Recording artist and content creator Javon Alvin releases politically conscious visual “Lonely in America.” This track was crafted with the intention of moving fans of all cultural and political backgrounds toward united progression.
The “Lonely in America” visual highlights the generational struggles of African Americans in America and encourages listeners to acknowledge the contributions and simultaneous tribulations of black men and women in this country.
Alvin creatively takes a 360°approach to the development of his music. As an artist who directs, edits, produces and records his own projects, “Lonely in America” personifies his personal reality and the experiences of his peers during the current social climate in America.
This ‘feel good’ track was created to inspire, enlighten and encourage all listeners to live life with love and compassion despite differences of race, creed and color.
Check out Javon Alvin’s discography on, Apple Music, Spotify, and Tidal.
TV One has announced the premiere date of its two-part documentary special UNSUNG PRESENTS: MUSIC & THE MOVEMENT –remembering the artists and songs that have provided the soundtrack to the fight for justice and equality – airing part one on Monday, January 18, 2021, at 8 P.M. ET/7C immediately followed by part two at 9 P.M. ET/8C. On hand to provide commentary about the new musical genre that emerged during pivotal movements in Black Americans tumultuous past and troubling present are Erica Campbell, Big Gipp, Raheem DeVaughn, Rev. Al Sharpton, Isaac Hayes III, Ronda Racha Penrice, Headkrack, Shante Paige, DJ Kemit, Dyana Williams, Angie Ange, Colby Colb, Rickey Vincent, Steve Ivory, Delores Thompson, Dave Washington, Billy Johnson, Jr., Kenny Gamble, P. Frank Williams, Keith Murphy, DJ Yella, Battlecat, Soren Baker, and Felicia “Poetess” Morris.
“Music is the heart and soul of Black culture – giving life to our experiences, voice to our stories and growing power out of our pain,” said Cathy Hughes, Chairwoman, Urban One, Inc. “Every melody, lyric and rhythm artfully depict the layers of Black diversity, scope of black creativity, and depths of the complexity of our people. TV One’s Music & the Movement special pays homage to the music and music makers whose talents created a soundtrack of Black music during moments of political and social unrest throughout our history. It is another opportunity for us to spotlight Black content.”
“Throughout history, Black music has been a clarion call to amplify the voice of our community and important social and political movements like the Civil Rights and Black Lives Matters Movements,” remarked Robyn Greene Arrington, Vice President of Programming and Production. “After an unprecedented year of social, economic, and political turmoil, we felt MLK Day was a great time to chronicle the ongoing struggles of Black Americans along with those who tirelessly lend their voices to protesting injustice and instigating positive changes for our community and social justice movements.”
The Martin Luther King Jr. Day special incorporates first-hand accounts, interviews with artists and media, coupled with archival footage from memorable speeches, soul-stirring vocal performances, and more. Moments of Black auditory dissent featured in the special spans centuries and includes themes of Negro spirituals, like “Swing Low Sweet Chariot,” which provided both a distraction from the harsh conditions of slavery and communication tools for the enslaved as they plotted their escape to freedom; to soul and funk anthems during the Black Power movement performed by Aretha Franklin (“Respect”) and Curtis Mayfield (“People Get Ready”) demanding an immediate change to the political landscape and that civil rights be upheld; to the heart-wrenching viral music videos by young, contemporary artists – like Keedron Bryant’s captivating single “I Just Want to Live” – creating rallying mixtapes for the current Black Lives Matter movement which, this past summer, saw a melting pot of cultures across the globe who marched in solidarity, to protest police brutality. The two one-hour specials serve as a re-examination of the power that music has had to transform a cultural moment into a movement.
Additionally, UNSUNG PRESENTS: MUSIC & THE MOVEMENT will feature the broadcast debut of the original track “KliKKK KlaKKK” by Sunny Dizzle and the group Steaksawse, recently announced as the winner of Reach Media’s “The Song” contest. Presented in partnership with Kevin Liles and 300 Entertainment, the contest was designed to provide an opportunity for an independent artist to create music that reflects the current climate, elevates the collective consciousness, and promotes hope and change. The single will have its global release on Friday, January 15, 2020 and will be featured accross Reach Media radio stations.
UNSUNG PRESENTS: MUSIC & THE MOVEMENT is executive produced by A. Smith & Co. Productions’ Arthur Smith and Frank Sinton with Executive Producers Mark Rowland and Co-Executive Producer Kysha Mounia and Co-Executive Producer P. Frank Williams. For TV One, Jason Ryan is Executive Producer in Charge of Production, Donyell Kennedy-McCullough is Senior Director of Talent & Casting, and Robyn Greene Arrington is Vice President of Original Programming and Production
For more information about TV One’s upcoming programming, including original movies, visit the network’s companion website at www.tvone.tv. TV One viewers can also join the conversation by connecting via social media on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook using the hashtags #MUSICANDTHEMOVEMENT and #REPRESENT.
SAN BERNARDINO, CA—-On Friday, January 22 the Young Visionaries will be hosting a Virtual Talent Search. The show will begin at 6 p.m. and is open to youth ages 14 to 17. There will be cash prizes for 1st, 2nd, and 3rd places ranging from $50 to $250.
The event will be hosted by I AM VanSwan, Miss Teen California US Alana Morgan, NFK Philadelphia Eagles Cheerleader Tamia Casey, and Gabriel Cannon.
The deadline to submit is January 8. If you miss the deadline, you may still be able to submit by sending your videos to iamvanswan@yvyla-ie.org.
SAN BERNARDINO, CA—- On Monday, January 18 at 9 a.m. the Inland Empire African American Churches –IECAAC will celebrate the 41st Annual Dr. Martin Luther King. Jr. Prayer Breakfast. This year they will continue the tradition of the dreamer, Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. through a virtual celebration. This year’s theme is “Embracing the Dream” found in Ecclesiastes 3:5.
The keynote speaker this year is Dr. Bishop Kenneth Ulmer. The event will be hosted by inspirational comedian, Lester Barrie. There will be a special performance by Stellar and Grammy Award Nominee, Brent Jones, and other guest performances. There will also be an award presentation for those individuals that excelled and showed concern and commitment helping to others.
To register for the event and receive access information, please visit: bit.ly/mlkcelebration2021. Or visit IECAAC website at www.iecaac.org.
The Inland Empire Concerned African American Churches thank you in advance for the prayers and support. If you have any questions, please call at 909-494-7036. At the conclusion of the event the MLK prayer breakfast committee will proceed to the MLK Jr. statue to lay the honorary wreath. It’s a day on, not a day off. Please wear a mask, and social distance. Amen!
In It didn’t take long for Shakur Stevenson to show the world his talent in the boxing ring. As an amateur, he won a silver medal in the bantamweight division at the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro. As a pro, he established himself as one of boxing’s future stars, showcasing an abundance of skills along with superstar qualities.
Stevenson won the WBO featherweight (126 pounds) title in just his 13th professional fight, cruising to a dominant unanimous decision victory over Joet Gonzalez, who had been undefeated through 23 professional fights.
After securing the featherweight title, Stevenson moved up to junior lightweight (130 pounds), where the dominance he showed at featherweight has stood intact through two fights.
Stevenson has his sights set on Jamel Herring’s WBO junior lightweight title. And if WBC champion Miguel Berchelt prevails against undefeated Mexican star Oscar Valdez next month, Stevenson looks to secure a date with Berchelt later this year. Given the crop of young talent at both junior lightweight and lightweight, the smaller divisions are receiving considerable attention; the crafty southpaw from New Jersey plans to be the cream that rises to the top.
Zenger News caught up with Stevenson, 23, to hear his plans for 2021. He explains why he doesn’t feel it’s necessary to be mentioned among today’s Four Kings, and addresses boxing trainer Buddy McGirt’s recent comments about him.
Percy Crawford interviewed Shakur Stevenson for Zenger News.
Zenger News: Who was that kid giving you buckets the other day on your Instagram?
Shakur Stevenson: Oh, that was my little brother.
Zenger: That’s wassup, man. Good-looking kid. How have you been, brother?
Stevenson: Ain’t nothing. I’m good. I just been laying low and staying out the way.
Zenger: You were the first fighter — definitely the first prestige fighter — to return to the ring following COVID. Was it important to you to get back in and set the tone for things to come?
Percy Crawford interviewed Shakur Stevenson for Zenger News. (Heidi Malone/Zenger)
Stevenson: Yeah, I think it was important to me because I was one of the first ones that got my fight cancelled. When my fight got cancelled, I wanted to be one of the first people back, so it didn’t matter when they called or whatever they said, I was going to be ready.
Zenger: You’re also one of the only — if not the only — big-name guys to get in two fights in 2020. Given the circumstances, that was big-time as well.
Stevenson: Yeah! That was another one… All the fights I had this year, I only had like five to six weeks to prepare for them. They’ll just call me and tell me the situation. Like the last fight, [Oscar] Valdez or Berchelt, one of them [Berchelt] got corona[virus], and they ended up saying, forget their fight, we’re going to put Shakur in there. He can take over the date. I knew in five weeks’ time. I flew into training camp, and just got prepared.
Zenger: Did that make the transition from 126 to 130 perfect timing, given that you weren’t getting full training camps, or was that move up in weight the play anyways?
Stevenson: I think that was going to be the move anyways, but the timing was kind of perfect. My body got bigger. It was about time. This year was definitely the time to hit the 130-weight class.
Zenger: You could definitely see it in your shoulders that you were starting to fill out. Physically, in the ring, how do you feel at junior lightweight?
Stevenson: Shit, I feel a lot stronger. I feel physically stronger. If you watch my fights, when I’m getting into clinches and all that stuff, I feel a lot stronger. I feel like I can put my body on people and stay solid, even my punches. I feel a lot stronger, I’m not gonna lie. I like it there.
Zenger: In your last fight, against Toka Kahn Clary, when you hurt him and he wanted to tie up, you were able to get him off of you rather easily. Definitely a sign of the maturation of your frame.
“Yeah, the main thing is, when you’re around other good fighters, you get better.” (Mikey Williams/Top Rank)
Stevenson: Yeah, I agree with that.
Zenger: The lower divisions are back in the spotlight. This is the most attention these divisions have received in a long time. Social media brought up the “Four Kings” thing — Gervonta “Tank” Davis, Devin Haney, Ryan Garcia and Teofimo Lopez. Where does Shakur Stevenson fit into that round robin?
Stevenson: I mean … in my head, you don’t even have to put me in that. Let them do whatever they do. I think I’m going to be the best fighter out of this young generation, so I’m at a point now where I just let them sit back and talk. In five to 10 years, you are going to see later on down the line who was what and what was what. I will be able to show — and everybody will see — that I was the one that I said I was.
Zenger: So, when you look at those names, you don’t want the inclusion — you don’t feel like you need to be looped in with those guys. You just want things to play out.
Stevenson: At first it was like, how are y’all not going to mention me in that sentence? But I can understand some of it too, because all those fighters are at 135. But then it’s like, Tank really at 130, so I don’t know. Something not adding up. But I mean, shit… I don’t really care for it no more. I’m at the point now where it’s like, I’m just going to show people. Y’all just gotta see who I am. I feel like they disrespecting me at the end of the day. They keep trying to disrespect me. I’m cool with it. Do y’all thing. Years later, when all them fighters are not on my level, then it’s going to be like, shit, ya’ll should’ve listened.
Stevenson: Nah, you can bring up whatever you want. You know I’m good.
Zenger: Do you feel like because of the silver medal and your amateur pedigree that you’re rushed more than other fighters? You’re only 15 fights into your career, yet you’re treated like a guy with 30-plus fights. Or do you welcome that treatment?
Stevenson: I think I’m in a weird situation. With my fights, if you’re really paying attention, I don’t have any trouble. No matter who gets in there, I don’t have any trouble. The fights look too, too easy. The fans… I’m so good, I’m at a level where I’m so good, it’s hard for the fans that don’t know too much about boxing to get in tune with me and understand what I’m doing because they question my level of opposition because every fight is so easy. You don’t see me in war type of fights like with Tank and Léo [Santa Cruz]. Even if you throw Léo in there.
I’ll give you an example. I ain’t dissin’ Tank. If I’m being real, I think Tank is a helluva fighter. Let me fight Léo. I get in there, and even if I don’t stop Léo but I go 12 rounds with Léo and I have no scratches, no nothing, and it’s an easy fight. The fans are going to look at it like it’s regular. Tank fight Léo and it’s like, “Oh, snap!” And he knocks him out, but it was a war the whole entire fight. These dudes are beating each other up. Now, the fans that don’t know too much about boxing gravitate towards that because Tank took some punishment, Léo took some punishment, but if I go in there and just wipe him out for 12 rounds, it’s like, “Shit, that was too easy. Who are you fighting? You ain’t fighting nobody.”
Zenger: I don’t remember your “prospect” phase. You were thrown into that world title talk so soon, it’s almost like you were never really a prospect.
Stevenson: I agree, but even that, when I fought for the world title, I feel like I ain’t get as much credit as I deserved. I felt like Joet [Gonzalez] was a young, hungry lion who didn’t have any losses. He had been waiting on a title shot, he got his opportunity, and he failed, but I just feel like I’m not going to get no credit for that, just for the fact that I made it look so easy.
Zenger: Your last three opponents have a combined record of 64-3-2, for a fighter who only has 15 professional fights. That’s insane. When you look at the current champions at 130 pounds, do you have a set plan to get these guys in the ring, or is it about who Top Rank puts in front of you?
Stevenson: Nah, I plan on getting the WBO first, and then getting the WBC by the end of the year. So, Jamel belt first, and then we’re going to get Berchelt belt by the end of the year.
“I’m going to be the best fighter out of this young generation…” (Mikey Williams/Top Rank)
Zenger: Berchelt took to Twitter to comment on your last fight, and you’re never shy about responding.
Stevenson: Nah, not at all. I don’t know. I don’t be caring about what these people be saying. They gonna talk, ya feel me? I had seen what he said, and I replied to him. You not gonna play me without me saying something back. I don’t care who it is. I think that we’re going to have a big fight at the end of the year, so it don’t even matter.
Zenger: When you see a guy like Dame Lillard from the Portland Trailblazers say you’re a problem, or you’re up next, obviously, you have to take it in stride, but it does have to be flattering.
Stevenson: It feels real good knowing people like Dame Lillard, even Kevin Durant, had hit my DM a couple of weeks ago. It feels good knowing athletes like that respect me and they understand I’m going to be on their level one day. It feels real good. When KD hit my DM, he didn’t even tell me anything about me; he was asking me a boxing question. He asked me about a certain fighter, like, “Is he good?” But he wanted my opinion, and I respected the fact that he would come to me and ask my opinion on another fighter. He respect my boxing knowledge.
Zenger: You have a tight bond with Terence “Bud” Crawford, Josh Greer Jr. and guys like that. The fact that you guys feed off of one another instead of it always being combative is impressive. Sometimes you can have that type of relationship with someone who is within the same sport as you and grow from each other.
Stevenson: Yeah, the main thing is, when you’re around other good fighters, you get better. Me being around Bud for these years, I have been picking up on certain stuff he does inside and outside the ring. I just feel like you get better being around other fighters like that. You pick up on things that help. Even with Josh Greer being around us, it’s going to help him and he’s going to help me too, because Josh Greer got a great mindset. He’s always positive. I need to take part of that too. It definitely helps a lot.
Zenger: When I spoke with [manager] J Prince, I told him that you can see a certain glimmer in his eye when your name is mentioned. So, I will ask you, what impact has J had not only in your career, but in life in general?
Stevenson: I mean, J is like a big role model to me. He is one of them people you don’t always come across. He is really real. He a real person. He look out for me inside and outside the ring. He treats me like family. Me and J’s relationship is not just a business relationship. He’s more like family to me. I appreciate J for treating me the way that he treats me, because he don’t even have to treat me the way that he treats me. He can just be my manager and it can be all business. But J treats me like family. He a real dude. I respect J a lot. I’m glad he feels the way he feels about me. Even with you saying that, I hear interviews with him too, and I see J, and every time my name do come up, you can tell he’s excited about the future for me. And you know what? J is hands-on too. He’s in the gym with me a lot. He’s always coming to watch me spar, he’s always paying attention, and he’s always around me. He is somebody who get to see me often, so he understands what he’s seeing. A lot of people don’t understand what they’re seeing, so they’re not going to understand what’s coming. He’s around me, so he know. That’s why you probably get that reaction out of him, like, “Shit, nobody can beat Shakur,” and that’s the truth.
Zenger: I hate to even bring up the Buddy McGirt stuff, but it’s fresh and it is newsworthy.
Zenger: I remember asking [boxing trainer] Derrick James why does he feel some old-school fighters and trainers talk down the newer generation, and he explained that most of them can’t remove themselves from the equation. They hang on to the past. Do you feel that’s why Buddy kind of came for you?
Stevenson: The thing is, that’s not the first time Buddy did interviews talking about me. That’s the second or third interview I have seen of him talking about me. I ain’t really say too much about it. I was just like, “Yeah, I’ll beat your fighter up,” or whatever. I don’t care because I’m thinking he’s trying to sell a fight with his fighter. But now I’m looking at another interview and he’s not even mentioning his fighters anymore. He’s saying Teó [Teófimo López] would stop me. Now it’s like, OK, you’re not even thinking about your fighter. You just really got something against me. It’s like, damn, why you keep bringing my name up in every interview you do? I don’t see nobody else name brought up from Buddy McGirt besides Shakur Stevenson. Somebody asks him about Shakur Stevenson and he got some negative shit to say. It’s Buddy McGirt. He keeps claiming he knew me since I was a kid. He didn’t know me like that. I was a teenager before he knew me. That man don’t even know me, so why are you in interviews talking like you know me?
And then … yo, they act like this dude is just so good of a trainer. Now, I’m going to keep it real. I’m going to keep it 100 with you because he been trying to play me, so I’m going to tell the truth on him. This man said in an interview, “Shakur better stay away from Berchelt. That’s how fighters like him get hurt,” or something like that. And then two interviews later, I swear to God, this man gonna say, “I never even seen Berchelt fight, he just look real big.” I’m like, damn, I thought you were supposed to be this master trainer. How the fuck you gonna say in an interview that I should stay away from someone who you never seen fight before? You never seen this man fight. That don’t even make sense to me. He’s supposed to be this real good trainer, and you’re going to say that I should stay away from someone who you’ve never seen fight before. I put two and two together.
Zenger: It’s frustrating to you because it sounds personal now.
Stevenson: Yeah, it sounds personal to me now. He got something against me. Now you’re saying I’m protected and Teó will knock me out in six or seven rounds. Bro, you just hating on me, bro. At the end of the day, Buddy McGirt … sits in the gym all day. Let’s be real: What fighter did Buddy McGirt start from scratch that he has right now? I don’t see no fighter that Buddy McGirt started at the beginning of their career and they became a world champion. He’s the coach that when fighters lose, you send them to Buddy McGirt, and I guess he tightens some things up and fix some errors. You don’t see him with no fighters that he started from scratch. Those are the coaches that I respect. Like you mentioned, Derrick James — Derrick James been with Errol Spence his whole career. It’s not like he just got [Jermell] Charlo now … no. He’s been with Errol Spence his whole career, and Errol Spence is one of the best fighters in the sport of boxing.
What we talking about? Buddy McGirt don’t start no fighters from scratch, so how you a good coach? How is he so good? Everybody want to respect these coaches. Buddy McGirt was a real good fighter. I give him that. But I feel what I feel, and I feel like he ain’t start no fighter from scratch. He don’t have a world champion right now that he started from scratch. He’s trying to leach off of everybody else’ fighters and get their paycheck. That’s what Buddy McGirt is.
Zenger: That being said, Shakur, I’m expecting a huge 2021 from you. Best of luck in trying to capturing those titles. Always a pleasure speaking to you. Is there anything else you want to say before I let you go?
Stevenson: I appreciate you. Tell everybody to follow me on Twitter and Instagram @ShakurStevenson. This year I’m going to have two belts at 130, and I’m taking over the whole 130-pound weight class.
Still, in March 1944, a young Jewish immigrant to Palestine named Hannah Senesh (Anna Szenes) parachuted into occupied Slovenia on behalf of the British Army.
The goals were twofold — to help Allied pilots who had fallen behind enemy lines flee to safety and to work with partisan forces to rescue Jewish communities under Nazi occupation.
Senesh was captured by the Hungarian police on June 7, tortured for months, and executed on November 7. She was only 23.
Hannah Senesh’s immigration certificate, 1939. (National Library of Israel)
A year later, a soldier in the British Army’s Jewish Brigade, Moshe Braslavski, returned to Kibbutz Sdot Yam, where Senesh had come to live in 1941. He found a suitcase full of letters, diaries, songs, poems and more under her bed.
Her tragic, heroic story and her poems — including “A Walk to Caesarea” (known popularly as “Eli, Eli” / “My God, My God”) — have made Senesh into an iconic figure of modern Jewish, Israeli and Zionist culture.
This year, Kibbutz Sdot Yam renovated its Hannah Senesh House, established in 1950, with an audiovisual display in Hebrew, English, Russian, French, Spanish and German presenting the story of her life, mission and death.
Hannah Senesh’s iconic poem, “A Walk to Caesarea” (“Eli, Eli”) in her notebook. (National Library of Israel)
Hannah Senesh House also houses an exhibition about the other six paratroopers who were killed on that mission and a monument brought from the Budapest cemetery, where she was initially interred. Her coffin was moved to Jerusalem’s Mount Herzl National Cemetery in 1950.
It contains her handwritten poems, personal diaries, a newspaper she edited at the age of six, letters, photographs, personal documents, the transcript of her trial and her suitcase, typewriter and camera.
Perhaps the two most moving items in the collection are a pair of notes found in her dress following her execution: the last poem she ever wrote and a letter to her mother.
Hannah Senesh’s childhood drawing of the Hungarian flag for her grandmother, 1930. (National Library of Israel)
“In 2021, we will commemorate 100 years since Hannah Senesh’s birth, and the National Library of Israel will work throughout the year to open global digital access to this significant archive, giving it pride of place among the millions of other cultural treasures we have digitized and made available online over the past decade,” said Oren Weinberg, director of the National Library of Israel.
The archive had been kept by the family until now.
After the war, Hannah’s mother, Katherine, immigrated to Palestine with more of her daughter’s writings and personal items from their home in Budapest. Katherine received the materials Braslavski had found on the kibbutz and kept the complete collection in her apartment in Haifa.
Hannah Senesh’s last note to her mother, found in her dress after her execution in 1944. (National Library of Israel)
Following Katherine’s death in 1992 and the death of Hannah’s brother Giora in 1995, the materials were passed down to Giora’s sons, Eitan and David, who used them to promote Hannah’s memory and legacy. Eitan also worked to manage, catalogue, translate and preserve the literary estate.
Over the past year, Ori and Mirit Eisen from Arizona enabled the transfer of the complete Hannah Senesh Archival Collection to the National Library of Israel, where it can be seen alongside the personal papers of other cultural figures, including Maimonides, Sir Isaac Newton, Martin Buber, Franz Kafka and Naomi Shemer.
“We feel that the collection has reached safe harbor, just as the renewed Hannah Senesh House opens in Kibbutz Sdot Yam,” commented the Senesh family.
“We thank the National Library of Israel and the Eisen family for their efforts and assistance and are happy and excited that the flame of the poet Hannah Senesh and her father, the writer Bela Szenes, will now be preserved in the most suitable place — the National Library of Israel in Jerusalem — and that from there, its light will shine upon the world.”
For information on Hannah Senesh House on Kibbutz Sdot Yam, click here.
For information on the National Library’s Hannah Senesh Archival Collection, click here.
TAIWAN STRAIT—- Ensign Elijah Jones, from San Bernardino, California, plots on a maneuvering board in the combat information center as the guided-missile destroyer USS Curtis Wilbur (DDG 54) conducts routine operations. Curtis Wilbur is forward-deployed to the U.S. 7th Fleet area of operations in support of a free and open Indo-Pacific.
Minority Health Institute and UCLA BRITE Center for Science, Research and Policy invite you to attend a virtual town hall with some of the nations’ premier COVID-19 experts and historically Black institution and organization leaders to address facts, fears and myths pertaining to COVID-19 vaccination as we fight to protect and save Black lives.
The townhall will take place on Saturday, January 16 from 9 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. To register and participate in the COVID-19 Vaccination: It Matters in Saving Black Lives visit www.mhinst.org.
Opening in Select Theaters, Digital & Cable VOD January 15
MLK/FBI is an essential expose of the surveillance and harassment of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. (labeled by the FBI as the “most dangerous” Black person in America), undertaken by J. Edgar Hoover and the U.S. government. Based on newly discovered and declassified files, as well as revelatory restored footage, the documentary explores the government’s history of targeting Black activists. Directed by Emmy® Award-winner and Oscar®-nominee Sam Pollard, MLK/FBI recounts a tragic story with searing relevance to our current moment.
Q: You were part of a team who made arguably the most comprehensive documentary series about the Civil Rights movement to date. I’m not sure you ever had any reservations about approaching a massive undertaking like this one but talk a little bit about how you arrived at taking on one of the most iconic symbols of civil rights in the United States. What led you to the project?
Sam Pollard: Working back in 1987 and 1988 on “Eyes on the Prize,” one episode I did was called “Two Societies,” which followed when Dr. King went to Chicago to bring the movement from the South to the North, and the hostility he faced. It was a wake up call to me to know that Dr. King wasn’t always loved and embraced by the American public. If we fast-forward, my producer Benjamin Hedin reached out to me over two years ago about making this documentary, and it was a continuation of my understanding of the contradictions in terms of how King is looked at today by most Americans, and how he was really looked at back then.
One of those interesting things in our film is when Beverly Gage mentions the fact that there was a poll taken after King and Hoover met – the only time they ever met – about who was more popular. Hoover was much more popular than Dr. King. Most people forget that now, because Hoover is looked at as a pariah, but most Americans back then thought he was a hero. As did I, as a young African American man— 15, 16 years old— I embraced the American notion of what the FBI was all about. Watching the FBI show on television, watching an old movie from 1959, Jimmy Stewart. The FBI were heroes: beating the gangsters, fighting communism.
It’s always interesting to learn the true story behind these organizations that we mythically make so heroic. We wanted to look at the complexity and the accuracy of the American landscape in terms of the federal government. I hope this film is a wakeup call for America. I understand how complicated this notion of being American is, and how complicated the FBI is today.
Q: We’ve generally known that the FBI spied on Dr. King. But obviously, your film dives deeply into this subject. How long did it take you to pore over archives and then newer revelations about the extent of spying? How long did it take to make the film?
SP: My producer Ben was poring over archives from day one. We started to really dig into this material, these memoranda and unredacted material, from the beginning. We did our first interviews in December 2017 but the majority, with Beverly Gage, Donna Murch, Clarence Jones, and Andy Young, were in fall 2018, which in this business is pretty fast. We had our editor start screening the material and footage in November 2019. And here we are with the film world premiering in September 2020.
But it goes back to this decision that was made in 1992, that in twenty-five years some of the documents collected by the Congressional committee investigating assassinations would be unsealed. Because they investigated both Kennedy and King’s assassinations, when documents are released about one, there’s always the other. We couldn’t have known what was in the 2017-2018 declassification. So I think that we were also very fortunate in the timing.
Q: What was new in that declassification?
SP: A lot about the informants and how surrounded Dr. King was. We knew, of course, there were allies in the movement who might be tipping off FBI agents about King’s plans, but the new discoveries make it plain how coordinated and vast the bureau’s sources were. You get to a point where, on the night he died, for example, they’re not even tapping his phones anymore, they have such good informant coverage.
All the same, it’s important to note that, given Hoover’s motives, you can never take anything that is in these files, even once they are declassified, at face value. One must always remember the source — where it came from and why.
Q: It’s eerie how similar the crisis over Black safety inequality in the period covered by the film feels today. And Civil Rights issues are once again at the fore of the American consciousness.
SP: We are a country that’s always constantly struggling with the issues of race, because this country is founded on the backs of slaves. We have what we call a tipping point and a reckoning in America with Trump in office, with the Black Lives Matter movement and the protests after the murder of George Floyd and the horrific murders that are taking place in this country. So it is extremely timely. But I would say that this film will always be timely in the American zeitgeist, because America and the issues of race never leave. Black men being murdered in the streets of America, by the police, is endemic. It happens every damn day. The work of administrations is to say there’s chaos in the streets, get your weapons out because America is going to fall apart -it happens not only in the Republican administrations, but it happens in Democratic administrations. This is not unusual, but it’s like a huge avalanche now. What Dr. King went through and what America’s going through today is so connected. At the end of the film, when Beverly Gage talks about the First Amendment, the importance of protesting, it speaks directly to what’s happening in the streets of America today.
We could have done this film a year from now and it would still be timely as far as I’m concerned. Because this is America, quite honestly, and unless we have a real revolution, it’s going to be the same cycle over and over and over again.
Q: Dr. King’s legacy has morphed so much from when he was living in your documentary. At one point in the film, someone refers to Dr. King as the most “dangerous Negro in America.” Can you talk a little bit more about how you dealt with his legacy?
SP:I think it’s important to say a couple of things. First, I think his legacy is going to stay intact. What happens to people who are very important in our history is that over time they are revisited. A great example is how I grew up thinking Abraham Lincoln freed the slaves. He was a great president. That’s what was taught to me. Now, we learned over time that Lincoln didn’t initially want to free the slaves. It just became something that was necessary to win the Civil War. In some ways he wasn’t “The Great Liberator” or “The Great Emancipator.” But has it really tarnished his reputation? Abraham Lincoln? Not really. You know, he is still considered one of the great American presidents. So the fact that we have known this already about Dr. King, that he was not a monogamous man, that he was a human being like everybody else. I don’t think it’s going to do anything to hurt his reputation.
We had this discussion when we decided to make the film. We talked about it. When we decided to include the rape allegations, we felt like it was important, as serious filmmakers. To look at all sides of this story, we couldn’t skirt that issue. We had to deal with that. Was Dr. King complicit in whatever went on in that room? Why would the FBI not go in there and interrupt and arrest them if they knew a woman was being raped? And this all comes from a handwritten note on a memo- there aren’t transcripts of the allegation. It begs many questions, but the information is out there, has been reported on, and we as filmmakers needed to include it in a responsible way, as part of the larger picture of the surveillance. In terms of what the FBI said on the subject, they’re going to couch it in a way that makes King look as horrific as possible. So you have to question everything about it. I don’t think anybody alive really knows what happened in that room.
When you create a film about someone, you have to look at everything, all the edges. Every part of the human being. If you wanted to see what I call a whitewashed version, it’s easy to do. But to me, as a filmmaker, I believe that all of us are flawed human beings – as James Comey said. My job is to look at all of that and question it. In a responsible way, but you have to do it. And if you don’t do that then you’re not doing your job. To me, whoever King was as a man didn’t take away from what he did as a great Civil Rights leader.
What we arrived on after scouring the documents and looking at the facts is that the FBI was so frightened and afraid of this man they were willing to go to any lengths to destroy his reputation. Something people overlook, is that the civil rights movement was not just Dr. King. America always has to create one person who takes us to the mountaintop, when there were lots of foot soldiers in the Civil Rights movement who got us to the ‘64 and ‘65 Civil Rights Act, the Voting Rights Act – Fred Shuttlesworth and Ralph Abernathy and Dorothy Cotton and Fannie Lou Hamer – there were so many people, it wasn’t just King. He’s been made into the titular head. There’s more than one way to look at Dr. King, and at the movement.
There’s a very important distinction at the end of the film that the FBI wasn’t a rogue agency. King was pitted against the entire power structure of the government, in that the White House was privy to the surveillance. They would listen in on the recordings. The Congressional committees all knew about it. Nobody stopped it. So it was something that went just beyond the FBI headquarters and the suspicion of King in the halls of power persisted for so long. You know, Reagan didn’t even want to sign the holiday into law. And that’s more than a decade after he was shot.
Sam Pollard on Set
Q: Can you talk about the stylistic choice to use archival?
SP:We had discussions in terms of stylistic approach, how we wanted to put it together. Normal rule of thumb is usually you have your interviews on camera and you interweave the archival footage with it. But we felt like we wanted to make sure that you get a real sense of the narrative visually, with this wealth of archival. We wanted to let you just marinate in that new archival material, like the footage of Dr. King at home with his kids.
I want to really tip my hat to Laura Tomaselli, the brilliant editor of the film.
Q:Sorting through all of the archives and materials must have been a huge undertaking. How did you get a hold of rare footage? How did that all come together to shed light on the surveillance of Dr. King?
SP: We had a great archivist, Brian Becker, and it was important to use footage we hadn’t seen before. So we privileged that. If it had been seen, it was almost like it was off the table. And we benefited quite a bit from stuff that exists but hadn’t been digitized. The March on Washington footage, the Library of Congress just digitized that a couple of years ago. That film’s been sitting in their warehouse, so that was a source also.
The footage of King with his family, I’ve never seen before, nor the footage of James Earl Ray being arrested in London. And that’s always the great thing about when you have a good archival producer, who will go to any lengths to find new and fresh material. This gentleman, Brian Becker, did an extraordinary job doing that.
Q:Can you talk about the experts and the voices you chose to include in the film? For example, we hear from James Comey, former FBI director. The voices were distinct from one another. How did you decide which voices stood out to be included in your documentary?
SP:One thing we decided early on was to limit the number of interviews to focus on people who could provide cultural and historical context, as well as people who were close to Dr. King.
Donna Murch’s book on the Black Panthers and Black activist groups, “Living for the City: Migration, Education, and the Rise of the Black Panther Party in Oakland, California” and Beverly Gage’s forthcoming book on Hoover, “G-Man: J. Edgar Hoover and the American Century” made them important voices for context.
In terms of people who were really close to King, Clarence Jones is the man. Clarence Jones is the man because he was at King’s side for many, many years, as was Andrew Young. Both of them were great.
David Garrow’s research remains foundational: he wrote the first major biography of Dr. King, in 1986, and the FBI at one point offered him a monetary settlement if he would not publish his book on the bureau’s campaign against King . And Marc Perrusquia was crucial because he knew about the informants, specifically Ernest Withers. He waged a long court battle against the FBI to get the records proving that Withers was a paid informant. So this was a small group that each person really fitted their particular role.
It was also extremely important to include Bureau sources. As FBI Director, Comey tried very much to take on the legacy of the King surveillance. He would send agents in training to the King Memorial on the Mall and he would have them write a paper about it. Comey said that he kept the original wiretap request that Hoover sent to the Attorney General, Robert Kennedy, in October 1963, the initial request to tap King, under the glass on his desk when he was director as a reminder of the abuses of power. The other FBI source in the film is a guy named Charles Knox, who wasn’t an agent while King was still alive,but what he did was close the “Solo” file. And “Solo” is the codename for a pair of brothers who were embedded in Moscow, maybe the most successful case of informants that Hoover ever had. And it was the intelligence they were providing about the Communist Party that initially sent Hoover on the trail of King. Knox understood the whole sort of arc of the Bureau’s obsession with King.
Q: The surveillance tapes are under lock and key until 2027. Was it a predicament or a challenge not to have those tapes?
SP:The big question for me was what if they opened the files in 2027, would the film become irrelevant? I believe that it will still be relevant. Above all, it’s what this story tells us about the American character. Especially right now. Which is why we decided to proceed. I think anything in the tapes will just flesh out what we already know.
“Of all the forms of inequality, injustice in health is the most shocking and inhuman.”
— Martin Luther King Jr.
LOS ANGELES, CA— Three African American health leaders — advocates for expanded health care who are on the frontlines of the battle against COVID-19 raging across California — took a moment to reflect on the state of health care as the holiday honoring civil rights icon Martin Luther King Jr. approaches on January 18.
Doctors David Carlisle, Elaine Batchlor and Adrian James are admirers of King and find his words of injustice in health care even more profound as hospitals and clinics are overflowing with COVID-19 patients — many of them African Americans and other people of color.
“On the day that we celebrate the great civil rights icon’s birthday, Dr. King’s sentiment has never been more relevant than today, as the pandemic has laid bare the great health inequities that remain in this country,” said Dr. Carlisle, president and CEO of Charles R. Drew University of Medicine and Science in Los Angeles. “COVID-19’s disproportionate impact on communities of color makes it more important than ever that African Americans, Latinos and other people of color seek out affordable health care coverage, such as through Covered California, and also get the COVID-19 vaccine when it becomes available.”
Carlisle, Batchlor and James recently teamed up with Covered California to address vaccine confidence and encourage Black Californians to get the COVID-19 vaccine when it becomes available, and to sign up for quality health insurance coverage through Covered California or Medi-Cal.
“Every day at MLK Community Hospital in South Los Angeles, we see high rates of unmanaged chronic disease that lead to poorer health outcomes,” said Dr. Batchlor, the hospital’s CEO. “This is illuminated by the disproportionate impact of COVID-19 on the African American community. We must change our country’s separate and unequal system of care, which is perpetuated by a payment system that disincentivizes doctors to serve in low-income communities like ours.
“I believe access to high-quality health care is a basic human right, and providing universal quality care to everyone, regardless of income level, race or political beliefs is a fundamental act of social justice,” Dr. Batchlor said.
Dr. Adrian James of the West Oakland Health Council in the San Francisco Bay Area said he and his colleagues are fighting misinformation circulating in the African American community about the vaccines to fight COVID-19.
Underlying medical conditions caused by inequality make people of color more susceptible to illness caused by COVID-19, Dr. James said. Other challenges Black people face include the inability to work from home and social distance.
“The quote from Dr. King that ‘Of all forms of inequality, injustice in health is the most shocking and inhuman’ is true because it may lead to death, which is the worst possible outcome. In California, the pandemic has had a devastating impact on the African American community,” Dr. James said.
The pandemic has also highlighted the importance of quality health care coverage. Right now, an estimated 1.2 million Californians are uninsured — including an estimated 67,000 African Americans — even though they are eligible for financial help through Covered California, or they qualify for low-cost or no-cost coverage through Medi-Cal.
“Roughly nine out of every 10 consumers who enroll through Covered California receive financial assistance — in the form of federal tax credits, state subsidies, or both — which helps make health care more affordable,” Covered California Executive Director Peter V. Lee said.
Covered California’s current open-enrollment period lasts until Jan. 31. Consumers interested in learning more about their coverage options can:
Westside Story Newspaper – Online The News of The Empire – Sharing the Quest for Excellence
