Past-his-prime moviemaker Spike Lee did the wrong thing, turning a Black History Month lecture at Pratt Institute into a soliloquy about rich, white folk allegedly ruining Fort Greene — the neighborhood he ditched after striking it rich.
The crabby auteur, whose recent film “Red Hook Summer’ did a paltry $338,803 at the box office, who is reported to have made a fortune in New York’s booming real estate market, skewered upwardly mobile types in a profane and racist rant meant to defend minorities against the establishment — a riotous about-face, since Lee is the establishment.
He slammed gentrification as “b——-.” He speared newcomers: “You come, and now s—- gotta change because you’re here? Get the f— out of here.”
He bashed whites for supposedly sounding the alarm about his planned 2009 Michael Jackson tribute party: “All of a sudden the white people in Fort Greene said, ‘Wait a minute, we can’t have black people having a party for Michael Jackson to celebrate his life — who’s coming to the neighborhood?’ ”
He spiraled out of control on garbage: “Have you seen Fort Greene Park in the morning? It looks like a m———— Westminster Dog Show.”
Lee should have sermonized instead about how he manages to keep a straight face as he moves up the economic ladder while claiming to have the backs his old friends in the ’hood.
His rise is a textbook example of gentrification. Lee bought a posh house on Washington Park for $650,000 and sold it for $1 million. He shelled out $16 million for a lavish home on the Upper East Side and then put it up for sale for double that. And he left the community he profited from for greener pastures and never looked back, except to unleash cussed-filled diatribes on its behalf to restore his crumbling street cred.
Spike Lee is an opportunist who is reportedly no great champion of the downtrodden, supporting just six charities, compared to black actors Samuel L. Jackson and Don Cheadle who bolster 18 and 19, respectively. He raised $1.4 million for his new movie through a website meant to finance the creative and independent projects of hard-up artists, instead of digging into his fat wallet. And he held himself up to a false higher standard when he raged, “Hollywood knows nothing about black people,” while hosting a $36,000-a-plate presidential fund-raiser at his home, hobnobbing with celebrities and President Obama — the most gentrified man on the planet.
Spike Lee is a rebel without a cause, and one who has a tough time keeping it real. He should have used his platform at Pratt to exalt the accomplishments of mighty African Americans, instead of shooting off his “m————” mouth to make his “b——-” point.
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