Green Book

Dolores Vallelonga and Tony Lip on their wedding day

Tony Lip

Tony Lip and Johnny Mathis, 1959

Tony Lip with Joe DiMaggio, 1964

Tony Lip

Don Shirley, 1970

Don Shirley, 1959

Don Shirley, 1965

Don Shirley at his home above Carnegie Hall in 1979

GREEN BOOK                      B                    

USA  (130 mi)  2018  d:  Peter Farrelly

There will be a day sometime in the near future when this guide will not have to be published.  That is when we as a race will have equal opportunities and privileges in the United States.  It will be a great day for us to suspend this publication for then we can go wherever we please, and without embarrassment.

 —excerpt from forward in the 1948 edition of The Negro Motorist Green Book, published yearly from 1936 to 1966

This appears to be the feel-good Christmas movie of the year, as the holiday finale is a warm tribute to family and good friends, the culmination of what is otherwise a wrenching ordeal to experience.  Inspired by true events, using the historical model of films like Jeff Nichols’ Loving (2016) or Ana DuVernay’s Selma (2014), black figures are placed center stage in an attempt to emphasize their contribution to American black history, which in this film includes Don Shirley, a relatively obscure classically trained black pianist turned jazz musician who toured the Deep South in the midst of the Jim Crow era of the early 1960’s, prior to the passage of major Civil Rights legislation, suffering the indignities and humiliation of how blacks were treated in that time, despite providing world class entertainment onstage.  This film is receiving its fair share of criticism for adding the white perspective of Tony Vallelonga, aka Tony Lip, who worked as a bouncer in various New York City night clubs, rubbing elbows with the stars, developing a reputation for “getting the job done,” recommended by the record company to accompany the maestro on tour, basically providing the muscle needed when the inevitable racially volatile situation arose, as someone used to dealing with violent confrontation was needed.  While the film is immensely appealing, much of it is due to Viggo Mortensen and his amazingly challenging Brando-esque performance (he put on 50 pounds for the role), where brawn over brains is not only highlighted but emphasized, actually dominating and overpowering the performance of Mahershala Ali (from 2016 Top Ten List #1 Moonlight) as Shirley, who is essentially the central historical figure.  This may do the artist an injustice, as Hollywood films portraying black heroes tend to overemphasize white characters at the expense of the black figures, which has the effect of minimizing their strength and historical significance.  And while it is true that Tony Lip is accurately portrayed as a “white savior” in this film ('Green Book' Is A Poorly Titled White Savior Film - Shadow and Act), there is some question as to how Shirley was portrayed among his own culture, as apparently he was much more revered in the black community than his portrayal here, where he is viewed more as an academic, a sophisticated man of letters, receiving doctorate degrees in music, psychology and the Liturgical arts.  This professorial aloofness is expressed in the film by his lack of social engagement, his need to be alone drinking a bottle of Cutty Sark in his room every night, which was written into his contract.  What this does, however, is place more dramatic emphasis on his driver, Tony Lip, an openly acknowledged racist who is portrayed as being more in tune with black culture than Shirley, which is unthinkable, but in the film it’s all played for laughs, especially when Tony is seen introducing fried chicken (eaten with your fingers) along with legendary pop artists like Little Richard, Chubby Checker, and Aretha Franklin to Shirley, as if for the first time, though in truth, according to his family, he needed no such introduction ('Green Book' Is 'Full of Lies': Dr. Don Shirley's Family Speaks Out).  The script was co-written by the director Peter Farrelly, Hollywood scriptwriter Brian Hayes Currie, and Tony Vallelonga’s son, Nick, which may explain his father’s place of emphasis in the film.  One could imagine a totally different movie had it been written by Shirley’s son, where Shirley’s younger brother Edwin Jr. was actually friends with Martin and Coretta King, often spending vacations with them, while Shirley developed a lasting friendship with jazz great Duke Ellington, performing together with him in his appearances at Carnegie Hall.  But the truth is Hollywood is not open to scripts from sons of black historical figures while keeping the doors open for whites.  Therein lies the unending problem with films like this.         

More conventional and much easier to digest, audiences that would never watch a Spike Lee film might find themselves venturing into this one.  Nonetheless, despite the galling reality that Shirley’s complicated life story is largely told from the point of view of an avowed white racist with a 6th grade education, which is deemed acceptable in Hollywood’s view of America, it must be said that this particular script, despite its well documented faults, is actually pretty good, because by the end of the tour the overall effect of their time together has a stunning power of transformation for each individual, with both remaining lifelong friends, which comes across quite profoundly here and adds to the overall appreciation of the film.  Very few films actually overcome all the collective racist baggage that comes with a project like this, but because of the power of the two performances, and just how well each of them comes to life onscreen, it would not at all be surprising for each to be seen embracing the other after what they went through together.  Flawed as it is, this film still gets to the heart of why these men mean so much to each other, and ultimately to us, despite their distinctly different backgrounds, and a lot of that is what they bring to the picture, as these two immensely appealing individuals are not like what we typically see onscreen.  While it may be true that the racist figure is humanized onscreen and given a larger-than-life platform no ordinary chauffeur would deserve, but as the film suggests, with Shirley contending no one plays Chopin like he does, well this is no ordinary chauffeur either.  The reason behind both contentions makes all the difference in the world, as by the end the audience agrees that these are two extraordinary men, like few others we’ve ever met in our lifetimes.  Sometimes cinema gets it right, allowing audiences to expand the breadth of their vision by catching a glimpse into different cultures and characters, and whether the process to bring this film to light is racially insensitive and socially unjust, the end product may still carry a potent message.  Strange but true.  Part of the reason this works is how warmhearted most of the central figures actually appear to be, despite their human flaws, as the journey allows them to overcome obstacles along the way, some violent and disturbing, but others hidden underneath the surface, where it’s the good intentions that matter.  The Farrelly brothers, makers of subversive mainstream comedies, have always included underlying messages about outsider figures with physical or emotional defects where they are part of what’s essential about their films, making empathy towards those who are different part of their core values.  That definitely comes across in a film like this, as viewers relate strongly to each of the developed characters, including Tony Lip’s wife, Delores (Linda Cardellini), who loves her big lunk, where the humor and affection she displays is part of a supporting family circle that resembles many Italian families where food is at the center of their social activities.  One can accurately say that no one in the history of cinema enjoys eating quite like Tony Lip, who wins a hot dog eating contest, earning a quick buck, but eats for the pure joy of it.  While on the road with Shirley, the maestro tells Tony that he should become a food critic, as it’s quite apparent throughout this is at the top of his reasons for living.  It’s also one of the reasons he’s so relatable with viewers, as he’s a typical wiseguy right out of the Scorsese Italian school of cinema, where the real Tony Lip played a prominent role in Goodfellas (1990) while later appearing in 11 episodes of The Sopranos (2001 – 2007). 

It’s a good twenty minutes before Don Shirley even appears in this film, instead focusing on Tony Lip’s career at the Copacabana night club, an enforcer known for quickly eliminating problems, using brute force before hauling unwelcome transgressors out of there, viewed as just another day at the job, developing a likable camaraderie with people in the business, seen shooting the breeze with others about work options when the club shuts down for a few months due to remodeling.  It’s something of a surprise when he gets a call for a job interview with some “Doctor,” especially when the address happens to be that of Carnegie Hall.  Until 2009, the studios above the Hall contained working spaces for artists, intentionally designed with very high ceilings, skylights, and large windows making it more conducive for artistic work.  Among those living there at the time was Don Shirley, whose apartment interior resembles that of an art museum, with walls filled with rare collectibles from around the world, kind of his own Xanadu.  Known as Doctor Shirley for his honorary doctoral degrees (speaking eight languages fluently), the two couldn’t come from more different backgrounds, but Shirley needs protection from a professional, a job that doesn’t require degrees but street smarts, and Tony fits the bill, negotiating his own terms and agreeing to the job, though Shirley calls his wife to inquire if being away from the family for two months would be a problem.  Once on the road, Shirley plays piano as part of a jazz trio (the white bassist and cellist followed along in their own car), basically performing in front of some of the richest white patrons in the South, where their innovative sound includes classical style elements, similar to the exploratory music of John Lewis, pianist for the Modern Jazz Quartet or the more commercially popular Ramsey Lewis Trio.  At the last minute, Tony is given a copy of the Green Book, which is an annual listing of safe places for blacks to stay on the road in the Jim Crow South, as they weren’t allowed to mix with white company.  Absurdly, though working for Shirley, Tony was allowed to stay anywhere and live like a king, while the artist himself, despite being the headliner, was forbidden to eat, sleep, or share rest rooms with whites.  Almost immediately, Shirley recognizes there are things Tony needs to do to improve himself, from his butchering of the English language to his crude table manners, eating almost everything in sight with his fingers and just stuffing it down.  Much of the film is the playful banter between Shirley and Tony while driving between jobs, where the more outgoing Tony always seems to get on every last nerve of the more withdrawn and quietly reserved Shirley, but the maestro, like Cyrano de Bergerac, is soon intervening on Tony’s written letters home to his wife, reconstructing them so they’re more eloquent and distinguished, becoming the pride of the neighborhood when Delores reads them back to her envious neighbors.  Though they amusingly bicker over minor details, Tony goes to bat for Shirley whenever there’s trouble, which is ordinary and often in this film, as part of Southern Confederate pride/culture is built upon humiliating and degrading blacks, treating them as inferiors, which continually happens with Shirley despite the fact he’s the star of the show and easily more learned and sophisticated than any of the white patrons.  In this manner, the film fits the mold of 60’s films like GUESS WHO’S COMING FOR DINNER (1967), where blacks have to be smarter and more qualified than whites in order to be accepted by whites, or IN THE HEAT OF THE NIGHT (1967), one of the first films to introduce brazen acts of bigotry to mainstream audiences, where Southern whites continue to distrust blacks simply out of habit.  In some rural areas of the South they passed sundown laws making it a crime for blacks to be out at night, where simply passing through town after dark was a crime.  Tony’s expertise was put to the test on this trip, where in some instances he got more than he bargained for, learning that in 1956 Nat King Cole was pulled off the stage during a performance in Birmingham, Alabama and beaten by a gang of white supremacists.  One wonders why Shirley puts up with these indignities, as he was the resident artist at the Carlyle Hotel on the Upper East Side of Manhattan, making plenty of money, but he insisted upon doing a Southern tour, believing that bringing culture to regions deprived of it is the only way to bring change to these backward environments.  As it turns out the same can be said for Tony and his outwardly racist family, where at least on that front, plenty of progress is viewable to audiences, enough to elicit a smile by the time the film closes.          

2016 Top Ten List #1 Moonlight

MOONLIGHT           A                    

USA  (110 mi)  2016  ‘Scope  d:  Barry Jenkins        Official site

There is always something left to love.  And if you ain’t learned that, you ain’t learned nothing.  Have you cried for that boy today?  I don’t mean for yourself and for the family ‘cause we lost the money.  I mean for him; what he’s been through and what it done to him.  Child, when do you think is the time to love somebody the most; when they done good and made things easy for everybody?  Well then, you ain’t through learning — because that ain’t the time at all.  It’s when he’s at his lowest and can’t believe in hisself ‘cause the world done whipped him so.  When you starts measuring somebody, measure him right child, measure him right.  Make sure you done taken into account what hills and valleys he come through before he got to wherever he is.

—Mama to Beneatha, Act III, Lorraine Hansberry A Raisin in the Sun, 1959

A film that gets into the depths of things most of us simply don’t understand, that lives up to the critical hype by being a smaller, more poetic film that expresses a lyrical grace, featuring some amazing performances.  It’s hard enough being black in America, a completely incomprehensible experience for most whites, but being black and gay is an altogether different island of extreme cultural isolation.  When you think of gay black artists, perhaps writers James Baldwin, Alice Walker, Langston Hughes, and Lorraine Hansberry come to mind, a short list with the latter two remaining ambiguously closeted throughout their entire lives.  Being black and gay was an incendiary subject in the 60’s during the formation of the Black Panther Party in America, where Panther Eldridge Cleaver belittled and derided the homosexuality of Baldwin in homophobic terms in his seminal book Soul On Ice (1968), while earlier Baldwin and black author Richard Wright had their own personal disputes and disagreements, where largely what they were discussing was the subject of black masculinity.  A similar cultural divide erupted with the success of Ntozake Shange’s mid 70’s theater piece For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide / When the Rainbow Is Enuf, as the play was publicly scorned and repudiated by black men in community forums, disgusted by the presence of lesbian characters.  In Chicago, noted journalist, independent radio commentator, and black activist Lu Palmer was the voice of the black community in the 70’s and 80’s, with his incendiary radio commentary known as “Lu’s Notebook,” helping to galvanize the political forces of Harold Washington, the city’s first black mayor in 1983.  But in the early 70’s he also originated “Lu’s Bookshelf,” organizing monthly community forums to discuss books critically relevant to black people, including the controversial Ntozake Shange, but the visibly present outrage expressed by the black community discussing her work was a repudiation of gays and lesbians in their midst.  The stark tone of derision was unmistakable.  Black masculinity has taken on a public persona through athletic success, as seen in Hoop Dreams (1994), where sports has been the gateway out of poor inner city neighborhoods, so for many Americans, watching football or basketball on television often reflects the extent of their knowledge on what constitutes being black in America, as athletes are asked their opinions on a myriad of issues.  These athletes spend their lives with microphones being stuck in their faces wherever they go.  But rarely, rarely, if ever, are any of them outwardly gay.  Let’s see a show of hands for anyone that can name a single black athlete currently playing professional baseball, football, or basketball in America today who is admittedly gay.  A few have announced in college or on their way out of the leagues, but America is simply not yet ready to accept gay black athletes, as it contradicts our perception of what it is to be a black man.  While there is a recurring gay black character named Omar on the television series The Wire (2002 – 2008), but even in independent American cinema, there is a surprising absence of gay black protagonists, which makes this something of a breakthrough film.  James Baldwin, from The Black Boy Looks at the White Boy, an essay directed at author Norman Mailer four years after he wrote The White Negro (Fall 1957) | Dissent Magazine, from Esquire magazine, May 1961:

I think that I know something about the American masculinity which most of the men in my generation do not know because they have not been menaced by it in a way that I have been.  It is still true, alas, that to be an American Negro male is also to be kind of a walking phallic symbol; which means that one pays, in personality, for the sexual insecurity of others.  

Arguably the best film on what it means to be black in America remains Michael Roemer’s Nothing But a Man (1964), a startlingly candid expression that is as relevant today as it was fifty years ago, though ironically it was directed by a white man.  Eight years after the release of his first feature, Medicine for Melancholy (2008), one of the best date movies ever, this is Barry Jenkins’ (who is not gay) adaptation of Tarell Alvin McCraney’s play In Moonlight Black Boys Look Blue, with McCraney a black, openly gay playwright, a 2013 MacArthur Grant winner, where the film blends the artistry of these two black men with similar backgrounds who grew up near one another in the Liberty City Projects in Miami, the same locale used for the film.  A black and gay response to humanist epics like Terrence Malick’s 2011 Top Ten Films of the Year #1 The Tree of Life and Richard Linklater’s 2014 Top Ten List #1 Boyhood, films that make growing up as white adolescent boys in America a universal experience, this is another intensely personal film shown in three parts, at ages 9, 16, and 26, each titled after the same character’s name, and played by three different actors, where the brilliance of the film is personified by the collective power of the overall performances.  Little (Alex Hibbert), a derogatory nickname other students call him, a bewildered, persistently picked-on kid that others bully and routinely gang up on, grown sullen and silent already, Chiron (Ashton Sanders), his name given at birth, seen slinking around the corners of the high school and housing projects, always seen looking over his shoulder, and Black (Trevante Rhodes), a drug pusher called by a nickname, now obsessively muscular and pumped up, physically defined by his masculine image.  Opening in the 80’s at the height of the crack epidemic, the film opens to the music of Boris Gardiner’s “Every Nigger is a Star,” Moonlight | Music of Moonlight | Official Featurette HD | A24 YouTube (2:32), where we’re curiously introduced to someone other than the main character, Juan (Mahershala Ali), a Cuban-born crack dealer who has a major impact on the outcome of the film, a father figure and protector, a guy running a criminal enterprise, yet shows tenderness and understanding in the way he handles a shy young kid he accidentally stumbles upon.  Bringing him home to his girlfriend Teresa (Janelle Monáe), as the shell-shocked kid refuses to talk, they treat him like a “Little Man,” feed him and let him spend the night before he opens up the next morning and identifies where he lives.  Respectfully returning him home the next day, his harried single-mom (Naomie Harris, the only one in all three sections) jerks him inside for a tongue-lashing, Moonlight | Back Home | Official Clip HD | A24 YouTube (1:12).  Juan’s home becomes a safe refuge for this young child, returning again and again to get away from his male attackers, where Juan patiently teaches him how to swim, yet at the same time what Juan sells on the street is ruining his mother’s life, all but abandoning him to the wolves.  In one of the more heartbreaking scenes of the film, he opens up and asks Juan what a “faggot” is?  It’s a rare film that provides an honest answer, but this gut-wrenching question sets the tone for just how real and complex this film is willing to get.  The film challenges the viewer’s perception of stereotypes and broadens the view of characters that are usually perceived as one-dimensional, like crack-addicted mothers or drug dealers, where we tend to lump them into a negative category, while in this film they express various degrees of love and tenderness, showing what they’re capable of, but instead have simply fallen through the cracks.

Luminously photographed by cinematographer James Laxton, who filmed his earlier film as well, accentuating color saturation in chosen scenes, adding a dreamlike, seductive quality to what is otherwise a difficult film, along with a pensive and melancholic musical score by Nicholas Britell that is illuminating and stunningly intimate, available on Spotify, Moonlight (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack) - Nicholas Britell - Spotify, where “Little’s Theme” and “The Middle of the World” are used most extensively.  When first introduced to Juan on the corner, the camera does a dizzying 360-degree turn around him, where the swirling effect disorients the viewer from what we are about to experience, shaking us out of any sense of complacency, offering a shift in perspective, requiring that we enter the film with a spirit of openness.  As a teenager in high school, Chiron is openly ridiculed by other males in class, particularly Terrel (Patrick Decile), who hounds and intimidates him incessantly, constantly getting in his face and daring him to do something about it, remaining close friends with Kevin (Jharrel Jerome), a good-natured friend since childhood, though boys at this age tend to openly brag about their sexual exploits, and Kevin is as guilty as anyone else.   His graphic depictions work their way into Chiron’s dreams, where he passively observes Kevin having rough sex with a girl.  At the same time, his mother is a full-fledged crack addict, kicking him out of the house to solicit various men, while growing increasingly hostile about demanding whatever money Chiron receives from Teresa (Juan is now deceased), as this remains his home away from home.  Not having anywhere else to go, he wanders down by the beach one night and runs into Kevin, who has a huge joint to smoke.  After an awkward discussion, they eventually kiss while Kevin passionately fondles Chiron, for whom this is clearly the first time.  In school the next day there is no lingering afterglow, instead Kevin is pressured by Terrel to play a hazing ritual of punching someone of Terrel’s choice.  It turns out to be Chiron, who refuses to stay down, but continues to get back up for more blows. Terrel eventually pushes Kevin away where he and a couple others kick and stomp on Chiron to finish the job before a teacher intervenes, refusing to cooperate with a school social worker afterwards, despite her encouragement to file a police report and put an end to this harassment, as he feels it will accomplish nothing.  It’s interesting to compare this hazing ritual with the more innocent paddling ritual in Linklater’s Dazed and Confused (1993), happening at about the same time, but the cultural deviations between black and white, straight and gay, couldn’t be more markedly different.  The next day in class, Chiron walks into class, picks up a chair, and smashes it over Terrel’s head several times, where he’s lead out of the school premises in handcuffs and placed in a police van, glaring straight at a mystified Kevin who watches in disbelief. 

We are a bit surprised to see the transformation of a skinny high school kid to this buffed, athletic physique, but he spent time in juvenile detention in Atlanta where there’s little else to do, and the man is a workout fiend, waking up early in the morning just to get his repeated repetitions in before falling back into bed.  Now living somewhere outside Atlanta, he’s the spitting image of Juan, running drugs on the street, diamond studs in his ears, even driving the same car, where he’s transformed himself into an imposing figure, using the nickname “Black” that was affectionately given to him by Kevin as a teenager.  Out of the blue, he receives a call from Kevin, who he hasn’t seen or heard from since high school days, who learned to become a cook and now runs a diner in Miami, inviting him to come by, apologizing for what happened when they last saw each other (words Chiron takes to heart), offering to cook something for him, as he heard a song on the jukebox that reminded him of Chiron.  His mother’s in a nearby rehab center, where she may finally be getting her life back together.  The vitriol she displayed in earlier segments are scarred in Chiron’s memory, where a repeating motif comes back to haunt him, where she’s standing just outside a doorway in their home, exaggerated by a heightened neon-pink color scheme, shot in slow motion, accentuated by swirling orchestral violins, where she’s screaming something at Chiron, though the words are never heard.  The meaning, however, is unforgettable, as the rage is always present, recurring in his dreams in the form of a nightmare.  He visits her on the grounds of the rehab center, and is about to abruptly leave, but she grabs his arm and suddenly displays an intent vulnerability, taking him completely by surprise, as she’s suddenly a sympathetic and compassionate figure seen in a new light.  As we see him on the road, driving his car, we hear a familiar refrain, Caetano Veloso Cucurrucucu Paloma Hable Con Ella - YouTube (3:44), a hauntingly dramatic yet utterly sublime song used so effectively in Almodóvar’s TALK TO HER (2002), a reminder of doomed love and an overt reference to the world’s most acclaimed gay film director, yet here we see a long stretch of the highway, with images of black children at play wading into the surf.  The road leads Chiron to a diner in Miami where he finds Kevin (André Holland), where suddenly he’s that same tentative figure seen earlier, shy, inarticulate, yet tragically wounded, hiding beneath the layers of muscles where he’s still the same scared kid underneath.  Their moments together move slowly, patiently, unsure of themselves, with plenty of unfilled space between them, a complex portrait of longing and sorrow, where we can see them thinking, imagining, yet their eyes speak volumes.  Asked about the jukebox song, Kevin plays the 60’s Barbara Lewis classic, Barbara Lewis -- Hello Stranger - YouTube (2:40), which seems to have been written just for this moment.  Both actors elevate the material with understated, unspoken messages, with what’s hidden underneath, the years of regret and marginalization, where there’s simply an extraordinary recognition of what these two guys have been through in their lives, where now, perhaps finally, no further obstacles stand in their way.  It’s a powerful yet fragile moment, filled with lyricism and tender grace.  For all the myriad of walls we construct to protect ourselves from the brutal realities, the strength of the film comes from the quiet acceptance of our own buried truths, where the openness of the characters reflect a director who couldn’t be more empathetic.   

  

Moonlight conversation at the 2016 Telluride Film Festival with the director and five actors on the lawn moderated by film scholar Annette Insdorf, http://telluridefilmfestival.org/show/showroom (50:05).