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News Flash
Tickets on sale now for our Philly Premiere Thursday June 14 at the Pearl Theater Click here. |
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Click here to listen to our Director Kevin Williams' interview on the Michael Eric Dyson Show. |
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Click Here for a Preview of our film in the Washington Post. |
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Click Here to watch Christian Broadcasting Network's Jennifer Wishon's interview with our Director, Kevin Williams. |
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Click Here to watch Al Jazeera's Inside Story, devoted to Fear of a Black Republican. |
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Where Have You Been?
Well, to answer that question, all I can say is that we’ve been spending the last few months recovering, planning and taking some time to figure out FEAR OF A BLACK REPUBLICAN’s road in the future. The last few months since our Northwest Premiere (and Occupy Portland/Wall Street Riot) and our New Jersey/Hometown Premiere have been very busy for us little, independent filmmakers.
Thankfully, we’ve been interviewed by some national publications and hopefully, those stories will be published in the coming weeks. We’ve had the good fortune to receive more Screening requests from around the country and we are working on making them happen. Californians… we will be coming, trust me!
First off news-wise, we will be holding our “Nation’s Capital Premiere” (with former Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele in attendance for the Q&A) on Thursday, March 22 nd at 7 PM; and a second Screening/Q&A on Friday, March 23 rd at 11 AM. Our venue of choice is the great “E” Street Cinema. There is a nice, inexpensive (compared to NYC and Philly) Colonial Parking Garage around the corner that offers Validation for E Street Cinema-goers. The Metro is also very close by. We hope to duplicate our recent successes and make our mark “Nationally” by screening in the center of U.S. Politics, Washington, D.C. This City is also Michael Steele’s hometown, so that makes it a little extra special. Should be a great couple of days, so please join us if you can. FEAR OF A BLACK REPUBLICAN will also be screened (in part) as one of the three featured Seminar at the annual and prestigious Dorchester Conference in Seaside, Oregon. This Conference is a THE gathering of politically-minded folks in Oregon. From their website, "Dorchester IV marked the first year the conference began attracting nationally recognized speakers when Governor George Romney, a presidential candidate, became the keynote speaker. Over the years, Dorchester has hosted luminaries such as Ronald Reagan, George H. W. Bush, Nelson Rockefeller, Jack Kemp, Elizabeth Dole, Karl Rove, William Kristol and Gale Norton." Pretty impressive company for sure. We are very proud to be a part of it and we thank the Portland State University College Republicans and the Dorchester Conference for including our film. We’ll have more "movie" stuff soon Blog-wise, but we do want take a moment to wish C.L. Bryant and his film RUNAWAY SLAVE well on their big night. I’ve only seen their movie trailer, but it looks to be a powerful and interesting film. We wish them the best! Finally, a big THANK YOU to Everyone we met at the Conservative Political Action Conference a few weeks ago. The response we received to our film was more than we hoped for. It was great to meet other artists who happen to be Conservative and so many people who just love films. It was also quite nice to find such a welcoming attitude and get so many good questions about our challenging film. There were A LOT of folks at CPAC who want to see the Republican Party do a better job at outreach and “Party-building” without changing their message. An interestingly enough, we got this from a lot of non-Black Republicans. We did expect that attitude though. As folks can see in our film (and its just simply part of the story, not propaganda), that "Party-building" goal is achievable. Hopefully, we’ll get to see a lot of these same folks in the coming year at a Screening or they'll buy our DVD. As Yoda wisely said to Luke Skywalker in THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK, “Do. Or do not. There is no try." BTW, if you’ve seen FEAR OF A BLACK REPUBLICAN and care to share your comments – we have an Audience Reaction page here. Your e-mail address will not be displayed, but your thoughtful reactions to our film sure will. Sorry we didn’t get this up sooner, but please do check it out now. Also, please check out our new Presidential Election trailer if you haven’t seen it already. Thanks for reading, Kevin J. Williams Director/Co-Producer,
FEAR OF A BLACK REPUBLICAN
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What Are The Chances (Part 3 of 3) or Apocalypse... Now? |
 Portland State University however, was a small oasis in downtown Portland. A State-funded University, it is part traditional college, part commuter school, part urban office complex. Thirty-thousand students attend PSU and the school has its own chapter of the College Republicans, led by a charismatic and energetic young woman named Julia Rabadi. Julia is President of the PSU College Republicans and she put this screening together after one of her members, Isaiah Taylor, found out about our film from the original piece I wrote for Big Hollywood. It took about six months to put this Screening together mainly due to PSU’s summer break. But nonetheless, these great young students were affording us the chance to not only make our first “College” Screening happen, but also our Northwest and West Coast Premiere.
We wanted a great and diverse crowd. Having our film play in an academic setting in a completely different part of the country (2,877 miles from Trenton), I couldn’t wait to start the film for the PSU audience. I had thought a good omen came about when I first arrived at PSU, put my bags on the ground and was promptly asked by a young man to sign his petition “against millionaires and billionaires.” I told him that I didn’t live in Portland, but would be happy to talk to him more after our Premiere and handed him one of our FEAR OF A BLACK REPUBLICAN postcards. He was stunned, in a good way. I think this had to do with my telling him that Cornel West and Mitt Romney were in the same film, as I mentioned our cast. Still speechless, he put the postcard on his clipboard and ventured off. Twenty minutes later, I would meet a PSU College Republican named… “Michael Steele.” Yes, his real name.
One note on the College Republicans and PSU. From the get-go, the PSU College Republicans wanted to open this Screening up to the greater Portland community and they even tried to partner with other on-campus groups to do all this. On my travels around the campus, it was very heartening to see our FEAR OF A BLACK REPUBLICAN posters in the windows of so many of other student organizations, particularly the various minority student groups. Hope for the future, I thought. Fortunately for me, Julia gave me a list of the different Academic Departments which I should visit before the Screening. I dropped by the History, Political Science Departments and had a nice, quick meeting with Dr. E. Kofi Agorsah, Chair of the Black Studies Department. He took some of our movie postcards to give to his upcoming class of students and said he would encourage them to attend our Screening that night. Thank you, Sir!
The only personally negative moment of the whole trip came when I went to lunch at an interesting vegetarian/locally-grown food café at the PSU Student Union called FOOD FOR THOUGHT. I’ve been trying to eat more healthfully for a while now and thought that I should give FOOD FOR THOUGHT a shot. So I went to the counter and ordered my food and chatted with their Manager who, it turns out, has some New Jersey connections. Having had such a nice conversation, I figured what the heck – I’ll ask if I could put some postcards on the counter for our Screening. The Manager said “yes,” and I put about 20 FEAR OF A BLACK REPUBLICAN postcards next to the register. The place was jumping with customers. Given Portland’s image and what I heard about the lack of tolerance that the PSU College Republicans had been subjected to, I considered this little moment a positive achievement. Well, it wasn’t even five minutes before one of their customers (a White, brown-haired hippie-chick with a hemp messenger bag and a bad attitude) went up to the counter (WITHOUT BUYING ANYTHING) and slid all of our postcards into her hemp bag. Then ran off. God knows what else was in that hemp bag with all of our poor, little postcards. I was standing about ten feet away from her, on the other side of the counter, when this happened and I couldn’t catch up to her. She must have ran track in high school or ran drugs for the Latin Kings or something. I have no idea how she even knew our postcards were on the counter as she just zipped in, swiped them and left. Wow. At least my lunch was good.
 Finally, the Screening at the Portland State University Multi-Cultural Center came.
The Screening itself went great and was quite fun to be a part of and observe. The College Republicans put out a great light refreshment and food table for everyone with lemonade, ice water and many healthy and usual “college” snacks. Excellent job, PSU Food Services! One funny thing I’d like to share is that in addition to the fifty or so people who came to the Screening, there were many foreign students for whom English is not the first or second language who showed up and gorged on the free food. While they may not have understood our film, it was neat to see that college students haven’t changed. Free food is free food. I remember those days well. ; )
Technically, the Multi-Cultural Center’s screening space was very good for a wide and open conference room. It had carpeting on the floor, a good projector on the ceiling and nice P.A. speakers in the back. Watching the audience from the back, I could tell that they were “getting” the film and were as so many other audiences – fully engaged. All except the one hard-core “I’m a Conservative, not a Republican” type who I guess has some kind of attention deficit issue and who kept checking his e-mail from the second row. It finally got annoying enough about twenty minutes in, that I went up to him and asked him to do it somewhere else or consider leaving. It is rude to do that during a movie anywhere, whether I am the filmmaker or another audience member. He put away his I-Phone and I got thanked by several audience members as I moved to the back of the room. Later on, he came to the very back of the room to turn on his laptop and work on it. Weird. Thankfully, there was a nice moment occurred just before this when a young, White female student’s jaw dropped and she blurted loudly (by accident) “Is that true?” when she found out that the Ku Klux Klan was co-opted by the Democratic Party in 1868. I’m pretty sure that she was convinced it was the Republicans who did this. Like so many. Truth can be painful…
The Q&A produced some cool and moving moments like the young, White Ron Paul guy connecting with an older, female African American “99%-er” (her button said she was one of them) over the issue of whether the Republican Party should have special messages for separate demographic groups. She conversed with him during the Q&A from the front row about the Republican Party just showing up in her community, whether she agrees with their positions or values or not. I think they ended up in some type of agreement on this and with the young guy saying that he wanted to bring the “Liberty” message to the urban areas. This civil exchange of views was worth this 2,877 mile trip alone. I did get some good, tough questions on Michael Steele’s time as Chairman, the Southern Dixiecrats (had to correct the history presented on this by the questioner), the Media, social issues campaigning, getting our film made and “out there” into the World and how both Parties do not always know or care to know where/how they are rallying their troops. I even got to sing a few bars of Garth Brooks, “Friends in Low Places” when I told the audience about a 2004 Bush rally in New Jersey where the organizers played Country music the most of the time we were there. Fortunately, no one threw tomatoes at me.
One African American lady did catch me by surprise when she spoke of how much racism existed in Portland and especially Oregon. She said that “Oregon is the South of the Northwest.” The “99%-er” agreed with her wholeheartedly. I said that the state is well-known for being “Progressive.” From these ladies, I got the sense that there are probably two Portlands and two Oregons. Just like there is in most parts of Urban America. One of them actually used the “n-word” in describing her treatment at times. Obviously, I’m not knowledgeable enough about Oregon to comment, but that was a first for a FOABR Screening.
The night ended with a number of folks wanting my e-mail address, many thank-you's for making the film and really getting these issues out there, lots of handshakes and plenty of smiles and encouragement. It wasn’t a great crowd for selling DVDS since hardly anyone outside of downtown Portland could make the Screening. This was because many of the streets and some of the major bridges were shut down because of the Occupy Portland riot. I heard too many helicopters and police/ambulance sirens to expect a packed house. But, a few of the African American supporters of Occupy Portland did show up and went out of their way to tell me they were happy that our film was “straight-up” and didn’t “Democrat-bash” the whole time. They said they were definitely not expecting a movie or night like this night. I wasn’t either. Hopefully, we’ll make it back to Portland with FEAR OF A BLACK REPUBLICAN someday.
I’ll close with something from the heart, more than from the head. Given all the challenges facing our even making this film and now getting it out there into the World, Occupy Portland and their riot wasn’t the biggest challenge we faced. But, having “gotten through” to another very diverse audience (age, ethnicity, political affiliation) in an academic setting, this Screening is amongst our proudest. Hope was renewed yet again, especially in partnering with the PSU College Republicans and seeing their outreach pay off against the odds.
I just wish I could get those darn helicopters and The Doors’ “The End” out of my head…
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What Are The Chances (Part 1 of 3) |
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The past four weeks have been an incredible journey for our film and for us. As I write this, I am at 37,000 feet in a jet airplane over Northern California. Hopefully, we land in San Francisco in one piece. The Beastie Boys classic, LICENSE TO ILL, is cranking on my Kelly green I-pod.
During the last few weeks, we have screened FEAR OF A BLACK REPUBLICAN in Buffalo NY, Rochester NY, our hometown of Trenton NJ with Michael Steele and just last night at Portland State University in Portland OR. These screenings in these cities could not have been more different, yet similar. Most important in the bigger scheme of things, we've kept the ball moving and are building some momentum.
After a beautiful late fall drive to northwestern New York State, we finally arrived in a cold, raw Buffalo. In Buffalo, we found a city that was mainly indifferent to itself and to our film. It was incredibly hard to gain any Media traction in Buffalo, which was surprising since it has a good-sized African American population. We did well gaining interest and coverage in Buffalo’s main Black newspaper, The Challenger. Unfortunately for them and us, their printing press broke down on the day of its issue (which had a 4-Star Review of our film). Alright, it was some bad luck. What can you do, right?
Buffalo gave us our first share of White hard-core Liberals who couldn’t wait for the Q&A to come, for the chance to have a good argument. When the lights came up though, they were rather muted, with very few questions and no nasty comments. Except one woman, who came in late and was very disappointed that our film wasn’t more like a Michael Moore film (apparently, she is a big fan). And a man who wanted to know why I don’t start a third Party. We don’t consider that an option for us. We want our Republican Party to do better. Soon. All in all, the Republicans, Conservatives, Democrats, Independents and Liberals really liked the film. Even if they weren’t sure that they would when they bought their ticket at our screening space, The Squeaky Wheel.
The Q&As were lengthy and informative both ways (as we want it to be). We also learned that our film plays well for the intoxicated. At one of our Buffalo screenings, we had a few guys show up who were definitely “three sheets to the wind.” However, they were highly intelligent and still “got” the film. Even though they had “beer goggles,” they enjoyed what they saw and got a lot from it.
A big, tough lesson was learned in Buffalo: If we don’t know someone in a place or have a “built-in” audience where we are screening, the going will not be easy at all. At our level, we don’t have the budget or firepower to make the Media and their Viewers/Listeners/Readers take notice and hear/receive our message – then come out to see our film.
In Rochester, we had a much different experience. We had a great ally in Chaplain Ayesha Kreutz and a “built-in” audience - the Frederick Douglass Foundation of New York. We also got a little bit more Media interest. It took some work and extra personal appeals, but because we had some peeps in Rochester (unlike Buffalo), we got the big newspaper (the Chronicle & Democrat) to give us at least a mention and also scored a short radio interview with the big Conservative talk show host in town, Bob Lonsberry.
As a result, the Rochester Screening went much better for the FOABR team. The screening went great, the Q&A was excellent and we sold a higher than normal number of DVDs at the end. Also, we got a few invites to come back to Rochester in 2012. If these invites come through, we are there.
Post-Buffalo, we got a nice review in the student newspaper, the UB SPECTRUM. And we made the effort to go speak with the Occupation Buffalo folks (they are following us on Twitter). We stopped by their encampment, at a traffic circle with a monument honoring President William McKinley (who was assassinated in Buffalo in 1901), across from Buffalo City Hall. We wanted to get a sense where some of these “Occupation Wall Street” peeps are coming from. We agreed to disagree on most points and were glad to offer some historical perspective to them on where things are today versus the year 1968. 1968 and the events that occurred during it can teach the OWS folks a lot on what they DON’T want their movement to become in the future. IMHO.
No matter what... being able to say that we have met with some of OWS folks bodes well in interviews, conversations, etc. in helping to explain to those on the "other side" that we are open-minded and non-partisan filmmakers. The fact that we are who we are and don’t try to pretend to be something we aren’t is very effective. As long as the “word of mouth” on our film keeps building… 2012 should be a very good year for FEAR OF A BLACK REPUBLICAN. Cross your fingers…
Next: Parts #2 (Trenton and Michael Steele) and #3 (Portland, the College Republicans and the November 17th Riots).
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What Are The Chances (Or "My Hometown") Part 2 of 3 |
November 12th 2011 will be a day that we’ll never ever forget. For the best of reasons. Our New Jersey and Hometown Premiere in Trenton NJ with Michael Steele was everything we hoped for and 10X better.
But, before I get to the “Day-of,” I’d like to briefly touch on the wonderful week we had BEFORE the screening. We were very blessed to have some great coverage in our city’s two daily newspapers, the Trentonian and The Times, and the Princeton Packet and in Pennsylvania’s Bucks County Courier Times. Given the state of newspapers in the U.S. and their lack of staffing, getting such coverage for a “hometown” story isn’t easy or likely. We will always hold these publications in high esteem for helping us get the word out locally. Especially for an event in Trenton, when crime is on the rise and it gets tougher and tougher to draw people from the suburbs.
Finally, the Day of Judgment arrived and we had a lot of running around to do to get ready. This special night would include a Kick-Off Reception at the New Jersey State Museum itself. We’d never done something like this before. When we helped found and run the Trenton Film Festival, we had a great Events Producer and she ran the Show.
Well this time, we were very fortunate to have our good friend Murph manage this for us. We had to make some runs to Party City, Sam’s Club and a few other places to get all the party wares. Also, we had a number of good friends, neighbors, family and crew members give us a hand with the Reception and the Screening. One of our Aunts even made over 150 cookies for us and “Aunt Fern” made a good bunch as well. Our focus was on the setting up the Museum reception first as the Screening Auditorium still had a Native American Indians performance going on when we arrived. (In case you are near Trenton, there is a very moving 9/11 exhibit there). Our Producer, Tammy, Murph and Company got to work decorating and setting-up. Balloons, bunting, table favors, Martinelli’s and food. They also set up all the cool political campaign signs we collected over the years at the Museum Walkway.
The Reception was a great sight to see. The space was decorated in Red, White and Blue and the place was packed. We had some of our local politicians there, some of the Filipina Sisters from Villa Victoria Academy were there (and they got to meet Michael Steele) and there was a nice turnout by our fellow Trentonians, some Black Republicans from around the state and many people we had never met before.
Just walking around the room, it felt like that Wedding Scene in GOOD FELLAS. It was dizzyingly wonderful and at the speed of light. We tried to say “hello” to as many people as possible. Fortunately, two good friends made their way around the room and took a lot of pictures to capture the night.
Well, I now know what it is like at a “Movie Premiere” with a Star. When Michael Steele entered the room, it was as if George Clooney, Brad Pitt, Denzel Washington and Frank Sinatra showed up at the same time. All eyes turned his way. It was gratifying to see so many people wanting to meet him. (Especially the folks we knew from the “other side of the aisle.”) Michael was gracious and warm with everyone, taking pictures and chatting with as many people as possible. I wish we could have taken pictures of all the people taking pictures with Michael Steele. Plenty of smiles all around.
Finally, it was time to walk the hundred feet or so to the Auditorium and finally screening our film.
Entering the “Big Room” even after Jamaal and I had set it up hours earlier, felt a lot different ten minutes before the PLAY button would be hit on the DVD player. As nervous as I was up until this point, I was even more nervous now. Fortunately, Michael pleasantly rejected my several offers to let him speak before the film. We were better off just getting the movie started. After Tammy’s Welcome and Introduction, I was happy to welcome and pay tribute to John Harmon (our Moderator for the Q&A) who is President & CEO of the New Jersey African American Chamber of Commerce and Zachary Chester (now Councilman for Trenton’s West Ward). Both of these gentlemen were key in helping us get our film off the ground in ways they did not know until they saw the film this night. BTW, both men are Democrats whom we have known for years. Yes, we can all get along and help each other to succeed.
I finally got to also thank before our “hometown” crowd, our three integral Crew Members: Jeff Metzner, Cinematographer; Jamaal Green, Camera and Assistant Editor; and Rob Fowler, Final Cut Pro Consultant and Assistant Editor. Without all three of them and their contributions, our film would not be as it is today. I still feel bad about dragging Jeff and Jamaal to New Orleans in August, but I know they had a good time.
As the Credits came up and Michael Steele’s RNC Chairman Election Speech played, I had a moment behind the stage to think about this entire journey and what would happen during the Q&A. It has been special and thankfully, the rest of the night would be too. After we pulled the table and chairs out for the Q&A, Tammy, Michael Steele and I spent at least an hour answering questions and hearing reactions to our film. I’ll just say that we are very happy with how the audience took to the film and that Michael Steele rocked the house. About halfway through, he took over the Q&A as some many of the questions were directed towards him (we were VERY happy about this). The questions were thorough, challenging and well thought-out. I learned a lot from the Q&A myself. It was a great give-and-take with the audience and he had so much fun that he stayed well past his departure time. Well past. Michael is, as one Facebook friend (and hard-core Dem) said… “a Class Act.”
Eventually, the final end of the night would come and all would safely get home. We wouldn’t be able to celebrate for too long as I had to leave for Portland, Oregon in a few days, but we did make sure to enjoy ourselves. A night like this doesn’t come for every Filmmaker and this one is very happy it did in a little City by the Delaware River called Trenton.
Next up: What Are The Chances (Part 3 of 3) or APOCALYPSE... NOW?
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Some Great News, Some Awesome News and Some Not Good At All News |
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Today’s blog/update was originally intended to highlight some great news about our upcoming screenings in Buffalo NY on Wednesday October 26th, Thursday October 27th and Friday October 28th. Then late Friday, we got the word from the West Coast that we will make our Pacific Premiere at Portland State University in Portland, OR on Thursday, November 17th. Both of these screening events took a lot of work, hope, persistence and guts. Particularly our Portland State screening, which we’ll write about soon. Instead, events of this morning will have to take precedence over our great news.
Presidential Candidate Herman Cain
Republican Presidential Candidate Herman Cain appeared on two of the major news networks this morning. Watching Mr. Cain on Fox News Sunday and This Week on ABC this morning was inspiring. He did a great job in the Chris Wallace interview and in the Christiane Amanpour interview, handled the detailed, “ginsu-knife” (my phrase) questions on her note cards very well. We can all be proud of this man and what he represents for the Republican Party. Not just diversity, but competency, integrity, honesty, gutsiness and leadership. In late 2006, we were in the Atlanta area to follow and shoot the campaign of Catherine Davis for the U.S. Congress seat in the 4th District. Many, many people would ask… “Have you ever heard of Herman Cain?” or whether we were going to interview him for the film. Unfortunately, we had to say “no” at the time because we hadn’t heard of him yet and our Atlanta story was centered around Catherine. However, it was obvious that Herman Cain was someone to learn more about and follow since that time. All we can say is that Mr. Cain was a legend in the Atlanta area and this legend was told to us by both Black people and White people. It didn’t matter, he was going to be an important player in the Party someday. Little did we know back in 2006!
Presidential Candidate Rick Perry
Waking up to hear about another Presidential Candidate, Governor Rick Perry, and his hunting trips on a ranch with a rock painted with the word N*****head on it was deflating as heck. Obviously, someone held onto this story for a long time and waited for the right moment to leak or push it to the Washington Post in order to nail Perry bad. It is easy to suspect who might want to do this and why they would do this. Politics can be a dirty, dirty business if people want it to be. It can also be an inspiring, uplifting business if the player(s) involved do the right thing. No matter if or when the rock in question was there, Perry should have been removed the rock as soon as he learned of it and made sure it was gone for good. The bottom of a creek bed was probably the best place for this Rock of Prejudice. Now, we are all probably in for a week of the media going crazy with this and for so-called (read irrelevant) leaders making sure we know where they stand on the issue. But, outside of probably putting a fatal torpedo or two into Perry’s 2012 Presidential chances… what will the Rock of Prejudice really mean two weeks from now? Unfortunately, not much.
But another man, this one from Atlanta (not Texas) will be inching ever closer to the nomination of his Party for President of the United States. Whether he makes it there or not, won’t likely be up to him. It will be up to the army of researchers, reporters, bloggers and media-types on both sides of the aisle. Will they try to bring him down with old report cards? Will they try to make him look like the Ebonics-spouting fool they play him for on Saturday Night Live? (Funny, the same cast member played Michael Steele too… hmmm.) Let’s hope not… because whether Herman Cain wins or loses his Party’s nomination – we’ll all be the losers in the end if people other than the Voters decide.
NOTE: Herman Cain Photo by Gage Skidmore at CPAC 2011; Governor Rick Perry Photo Courtesy of Rick Perry.org
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