Before Lee took the stage, the packed crowd was regaled with the season finale of She’s Gotta Have It, a sufficient reimagining of his breakthrough 1986 film. The show stars DeWanda Wise as the “pansexual polyamorous” Nola Darling, an earnest if hugely self-absorbed, emotional wreck.
The episode (“#NolasChoice”) is a redo of the famous Thanksgiving scene from the film. Without spoiling the plot of either the original or the series, let’s say that there’s an optimistic endeavor into eating the cake she’s baked, with fascinating success – and includes a musical number involving Prince’s classic “Raspberry Beret.”
Lights come up, audience claps, and after a short story about the development of She’s Gotta Have It, the indomitable Spike Lee is onstage taking questions. Having an audience with one of the most influential auteurs of the last 30 years in Lee, one figures it would be an opportunity to learn. That’s definitely not what happened, at all.
One black woman had asked why the problematic Nola of this series wasn’t as progressive as the (also problematic) original. It’s a valid question and Lee’s answer – that, in fact, black women were in the writers’ room – was only detected after her need to hear her talk more was satiated. She even spoke over Lee, as he was explaining himself. Another person, a white woman from Pittsburgh starting an arts-based consortium, wanted Lee to give her the keys in how to talk to black people.
One of the best interactions with Lee was from a young dreamer from New Braunfels who didn’t feel comfortable talking specifically about trying to be a filmmaker in a town with few blacks. Lee expressed that it didn’t matter and that he needed to “find a way.” However, the sympathetic Lee would ask him to go to the side of the stage and wait for him.
Others made a South By Star Search audition out of what was an initially touching moment. The best interplay of the Q&A session was from a delusional California man, named Peter, a self-proclaimed “vegan for 35 years” amongst many other things, if you just ask him. He asked Lee if he’s considered making a film about a polymath. Lee said he hadn’t to this point – even arguing about what “mastery” means – to which the self-confident man with a straight face suggested Lee make a movie about him.
“There’s only one Spike, right? There’s only one Peter,” said the man, after running down a shortlist of polymaths.
“Who’s Peter?” Spike asked.
“Me.”
Spike Lee Master Class: She’s Gotta Have It – Episode 10
Sunday, March 11, Vimeo TheaterThis article appears in March 9 • 2018.
