City Desk: Malcolm X (1963) / American Playhouse: The Meeting (1989) | Q&A with Jeff Stetson

Good evening and welcome to the Billy Wilder Theater, home of public programs for the UCLA Film and Television Archive. I'm Mark Wiggley and I'm the John H. Mitchell television curator for UCLA. Thank you for joining us for the opening night of our screening series, You Had Better Make Some Noise, Malcolm X at 100, honoring the centennial of the birth of minister and human rights activist Malcolm X. Before we begin, a few announcements. Archive screenings in the wilder are free thanks to an anonymous gift from a donor. And tonight's Yep. Thank you, Tan, that person. And tonight's screening is underwritten by the John H. Mitchell Television Programming Endowment. Special thanks to the Hammer Museum, PBS SoCal, NBC5 Chicago, our community partners at Black Image Center, Black Women Directors, Platform UCLA, and Tape Collective Los Angeles. So, let's give those people a hand to please. Many thanks also to staff and student staff throughout the archive and the UCLA library for making tonight possible. This series was curated by archive film programmer Beyondre July. She's in here somewhere. Beyondrea. And I'm honored to have collaborated with her on tonight's TV selections. You will hear from Beyondrea after our screening as she takes the stage for a conversation with our very special guest, internationally acclaimed award-winning playwright and screenwriter Jeff Stson. Among the more than two dozen films and television movies that Jeff has written and developed for major studios and networks, tonight we are very honored to present his innovative, influential, and groundbreaking production, The Meeting. Directed by the Great Bill Duke and broadcast nationally on PBS as part of the prestigious American Playhouse anthology series. Jeff's riveting drama imagines a deep Clandiststein meeting and discussion between the two most important human rights leaders of the 20th century and 21st centuries, Malcolm X and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Thank you, Jeff. We are extremely fortunate and grateful to have you here for this screening of your essential work. Preceding the meeting, we have a bonus feature, City Desk, a halfhour public affairs program produced in Chicago in 1963. Malcolm X is the only guest on the program, which affords the chance to see the highly gifted debater effortlessly respond to sometimes hostile questions from four white journalists. It's a powerful historical document and a rare surviving instance of Malcolm X captured on color videotape. The umbrella title for this screening series, You Had Better Make Some Noise, is a direct quote from Malcolm X from his autobiography. In speaking with ax author Alex Haley, Malcolm X reminisced that as a young man, as a young child, he learned an invaluable lesson. With his mother's attention divided among his siblings, young Malcolm found that if he wanted something, he had better make some noise. that resonated into his adulthood as a vocal truthtelling world leader and through to our lives today where the words and activism of Malcolm X continue to cut through to teach a reluctant dysfunctional nation about itself. In the 60 years since his tragic assassination, history has repeatedly reaffirmed the prophetic relevance of Malcolm X. His critiques of systemic racism, economic equality, and media bias are all too timely. We invite you back here Sunday evening at 7 pm for the second evening of this fournight series featuring Alex Haley, Yuri Kochyama, and the acclaimed feature documentary from 1972, Malcolm X. Please stay seated directly after this screening for Beyondrea and our esteemed guest, Jeff Stson. Thank you for being here. >> Wasn't that amazing? Um, yeah. Um, I would like to introduce uh say a little bit more about Jeff. Mark told you some great things earlier. Um, and then we will have a Q&A. So, uh, Jeff, you can start making your way down if you'd like. Um, uh, Jeff Stson is an internationally acclaimed, award-winning playwright and screenwriter for film and television. He first gained national recognition with his play The Meeting, which has become a staple of American theater. The play received critical acclaim, earning the Louis B. Mayor Award and eight NAACP theater awards, including best play and best writer. It has been performed extensively across the United States and internationally with productions in South Africa, Nigeria, Kenya, Canada, and the Netherlands. His screenwriting credits include more than two dozen film and television projects developed for major studios and networks. And most recently, he served as an executive producer and writer of MLK X, an upcoming series for Disney Plus. Well, it's no longer upcoming. It's already come out. And um National Geographic and Imagine television. And he also co-wrote the Christmas Wish with Debbie Allen for Warner Brothers. Welcome, Jeff. because I haven't seen this for over 30 years and uh it's very nostalgic because Dick Anthony Williams and Jason Bernard were very close friends. In fact, Jason was my best friend for many years. He uh and I would talk every day. He would be over at my place at least three times a week. He was an extraordinary actor and an incredible friend and I miss them both. So, so thank you for this. >> Wow. Um that was going to be my first question is what is it like to see this uh after so many years. So uh you getting us rolling here. Um there's so much to talk about. So I guess we could just start with some of the basics that people usually like to know which is what inspired you to write the play the meeting. I heard there was an anograph that moved you. >> Uh there was a photograph of of Malcolm holding his daughter Adela and she was looking off face looking very sad and he was looking very proud and I didn't know that that image was going to stay with me but it clearly was the motivating force for the sequence with the doll and um it was very amazing when years later after that was written that uh Adela and uh King's daughter uh became close friends the magic of theater and the magic of uh struggle. So, it it was it's quite interesting. I wrote it because I had been dean of faculty and staff for the Cal State system, all 20 campuses, and I visited the campuses often. And I was asked if I would teach a course. Uh, and I said, "Yeah, I was interested." And if I was going to teach it, I wanted a very diverse group of students from various academic disciplines because as an educator, I think we need to teach people horizontally rather than vertically where you just kind of learn one thing and then you're supposedly off in and running in the world. I think you have to be able to blend the various disciplines in a way that gives you a broad sense of humanity and who you are as a person. So I said I would I would u teach a course but I wanted it to be on the civil rights movement and I knew that students when I was teaching the course when I was going to teach the course uh weren't alive for Malcolm and King and this country does much to kind of diminish the importance of really understanding that struggle. civil rights movement is defined from 1954 to 1964 as as if the struggle for human justice takes place over an August Wilson 10-year play. Uh civil rights struggles happened long before 54 and they continue to this day. And if you don't believe that, just listen to the news and we understand where we are as a as a nation. As it turned out, I just didn't have the the time to teach the course. And I was a member of the Los Angeles Actors Theaters uh playrights workshop. There were about 15 to 20 writers who would meet every week to develop their plays. And the Louis be Mayor Festival was something they did every year during the summer. and they would take six or eight one act plays and they would over a period of six weeks do all the plays and we would rotate them. So my play might be on Tuesday the first time and then Thursday and then Saturday and so on. Whenever the meeting was produced, it was the only play in that group that was sold out and as a new playwright I was obviously very nervous about the first production. There was a two-part movie being filmed in in LA about the Atlanta child murders and in walks Morgan Freeman took the pledge. So I said, "Oh." And he came back a second time and he came up to me said, "I want to I want to take you to dinner." And of course I said, "Well, have your people contact my people. We'll be able to do that." No, I didn't say that. Um, the first night the play was on, there was this woman who was dressed in a green and white African wardrobe and she had a headdress the same color. And throughout the entire play, she kept talking and I was going, should I get up and stop the play? Should I throw her out? So, I was annoyed. And at the end of the play, it was a standing ovation. And I noticed this woman was talking to my director. And then my director had motioned me over and I said, "Well, now I'm going to tell her what I really think." And as I walked up, the woman turned around at the same time that the director said, "Jeff, I want you to meet." And I saw Ruby D. Ruby D. And we talked about how much she cared about the play because as many of you know Ruby D and Azie uh were very close to both Malcolm and Barton and in fact they tried along with people like Harry Bellafonte to bring these people together and it never happened. Um, so I wrote the play because I was concerned that these students didn't know anything about the movement and that the country tries to diminish these men in such a way where one is a dreamer and the other is a revolutionary. And as any dreamer knows, if you're gonna try to bring justice to this country, you're going to understand the nature of a revolution. And any revolutionary knows that if you're going to be successful in the revolution, you have to understand the vision of the dream. So these two things are not different at all. But what happens when you define them in specific tame terms, leader, revolutionary, you're nonviolent and you're uh Thank you. Um, excuse me a second. What did those men say? We have all the time in the world to Malcolm, right? And he's like, you don't have to rush. And uh so what happens if you view one person as the nonviolent person, the other one is a revolutionary by any means necessary. In order to embrace one, you have to reject the other. And I wrote the piece because I wanted these young students that I was going to meet with and now the audiences that have shared the play throughout the world to understand that both of these men deserve our respect. Both of them fought for the same causes. Both of them were two extraordinary men. And rarely in human history do we find two men such as these. And so if you can embrace them, we embrace really the best of who we are. That's why the play was written. >> Yeah. Yeah. That's great to hear that background information. Um the thing that I'm struck by now watching it again tonight was um wondering about the timing of the meeting that you created. Obviously it was a week before Malcolm was assassinated and I wonder how you landed on that as the framing because obviously you could have chosen any particular time since this is a fictional event. What were you thinking there? >> It had to happen close to Malcolm's uh uh house of being bombed. uh because Martin would have seen it and would have felt that he would have to reach out in terms of his own compassion. But Malcolm calls him for one particular reason. He knows he's going to die. It's very clear that he thinks he has five days left and no more than that. And so if he's not going to be around in a movement, he knows the only other person that would understand what he's gone through is Dr. King. And so he brings King really to try to emphasize how important it is to be a little bit flexible in terms of the nonviolent kind of strategy. Uh but I also think as a motivating factor he wants to bring them out of respect because he knows he's said some things that is hurtful and if this is going to be his goodbye date he wants to at least uh you know sit down with the man who he admires and respects but also has been very harsh about uh I just don't think there were any any other person that Malcolm could have turned to that understood what Malcolm had gone through because King had his home bombed. He certainly has lived under the uh notion of he could be dead at any moment that his family could be killed. So if those two men can't come together uh then God help us. One of the interesting things about the uh show which I had totally forgotten I think they made some cuts for time and when Malcolm and Martin have the third arm wrestle uh Dr. King says, "Imagine what we could have done if we had joined hands and pushed together." And that's kind of the important part that most audiences take out of the the piece. You know what what happened with the arm wrestling is I knew that if I wrote a play about Malcolm X, Dr. King's uh folks wouldn't come and see it. And if I wrote if I wrote something about Dr. King. I'm not sure people who see Malcolm would have come to see it. And I wanted to bring both of these groups together. And when I came up with the arm wrestle, I said, "Well, these are two very competitive men." So once their hands touch in anger, it's natural for them to just take it all the way as as competitors. What happens virtually every time the play is done and particularly when the play first started on Sunday matineese. I love Sunday matineese because the church people would come out all dressed the women would be wearing those hats and they were all Dr. King Christian you supporters. So when Martin loses his first arm wrestle you know they're angry. I mean, they're just looking at each other now. This child cannot do that to Dr. King. Malcolm's people on the other hand, all smiles, fist up in the air. Then when it turns around, Malcolm's people are angry. Dr. King's folks are just smiling, praying for me. And when it ends, what happens and is perhaps the heart of the play is that people want to see neither one lose. And if possible, they want to see both men win. And if that can be the substance of the play that people take away, then I'll be very proud of the the piece. And in fact, the you know, the play has been done now in 14 different countries and all 50 states. And one of the things I'm most proud of is that it has created an opportunity for black actors, black directors, black producers, black drama to work on something that they love. One of the things I learned when I became a writer is that I was very much surprised how I could get actors like Dave Williams and Jason Bernard who are well-known actors, highly paid to do plays for free. And they do it because that's what they love. And I've had uh actors who have stopped acting and came back to it because they could play either Malcolm or Dr. King. I've had people who have had uh theaters uh founded by two or three people who fell out and don't talk to each other anymore and did the play and became close again. That's the power of theaters. power of the individual who sits down as a total stranger and they laugh and they cry and they think uh it it is magical and and I hope if you see the play itself when it's in your area that you'll be able to take a look at it on the stage as well as what you've seen here tonight. >> Yeah. Yeah. I love that point. Um, I love that point about the power of theater and I mean there's a larger conversation to be had about how there's so few plays that actors, black actors can do that are that rich and juicy, especially at the time you're talking about when the play first was created. Um, I'm I'm wondering if you could talk about to the point around theater. So obviously we just watched a tea play, right? So there's the the play, you know, in its original form that's meant to be for live theater and then you adapt your play for television. So tell us a little bit about that process and sort of the different mediums and how you thought about what needed to stay and what needed to go. >> Uh most of it was easy a lot easier than typical adaptations because I knew the play was going to stand on its own as a play. Bill Duke, who directed it, asked me if I could open it up because he wanted to be able to take the camera outside of the room. I wanted to keep it claustrophobic as much as possible because I think that adds to the tension. But when I thought about how I could open it, I said, "Well, let me create a situation where they're being watched, which we know they would be watched." And I decided I'd bring in a a black detective to work with the FBI because the FBI didn't have any black agents. And I just I didn't know how to really deal with it initially. And then I said, you know what I'm going to do? I'm gonna make this brother at least be good. you know, so when he he he understands that if that phone call is made to Hoover, then that's going to set things in motion, which is going to be damaging to black people and particularly those two leaders. So, when you see the FBI agent ready to call up Hoover and the detective takes a look at, no, I got to protect these two people because I know what will happen. Um, and I also made it clear that Rashad was the person who betrayed Malcolm. Uh, and I didn't do that directly in the play, but I did it once we went to the the teleplay. >> So, the the part about the NYC detective wasn't in the original play. >> No, the the original play and the play that's been done all over the country in the world are three characters, Rashad, Malcolm, and Martin. >> Wow. Um, yeah. I mean, you mentioned Bill Duke, um, wonderful director, esteemed director. Um, I understand he was really open to you being on set when this filmed and this filmed here in LA, >> correct? >> Um, what do you recall about uh filming this in terms of your involvement? I I just love to see actors work and I love to see a director provide his or her own uh vision and instincts because it is a collaborative process particularly in theater um you know in film and in television depending upon the director often the writers don't even have opportunity to be there. In fact, if you're writing a screenplay for a movie and you sell it for a lot of money, it could be made and you won't even recognize it because every word has been changed, every concept has been changed. Which is why I became a playwright because I knew as a playwright, you can't change a playwright's words without the author's permission. So, in fact, I had a really uh naive plan. I didn't know I was going to be a writer. I was an educator. I was an educator because I saw to serve with love when I was a teenager and I said, "Well, I want students to sing to me at the end of each class." I mean, who wouldn't? >> I I then met >> the movies. >> Yeah. I met Sydney Portier, Mr. Poier, and I went up to him. I said, you know, I became an educator because of that movie. And then I realized what I should have been is the writer who's creating those kinds of images that make people want to be educators. Um, but I had developed an organization with Mara Gibbs, the actress. It was called The Choice. And we used to have celebrity fashion shows at the Coconut Grove every year for five years. And I would write the scripts. I would write about Billy Holiday one year or Duke Ellington the next or Ethel Waters, Natkin Co. And they were very successful. We raised a lot of money. But because uh Mara and the celebrities, a lot of people from the industry would come to those sessions. And uh at the end of each show, people would come up to me and say, "Jeff, you can make a fortune as a writer. What are you doing?" And they'd offer me jobs. And I said, "I don't want to do that." Because the halfhour sitcom format, which really was the only thing that black folks were doing at the time, was the kind of uh shows that I just couldn't be involved in. But I understood the importance of Hollywood, having moved here from uh LA, moved from Boston to LA. Once you're here in LA, you understand how Hollywood changes what you're trying to do as an educator in terms of the images you create about the history you want to tell and so on. So I said, I want to, you know, I I want to be a writer, but I know my friends who are writers and they say you have no power as a writer, particularly in film or screenplays, because your words could be changed. I said, well, as a playwright, I know you have powers. I said, I'll become a well-known playwright. And as naive as that plan was, uh, it worked because I did a play at the O'Neal, which is a national workshop that attracts writers from all over the world. And you select about 10 writers, and all of the Hollywood agents come out there to see who the new writers are. And that's how I got discovered. But I didn't intend to do it that way. I simply wanted to protect my work. And as a playwright, I would then surround myself with directors and talent that would protect my vision. Now, after doing this for 35 years, it's still a struggle every day. But I do find that as a playwright, you love the audience, you love the actors, and whether the play works or not, it's your work. You don't have to worry about being screwed up by somebody else. >> W Okay. So, it was you as an educator and just your sort of organic interests in the world and in your city that led to you becoming a playwright. >> Correct. I was concerned about the kind of uh damage that occurs to the black psyche uh that has gone through a period of 400 years of oppression and discrimination. As an educator, I used to deal with students all the time. In fact, when I was in Massachusetts, we had a program called Alternatives for Individual Development, and I was coordinating programs through 11 campuses. And twice a year we would ask the campuses to select black students from each of their programs and we would take them to a hotel somewhere in Massachusetts for three days and we would expose them to black talent, psychiatrists, engineers, doctors, and we talk about the issues that concern them. Most of these black students were first generation students. Most of the black males didn't have fathers in their lives. When I would talk to them, their eyes would be shifted to the ground. And we would sit together until they were able to look at me eye to eye because I said to them, if you can't do that, you can't negotiate the world. You have to know what's going on. And I understood part of that damage simply occurred as a result of the kind of oppression that's existed in this country. You know, I often say uh there was a daughter of one of the wealthiest men in the country who was a newspaper titan whose daughter was kidnapped. She was in Patty Hurst. She was in a closet for two weeks. She came out of revolutionary. Black people have been in a closet for 400 years. So, it's understandable if we have some kind of dysfunction in our lives because uh that's what we've had to deal with. And so, I became an educator to try to heal that and to say our history is one of heroes and sheros. We've done enormous things. We've not only survived, we kept our love alive. That ought to be celebrated. And uh once I came to LA, I realized that the images I wanted to create and the and the education I wanted to transmit was being undermined. Black men in in film and and television were people who couldn't love their children, couldn't love their their wives, uh weren't around to support their kids. Our history was being distorted. And I said, "Well, look, everything I wanted to be as an educator is being undermined by Hollywood. So, go into Hollywood and try to make those changes. I don't know that I succeeded in any strong way in film and TV, but you take it one day at a time." >> Wow, that's wonderful. I think you're like the only person who moved to LA not to be in the business. Well, my wife's in the business still. >> Um, I want to open it up for questions, but um, I did want to ask one more question before I do that. So, start thinking about your questions. Um, you had mentioned earlier, I'm curious about you told us about the photo that like initially inspired you for the play, but obviously you have a connection to these men as a person, as a black man, as an individual. Um I think you said that uh the funeral procession where of Malcolm's funeral happened on the same block that you grew up on. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. I was on 147th Street between Convent and Amsterdam. That's where I grew up my first Wonderbread years 0 through 12. And uh I know that after his assassination he was having difficult his family was having difficulty having anybody do the funeral service because there was still a lot of violence in anticipated. And so I knew that that was happening when I was there. And I knew of Malcolm a lot. I mean I number one I grew up in Harlem light-skinned hazel eye blondish hair. So when I looked at Malcolm being a man with those green eyes and red hair, I said, "That's who I want to be." And I didn't understand how much I really respected Dr. King until he did the play. You know, when we first were in rehearsal with the play, the actor who was playing Dr. King after he was getting humiliated by by Malcolm for the first 15 minutes, he turned to me and said, "Jeff, you gonna give me something to say?" And I said, "The man that you're representing gets his head beaten. He sits down and gets his head beaten. You can take a little stuff from Malcolm for the moment. You know who you are." But it was a difficult thing for the actor and it's a difficult thing for many of us to understand the kind of courage it takes to do that. Uh my philosophy is probably closer to Malcolm in terms of you know giving up the right to you know to protect yourself in whatever way you can but I certainly have enormous uh respect for King and I often look at them in terms of Ali and Frasier because Ali would just be so quick he'd beat you beat you beat you and uh Frasier would say I don't care how much punishment I want to take I'm going to get to you if it's one punch at a time that's what happens. And as Ali was so quick in terms of his language, Malcolm was extraordinary as a debater. >> Goodness. >> But King once he got when when King does interviews, you'd go to sleep because he's kind of boring. I mean, really, he, you know, he was just a guy talking about stuff that was very valuable and and very important and very spiritual, but it's kind of dull. But when he took that pulpit, he was the kind of aator that when he spoke behind in the church, you were prepared to die for him to go to heaven. When Malcolm spoke, you were prepared to die for him in war. You weren't thinking of heaven. You were thinking of not making this world hell. Uh so they're two extraordinary figures. So, it just lends itself to bringing them together and hopefully not making one a protagonist and one an antagonist. That both of these men at the end of the play ought to be the kind of people you embrace. >> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I love the choice that the actor who plays Martin, I always think of him as uh Claire Huxable's father. um um uh you know how he chooses the hard seat and then eventually after the sort of defenses are down, they sparred a little bit, he comes and sits in the really comfortable seat >> and you know with Jason who I mean both of these actors all over the world but you know Dick Anthony Williams and and uh Jason Bernard God help us they were extraordinary. Jason, again, this is my first play, and I would be waiting outside for the actress to come. Jason would be doing a sitcom. He'd park his car, and I saw him get out of the car and he had a bag over his shoulder and he walked like he was 105 years old. He just looked like he was miserable. And as soon as he got on that stage and played that part, it was everything he wanted to be as an actor. And he was able to display the gift he had as an actor. And that's very hard for black actors who are in shows that don't expect them to show that talent. Jason was in a sitcom with the executive producer and and star was 12 years old and he was the butt of the joke most of the time in the sitcom but he had the kind of integrity that no matter what you gave him he was able to transcend that. He was a beautiful beautiful man. He would just come home he'd talk. He'd cry about stuff. Uh he I just I I wrote a play specifically for him that was called to play a black man and it was based on our experience because he had given up so much in it in his family because of the stress and the humiliation you go through as a black male actor in certain kinds of parts that it was killing him. And this was a guy who had an incredible gift and talent and I just wanted to give him an opportunity to display that whenever he could on an individual basis as well as as and there many people that are doing that. You know, even when I was an educator, black people who made um themselves into relatively high positions, a lot of them were alcoholics. kind of crap you have to put up here in this business in order to do what you do, be rejected, be vulnerable as an actor, it takes a lot out of you. So I have enormous respect for actors and directors and people who allow themselves to be vulnerable in order to get to the truth. And the responsibility for all artists is to tell the truth. But for the black artist, for the black writer, it's important to tell what can be true so that you're creating the dream that young kids can say, "Yes, there is something for me that I can do because he did it and I can take that and move beyond it." So, I just have great respect for for this uh this business even when I want to choke somebody. >> Wow. Well put. It's really refreshing to hear that intentionality around your work because I don't think we come across that a ton. Um, okay, questions. We have our wonderful theater staff's going to run mics to you. So, wait for the mic. Raise your hand high and keep it up so we can see you. No silly questions. Thank you. Okay, we have a question in the middle here. Put your arm up again so they can see you. Yeah, go here and then we'll go over there after. How you doing? Thank you so much for the inspiration. I appreciate it. Um I was curious um during that during the play or at least in the interaction um MLK had mentioned uh Malcolm Strick to Mecca and um I was wondering just given like you said the context of when that conversation occurred um or even just Yeah, I guess when that conversation occurred, can you um can you kind of speak on Well, I would I would kind of think that Malcolm will probably come from more of a compassionate side like I said just given that he just took that trip. Um but I'm just curious just in terms of just like what were you were thinking in terms of shifting that conversation when he came back he was definitely changed. Um and there were two things happening. One he was outside the country in a religion that he loves where he saw white people of the same faith and the same compassion and the same desire for justice. So he is brilliant enough, intelligent enough to know, I can't contradict what I've just seen when I come back home. And the second thing that was happening in his life is he discovered Elijah Muhammad's behavior, which then put him in a situation where he could no longer see this man the same way that he had. Um, so Dr. King knows that when he came back he was changed. And so he was trying to say, "You're giving me all this stuff, but you know better. You know that it's not simply about white or black. It's about the human being and their spirit and their compassion." Um I think if Malcolm had not gone and experienced that, then that kind of change and evolution wouldn't have happened. But at the same time, when a man is ready to to accept the fact that he's g he's going to die very soon, he's going to be murdered very soon. Um everything else is set aside and you begin to wonder, was it worth it? Could I do it again? You know, when he talks about I have nothing to leave my family, not even a house, no money, because all of his money had been taken. He didn't take any money when he was in the faith. Um, it's enormous. You know, when you talk about trying to get into the business of writing, you want to find characters that can evolve. Malcolm is the person in the play. Malcolm is the person in real life that has gone from one point being a drug dealing pimp pushing prison person. for 18 20 years to this religious person who is about helping people as a whole. So he's got the arc. Dr. King has pretty much been raised in the church to do what he does and believes what he does. So he doesn't have the same kind of arc, but he has the same kind of uh obstacles that are getting in his way to freedom for his people. But yes, if if if Malcolm comes back from the experience where he sees in his religious and spiritual way how how people are meant to be, how people are meant to treat each other. Uh that changes you. And uh what what I loved about by the way the uh the debate he had is people forget how not just people know he was very good very quick but they don't know how respectful he is. >> You know he always says sir he always tries to to give you the benefit of the doubt that you're listening and you're capable of change. and he is in that 1963 production saying everything that needs to be said today. That's the irony in terms of you think you've changed, you think you made all these kinds of growth in the nation. But you see our history is being completely whitewashed. When did DEI become I mean you got a man who's putting people in his cabinet that are morally inept intellectually inept. He This is a guy This is a guy who will sue his university if they release his grades and he's defining excellence. You have to wonder what would be happening today if Malcolm and Martin were still ar around and how how Malcolm would totally destroy the administration based on the kind of hypocrisy that exists. >> Um that's like the future version of your play. >> Yeah. >> Um >> welcome to America. >> Yeah. >> Um is the question here still active? Okay. >> Yeah. Uh, I was really interested, uh, when you spoke about the, uh, uh, agents not being a part of the original play. I thought those guys were really great and added a lot to the story. Was that ever a consideration to maybe write that back into the play? >> No. >> All right. >> But I'm glad you liked it. >> Okay, we have time for maybe one more question. Okay, there we go. One in the middle here. um and run the mic down to the middle section halfway down here. You can put your hand up because they don't know who raised their hand. >> Hi. Uh just want to say great play. Excellent. Excellent. Um I just wanted to you to talk a little bit more about uh what you wanted to convey when you had I think it was Rashad on the phone at the end. He was kind of say like giving out some coded message, but just what you what you were trying to show there. and um convey to the audience because I know like some recent stuff has coming out. Not recent, but uh history has kind of redefined itself and we've looked back at what what took him out and all the things that were happening behind the scenes. I just wanted to know where you were going with that and what you wanted to say. >> I don't think there's any question and Malcolm knew this uh that he was infiltrated. His organization had been infiltrated even before he left Elijah. So he knew he was being watched. and he was at a point where he really couldn't trust anybody other than his family. The character is really interesting for me because years after the play was written, I I uh spent a week with Gene Roberts. Jean Roberts was the undercover cop working for a highly selective, secretive organization in New York called Bossy, Bureau of Special Services Investigations. He infiltrated Malcolm's organization. If you recall the famous photo when Malcolm is assassinated, there's a guy over him giving a mouth to mouth. That's Jean Roberts. Jean was 22 years old when he was recruited by the police in New York. And he had a simple job. He was to to hang out around Hotel Teresa, see if he could get to know Malcolm, see if he could join the organization. And he did that. Jean actually cared a lot for Malcolm. He didn't understand why we were spending so much time and money watching him. He really respected Malcolm. When Malcolm was assassinated and he was giving a mouth of mouth, when he went back to talk to his supervisors, who were two people that he dealt with, they wanted to know what he was doing giving him mouth of mouth. He cried about it and they knew he was crying. So they asked him about why were you crying? This is a man I know that died that was murdered in front of his children, his family. When I met with Jean, he told me basically his whole life story when when he started working for Malcolm in the summer of 1964. There was a riot in Harlem that occurred because there was a rumor that a cop had killed a teenager. And in fact, a teenager had shoplifted something. The cop went after him. He fired, but he missed him. So he the kid wasn't killed. He wasn't even hurt. But the rumor mill was he had been murdered. 2 o'clock in the morning, Gene gets a phone call from his supervisor. Says, "What's happening in Harlem? You should go up there." He goes up to Harlem. Somebody taps him on the shoulder who has a camera. He's out there taking photos and he said, "I think I know you. Didn't you go to Dwit High School?" He said, "Yeah." "Oh, I was uh two years ahead of you." And the guy says, "Well, let's have a cup of coffee." Now, this guy is supposed to be a freelance photographer for Life magazine. Now, for those of you who are young, which is most of you, and virtually everybody other than me, if you're working for for Life magazine or any magazine where you have to take photos, it's a perfect cover because you go to a ride, you take photos of everybody, and then you give the photos to your supervisors or department. So, this guy says, "Yeah, I'm I'm uh you know, doing this part-time, part time." and uh asking questions about what are you doing here? How long did you know Malcolm and the next day Jean gets a call from the supervisor saying did you apply for something some kind of credit? He says, "No, why?" Well, somebody has called the bank because Gina told him the cover was he was working with Chase magazine uh for Chase Bank. And uh so the guy who spoke with him evidently called. Now go 6 months later, one week before Malcolm's assassination, Jean sees a rehearsal for the for the assassination. In the seat in the front row where the guy who was stocky got up and shot Mal with a with a a shotgun was this guy from the session in the summer where he says I'm working for Time Life Time magazine. In the middle of the assembly, two people get in an argument. In the back there was an argument. There was somebody who got out of the chair and walked across the stage. So, Jean sees this and says, "I think I just witnessed an assassination at rehearsal." He tells his two supervisors and they said, "We'll take care of it." A week later, his friend from school, who's the photographer, isn't in that seat, but the killer is. And and the assassination happens exactly like the rehearsal. When Jean gives Malcolm the resuscitation in the hope of bringing him back to life, while his supervisors were upset, they said, "Well, actually, this could work in our benefit, because they'll see you as a hero, those who are Balman supporters." So, they give an assignment. He infiltrates the Black Panthers. And when he goes for his first meeting with the Black Panthers, he meets a sister who says, "Brother, brother G, we're so happy you're here. We've heard so much about you. Let me introduce you to the deputy of defense." Who turns around? The photographer. Three years later, they're busted in the famous trial of the the Panther 19. That's when for the first time, the Panthers realized that Gene was undercover because he gave testimony. The only person who wasn't put on trial was the reporter, the photographer. I discover that this guy gets put on a department in the university full tenur without a search. I can tell you having spent 15 years as an educator in the university, you don't do that unless somebody has the kind of power that says we need you to take this person and put him in a position. I am convinced, as was Jean, that this guy who obviously worked either for Bossy or the federal government was involved in the assassination of Alz. So when I'm now dealing with the play that's been around for 10 years before I meet Jean, that's when it becomes clear to me that Rashad is possibly someone who while has become enamored by Malcolm because he's worked with him so closely is nonetheless working for somebody that's going to finally say you need to take him out next week. And the reason he does that in the play is that the one thing Hoover and his people were terrified of is a possible unification of Malcolm and Martin together, working together for freedom. That was terrifying. In fact, if you look at all the reports from the FBI in terms of the Freedom of Information Act, they were afraid of a black Jesus. They were afraid of what would happen if somebody could come around and do what Malcolm and Martin were able to do individually, what would happen if they could do it collectively. So, I have no doubt at all that uh one way or the other the feds or the New York detectives or both were fully aware of what was happening, were fully aware of the people who were going to kill him. We know that three of the people who were arrested, two of them had no involvement at all. And to to close this up, there was one uh person who was very close to Malcolm who said, "We are concerned about his life after the bombing, and I know Malcolm doesn't want us to bring guns, but we're going to have guns the day he speaks." That individual was driving his car with a bunch of rifles and protective gear and he was stopped by the police and his body was later found in his own apartment overdosing when the man hadn't used drugs in 10 years. So I leave you with a faithful idea of what our country can and cannot do. And I have a question for you. Anybody know what happened with the Warriors? >> They what? >> They lost. >> They lost >> this this damn country. >> Wow. Um, well, I mean, can't think of a better way to end than that. Thank you so much, Jeff. I hope you write a memoir. You