a director's cut is ever released.

The Invasion is also one of a series of fantasy remakes that fortified Nicole Kidman's bank account (The Stepford Wives, Bewitched).  Kidman plays a D.C. psychiatrist named Carol Bennell.  Her best friend and maybe-boyfriend is Ben Driscoll (Daniel Craig).  Much of the drama stems from Carol's efforts to reunite with her son Oliver, who's been taken to Baltimore by his father, Tucker, during a public-health crisis.

The main problem for the filmmakers is the familiarity of the subject matter, which is not confined to the four credited adaptions but encompasses the entire viral-horror subgenre.  The Invasion fails to distinguish itself, but it has a nice, chilly feel, and tries hard to provide the subtext essential to this kind of parable.

** moderate spoilers ahead **

The film shows an America guilty of divisions: just as Carol has split from her ex-husband, and her patient (Veronica Cartwright, also in the 1978 film) has a "volatile" relationship with her husband, so the broader nation is divided: when the space shuttle crashes, the story dominates the various cable news channels, reminding us of a modern U.S. that's united only by crisis.  (Listen closely and you'll hear a theory that the crash was intentional, which suggests that at least one astronaut was trying to save the nation from possession by alien spores.)

There are repeated references to psychiatric medications.  The filmmakers seem to have a grudge against Clonazepam (they carefully avoid the more familiar brand-name, Klonopin), although why Carol grabs an extra supply when she needs to stay awake is unclear.  Carol prescribes freely, even for little Ollie, who's having nightmares.  The suggestion is that we're using stopgap measures such as medications instead of resolving real problems. 

The most outspoken person in the film is a Russian diplomat who declares civilization a lie to distract from our competitive, animal natures.  Gently sparring with Carol, he asks if there's "a pill to make me see the world as you Americans do."  Carol contends that humans are still evolving, referring him to the work of renowned psychologists. 

This is the first of the four versions to be directed by a non-American, but if Oliver Hirschbiegel (he's German) was compensating by including a namesake in the story, it wasn't enough: he was replaced in post-production by the Wachowskis (The Matrix), who added lots of action, making the film into something a 21st century studio could understand.  The real problem here is not the direction or tone, though (or even that it was preceded by the 2005-06 series called Invasion), but that the film doesn't seem to know what it wants to say. 

** severe spoilers ahead **

One of the reasons for the success of the 1978 film by Philip Kaufman was that W.D. Richter's script cannily updated the tale with the trends of hedonism and pop psychology.  Arguably, the U.S. hasn't changed much since 1978, so there's less inspiration for a new film to draw on.  The exception is the increasing death-grip of our political correctness, which The Invasion lacks the nerve to mention.  Like its characters, this film is openly ambivalent about a collectivist world in which strong emotion is outlawed, and where peace breaks out all over (according to featured news reports).

Or maybe this is the point?  Maybe the non-American actors and director were trying to subvert a cherished text of American subversion?  Fair enough as a goal, but it doesn't seem to work here. 

Carol's ambivalence is signaled not just by her medicating but by her choice of Ben, a smooth Brit who doesn't change all that much once possessed by aliens.  Near the end, an exhausted Carol almost gives in, but continues fighting once the pod-people make clear her son, who's immune, won't be allowed to survive.  Maybe Carol has also seen the earlier films in this franchise, so like the audience, when told not to drop her guard or go to sleep, she's tempted to reply, "What, again?" 



 

Monster's Ball (2001) 1.5 of 4

EDIT 21 June, 2015: I wrote this review before knowing much about the recent madness in Charleston, S.C.  I apologize for the poor timing, especially to anyone who's read before this edit.  (I'm 50, and the realities of digital media don't come easily to me; I tend to forget how easy it is to edit the blog, for example.) 
These remain my views on the film, but right now they are trivial at best. 

The sitcom 30 Rock once did an episode in which Tracy Morgan's character made a "serious" movie, a piece of  autobiographical Oscar-bait about his troubled childhood.  This way-over-the-top film-within-a-film seemed to be a parody of the then-current movie Precious, the biopic about a young black woman who's been horribly abused for years.  Though I was a fan of 30 Rock at the time, I remember thinking the parody unkind. 
Precious was directed by Lee Daniels, who'd already co-produced Monster's Ball, and would go on to the current TV hit Empire.   Now that I've seen both those films, I can see exactly where 30 Rock was coming from.  At least Precious was apparently based on a true story, whereas Monster's Ball is just shameless manipulation, piling on misfortunes as if terrified we'll stop taking it seriously. 

Lee Daniels also put his name in front of The Butler.  All of these movies and more (The Help, 42) seem best suited for suburban white people, for guilt mitigation.  These movies do everything but take my hand and say, "Now you hush, chile.  Ain't nothin' to be afeared of , 'cause black folk is jus' folk, jus' like you."

** major spoilers ahead **

Monster's Ball was showered with awards, but to me this just proves again that certain topics paralyze the critical faculties: the Holocaust, race in America.  It's the story of a prison guard (Billy Bob Thornton) who falls in love with Halle Berry, after helping to execute Halle's ex-husband (Sean Combs), who'd abused her.  The guard had a racist upbringing, but fortunately both of their sons die violent deaths (within days of each other), which is quite an ice-breaker, and before you know it we get some admittedly steamy, interracial sex scenes. 

So yes, this is an interracial love story.  Barely.  It seems to me that a racist redneck finding redemption in the arms of Halle Berry is like the person who claims they can't be anti-Semitic because they love Jesus.
Then again, this movie was made in 2001, when we were all more innocent.