Entertainment

Black Film Festival Shifts Focus to Web as Options Expand

Published

9 years ago

June 12, 2015

In this Sept. 7, 2011 file photo, producer, director and writer Issa Rae, creator of the YouTube series “The Misadventures of Awkward Black Girl,” poses for a photo at her home in Los Angeles. As scrutiny continues over diversity in film and opportunities for African Americans in Hollywood, some black actors and producers are looking to another avenue where they see growth, the Web. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)

LUQMAN ADENIYI, Associated Press

NEW YORK (AP) — As scrutiny continues over diversity in film and opportunities for African Americans in Hollywood, some black actors and producers are looking to another avenue where they see growth — the Web.

Success stories like Issa Rae, whose “Awkward Black Girl” Internet comedy series was so successful she received a development deal with HBO, have opened the door for others who may have found more traditional avenues in Hollywood closed. So as the American Black Film Festival opened in New York this week for its 19th year, it has turned its focus to the Web.

“Degrassi” star Andrea Lewis is among those finding more exposure on the Internet. Used to being the only black person on set, when Lewis was not getting the roles she wanted, she decided not going to wait.

“Instead of wondering where the next opportunity can come, I said, ‘I am going to come up with it and do it myself,'” Lewis said.

She took to the Web with her comedy series “Black Actress,” sharing the narrative of black women trying to make it in the industry. The 10- to 20-minute episodes include the storyline of a young women going on auditions, woven in with real-life interviews from actresses such as Tatyana Ali and “Power” Naturi Naughton. They discuss the lack of significant roles offered, and the struggle to live creatively.

Lewis said she created “Black Actress” after she was introduced as the “urban one” by a cast member.

“I was seen as the black one on the set, not as a peer or another actor who is trying to work,” she said. “It was an uncomfortable experience for me and also for the others who were there.”

Now Lewis is writing, producing and acting on her own terms. She is working on three other Web series and a feature film with Jungle Wild Productions.

For her, the Internet offers “creative freedom and there is no gatekeeper on what you can put out with your team.”

Her show is featured as a part of the festival’s “2015 Web Originals” panel. Other events at ABFF, which runs until Sunday, include the New York premiere of “Dope” and a conversation with ABFF ambassador and “Empire” star Taraji P. Henson.

Jeff Friday, co-founder of the ABFF, said using the Internet and social media is an easy way for young actors and producers to get themselves out there and create content.

“You’ve got to try to take your own destiny in your own hands and there is no excuse now,” he said.

Rae, the creator and star of “Awkward Black Girl” and the HBO-ordered pilot “Insecure,” is joining Andrea Lewis and the creators of website BlackandSexy.tv, Numa Perrier and Dennis Dortch, for the panel “How to Create and Monetize a Successful Web Series.”

Rae said events like these are important at ABFF because “a lot of people don’t know how to get started and how to make money.”

Rae’s success comes after creating multiple web series and producing other projects with her company, Color Creative.

“I got into this industry initially as a fan and to be able to use my platform to support other up-and-coming artists that I am a fan of. That’s an ideal situation for me,” she said.

When she created her first Web series in 2007, her main concern was creating more roles for black women and creating content for the type of humor she enjoyed.

“I never thought that anyone would really pay to see my work online,” Rae said.

BuzzFeed actress and comedian Quinta Brunson, known as Quinta B., started with posting funny self-made videos on Vine and Instagram. Now she is making videos for a major media company on topics such as the perks of being short, the struggle to gain weight and the best free bread at restaurants.

She said she is able to express herself as a writer and comedian that she would not be able to do anywhere else.

“The thing I like the most about BuzzFeed is I do the kind of video where it’s just me being a person,” Brunson said, “especially as a black women, I appreciate the freedom to decide who I’ll be rather than being told who I will be.”

Friday said with ABFF’s focus on writing courses and producer panels, they are trying to create a close-knit African-American film and television community, so that successful black artists can share their secrets and make those coming up feel like they can make it.

“Ultimately we just want the people who are working in Hollywood to be more reflective of our audience,” Friday said.

By using the Internet and Web series, “once you have an audience Hollywood will come knocking.” Friday said.

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Entertainment

O.J. Simpson, 76, Dies of Prostate Cancer

Orenthal James (O.J.) Simpson, who rose to fame as a college football player who went on to the NFL and parlayed his talents in acting and sportscasting, succumbed to prostate cancer on April 10, his family announced.

Published

1 day ago

April 17, 2024

Oakland Post

Orenthal James (O.J.) Simpson. Wikipedia photo

By Post Staff

Born and raised in San Francisco, the Galileo High School graduate was recruited by the University of Southern California after he was on a winning Junior College All-American team.

At USC, he gained wide acclaim as a running back leading to him becoming the No. 1 pick in the AFL-NFL draft in 1969 and joining the Buffalo Bills, where he had demanded – and received — the largest contract in professional sports history: $650,000 over five years. In 1978, the Bills traded Simpson to his hometown team, the San Francisco 49ers, retiring from the game in 1979.

Simpson’s acting career had begun before his pro football career with small parts in 1960s TV (“Dragnet”) before “Roots” and film (“The Klansman,” “The Towering Inferno,” Capricorn One”).

He was also a commentator for “Monday Night Football,” and “The NFL on NBC,” and in the mid-1970s Simpson’s good looks and amiability made him, according to People magazine, “the first b\Black athlete to become a bona fide lovable media superstar.”

The Hertz rent-a-car commercials raised his recognition factor while raising Hertz’s profit by than 50%, making him critical to the company’s bottom line.

It could be said that even more than his success as a football star, the commercials of his running through airports endeared him to the Black community at a time when it was still unusual for a Black person to represent a national, mainstream company.

He remained on Hertz team into the 1990s while also getting income endorsing Pioneer Chicken, Honey Baked Ham and Calistoga water company products and running O.J. Simpson Enterprises, which owned hotels and restaurants.

He married childhood sweetheart Marguerite Whitley when he was 19 and became the father of three children. Before he divorced in 1979, he met waitress and beauty queen Nicole Brown, who he would marry in 1985. A stormy relationship before, during and after their marriage ended, it would lead to a highway car chase as police sought to arrest Simpson for the murder by stabbing of Brown and her friend Ron Goldman in 1994.

The pursuit, arrest, and trial of Simpson were among the most widely publicized events in American history, Wikipedia reported.

Characterized as the “Trial of the Century,” he was acquitted by a jury in 1995 but found liable in the amount of $33 million in a civil action filed by the victims’ families three years later.

Simpson would be ensnared in the criminal justice system 12 years later when he was arrested after forcing his way into a Las Vegas hotel room to recover sports memorabilia he believed belonged to him.

In 2008, he received a sentence of 33 years and was paroled nine years later in 2017.

When his death was announced, Simpson’s accomplishments and downfalls were acknowledged.

Sports analyst Christine Brennan said: “… Even if you didn’t love football, you knew O.J. because of his ability to transcend sports and of course become the businessman and the pitchman that he was.

“And then the trial, and the civil trial, the civil case he lost, and the fall from grace that was extraordinary and well-deserved, absolutely self-induced, and a man that would never be seen the same again,” she added.

“OJ Simpson played an important role in exposing the racial divisions in America,” attorney Alan Dershowitz, an adviser on Simpson’s legal “dream team” told the Associated Press by telephone. “His trial also exposed police corruption among some officials in the Los Angeles Police Department. He will leave a mixed legacy. Great athlete. Many people think he was guilty. Some think he was innocent.”

“Cookie and I are praying for O.J. Simpson’s children … and his grandchildren following his passing. I know this is a difficult time,” Magic Johnson said on X.

“I feel that the system failed Nicole Brown Simpson and failed battered women everywhere,” attorney Gloria Allred, who once represented Nicole’s family, told ABC News. “I don’t mourn for O.J. Simpson. I do mourn for Nicole Brown Simpson and her family, and they should be remembered.”

Simpson was diagnosed with prostate cancer about a year ago and was undergoing chemotherapy treatment, according to Pro Football Hall of Fame President Jim Porter. He died in his Las Vegas, Nevada, home with his family at his side.

He is survived by four children: Arnelle and Jason from his first marriage and Sydney and Justin from his second marriage. He was predeceased son, Aaren, who drowned in a family swimming pool in 1979.

Sources for this report include Wikipedia, ABC News, Associated Press, and X.