WRITING! I can write my ass off and I want to tell the world that if you can tell a story, you can write a story. Writing doesn't come from heaven. Its a skill that can be learned, just like driving a car, or doing brain surgery. When I was a kid I was always getting busted for telling lies. They didn't realize I wasn't lying I was telling stories, or storytelling.
Music
I love music! Music is POWERFUL! At my funeral I've instructed them to play the 'crying song', (Amazing Grace) over, and over, and over. I want people crying and passing out and falling all in the casket. And just in case my daughter tries to be stoic, I'm having them play Dance With My Father. After the burial, go to the house, eat some chicken, tell some lies, and listen to some Good Music.
Movies
Television
I sold a movie to television in 1972, titled, If You Give A Dance, You Gotta Pay The Band. It aired on ABC Theatre and starred a young Laurence Fishbourne in his first movie. ...Dance was nominated by the Writers Guild of America as one of the best scripts of 1972. I thought I was William Shakespeare, and I had more money than I had ever seen.
I sobered up in 1978, got married and made a baby.
Books
Black Rednecks And White Liberals. The Foutainhead. Manchild in the Proimised Land. Double Crossing. The Old Man and the Sea. Malcolm X. The Keeper of the Flame
Heroes
It's not easy to find a real hero nowadays. You know what they say: If we don't have heroes, we have to settle for celebrities. (Govonor Arnold)! Some of my heroes include Colin Powell, Howard Roark, Jackie Robinson, Joe Louis, Dr.J, the Freedom Riders, Mohammand Ali, Larry Bird, Richard Pryor, Superman, the Roadrunner, and my number one, all time bestest, a Negro named Shine. He was the world's greatest swimmer and sole black survivor of the Titanic: ("By the time the news reached the world that the great Titanic had sunk, Shine was standing on a cornor in Harlem, damn near drunk").
But I'll tell you who could have been my heroes: Bill Clinton and Kobe Bryant if they would have told the ladies no thanks. Kareem if he hadn't retired so early, and Jessie Jackson if he would have retired in the sixties. Mike Jackson and Tyson if they would have denied being black, and 50 Cent if he would have driven himself to the hospital after he got shot.
About me: There are two kinds of people out here: Those who get it and those who don't. I was one of those who didn't get it, and I paid accordingly. I'm an ex drug addict, ex-convict and ex alcoholic. Somehow I managed to make it to age seventy. Now I get it.
Hosted By:: Buzzie Photo + TCT When: Wednesday Dec 17, 2008 at 8:00 PM Where: 2nd Street Jazz 366 E. 2nd Street LA, CA 90012 United States Click Here To View Event
SO YOUNG
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