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☆ ‘American Fiction,’ ‘Origin’ and the Pressures Black Writers Face
▼ + stars: | 2024-01-19 | by ( Salamishah Tillet | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

“We younger Negro artists who create now intend to express our individual dark-skinned selves without fear or shame,” a young Langston Hughes proclaimed in an essay nearly 100 years ago. “If white people are pleased we are glad. If they are not, it doesn’t matter.”Seeking to establish his autonomy as a Black writer, he concluded, “If colored people are pleased we are glad. Like Hughes, the protagonists of these movies — the journalist Isabel Wilkerson and the novelist Thelonious Ellison, known as Monk — strive to write as they please. But, by depicting their characters’ struggles, the films offer refreshing commentaries on the social construction of race and its devastating consequences for those at the bottom of the hierarchy.

Persons: ”, Langston Hughes, “, Ava DuVernay’s “, Cord Jefferson’s, Black, Hughes, Isabel Wilkerson, Thelonious Ellison, Monk —, ’ Organizations: Negro

☆ 10 Works and Performances That Helped Me Make Sense of 2023
▼ + stars: | 2023-12-02 | by ( Salamishah Tillet | More About Salamishah Tillet | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +2 min

I was staving off my own mourning as my family prepared for the 10th anniversary of my brother Shaka’s death from cancer. That, coupled with political crises and global despair, pushed me to find film, television and performances that helped me make sense of my grief and, hopefully, find a release for it. I can’t think of three more heart-wrenching performances of parental loss than Shiv (Sarah Snook), her voice breaking as she pleads, “Daddy? A man without a company, it is a fate that, for him, is far worse than death. (Read our review of the “Succession” finale.)

Persons: ” Juicy, Shakespeare’s, Z, Marcel Spears, Juicy, Ham, ’, Logan Roy, Brian Cox, Jesse Armstrong, that’s, Sarah Snook, “, Don’t, Kieran Culkin, Kendall, Jeremy Strong Organizations: Broadway Locations: Ham

☆ Beyoncé the Auteur Takes Center Stage in ‘Renaissance’
▼ + stars: | 2023-12-02 | by ( Salamishah Tillet | More About Salamishah Tillet | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +2 min

“I’m excited for people to see the show,” Beyoncé says early in “Renaissance: A Film by Beyoncé,” based on her recent world tour and seventh studio album. “But I’m really excited for everyone to see the process.”I’ve long wanted to understand her process better, too, especially because she has taken to rarely giving interviews. Instead she has let her art speak for itself, a risky venture when critics do the interpreting without her input. If “Renaissance” was only a film about her beaming audience, dazzling performances and the making of the tour, that would be more than enough. However, it’s clear early on that Beyoncé is not entirely interested in fetishizing her “process” to validate her artistry.

Persons: “, ” Beyoncé, Beyoncé, I’ve

☆ In Praise of the Ever-Evolving Lauryn Hill
▼ + stars: | 2023-10-20 | by ( Salamishah Tillet | More About Salamishah Tillet | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

“She is having so much fun onstage” was the surprised thought that ran through my mind as Lauryn Hill kicked off her Ms. Lauryn Hill & Fugees: “Miseducation of Lauryn Hill” 25th Anniversary Tour at the Prudential Center in downtown Newark on Tuesday night. Perhaps Hill was also amped by the high stakes of the performance. Earlier this year, her Fugees group mate Pras was found guilty for an illegal foreign influence scheme, leading some to predict that this full reconciliation of Pras, Hill and Wyclef Jean would be their final tour as a trio. Or maybe, I was projecting glee back onto her since this was the first of her concerts at which I’ve felt fully at ease since attending her initial solo tour back in 1999. Every time since — including when I bought tickets to her performance at the Montreux Jazz Festival in Switzerland in 2009, only for her entire European tour abruptly canceled — I’ve been disappointed by her inconsistency.

Persons: ”, Lauryn Hill, Lauryn Hill ”, Miseducation ”, Hill, Pras, Wyclef Jean, I’ve Organizations: Prudential Center, Montreux Jazz Locations: Newark, South Orange, N.J, ”, Switzerland

☆ ‘Purlie Victorious’: Ossie Davis’s ‘Gospel to Humanity’ Returns to Broadway
▼ + stars: | 2023-09-18 | by ( Salamishah Tillet | More About Salamishah Tillet | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +2 min

But I also spent time with Ossie and Ruby when they came to the rehearsals for my first Broadway show, “A Raisin in the Sun” [in 2004]. When Jeffrey approached me about possibly doing this on Broadway, I said, “I’m your guy,” because I love Ossie Davis. I found out that he always loved the play, so to have him want to be in it and produce it with Jeffrey Richards made it a reality. KARA YOUNG I was really surprised that Ossie Davis wrote a play like this. [Dee starred in the original 1959 Broadway production with Davis joining the cast later that year.]

Persons: KENNY LEON, Jeffrey Richards, Helen Stern Richards, Ossie, Ruby, Jeffrey, “, Ossie Davis, LESLIE ODOM, LEON, Leslie, KARA, Sun ”, Dee, Davis, LEON I don’t, shortchange Ossie Organizations: Fox Theater, Freedom, Sun Locations: Atlanta, Philly, America, American

☆ On Our National Mall, New Monuments Tell New Stories
▼ + stars: | 2023-08-17 | by ( Blake Gopnik | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +2 min

Combine those three terms, and you often end up in a glorious muddle. For just one month, Friday, Aug. 18 through Sept. 18, the National Mall will be hosting “Pulling Together,” an open-air exhibition that tests what works best, or fails least, when artists, publics and monuments are brought together. “Pulling Together” makes room for monuments that talk, for instance, about Black church leaders with AIDS, about the schoolchildren who cut through Washington’s color line, and about Asian migration after America’s war in Vietnam. (One shocking absence: art that addresses the sexism undermining half the world’s humans. The show is planned as the first installment in “Beyond Granite,” a series of temporary public projects led by the Trust for the National Mall with the National Capital Planning Commission and the National Park Service.

Persons: Paul Farber, Salamishah Tillet, Lincoln, Farber Organizations: Art, AIDS, Trust, National Capital Planning Commission, National Park Service, Rutgers University, The New York Times, Mellon Foundation Locations: Vietnam, Philadelphia

☆ Why Nina Simone Was Always Ahead of Her Time
▼ + stars: | 2023-08-02 | by ( Salamishah Tillet | More About Salamishah Tillet | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Nina Simone was always ahead of her time. “They say you’re mean and evil/Don’t know what to do,” Simone sang. “And that’s the reason that he’s gone/And left you black-and-blue.”I’ve been intrigued by “Blues for Mama” since I first heard it on Simone’s 1967 album “Nina Simone Sings the Blues.” And now, thanks to Verve Records’ recent issue of the previously unreleased recording of her Newport performance — packaged as the album “You’ve Got to Learn” — we have an even earlier version of the song out in the world. “Blues for Mama” signified a new moment. Rather than accept the abuse and the negative rumors, Nina tells Mama to set the record straight: “It wasn’t you that caused his bitter fate.”

Persons: Nina Simone, Abbey Lincoln, ”, Simone, “, Mama, ” Simone, he’s, I’ve, “ Blues, Mama ”, Nina Organizations: Mama, Newport Jazz Festival, Verve Records Locations: Newport

☆ Two Filmmakers, Two Dramas and the Pain of the Foster-Care System
▼ + stars: | 2023-07-14 | by ( Salamishah Tillet | More About Salamishah Tillet | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +3 min

Why did you decide to confront the foster care system? LEAF When researching the foster-care system, you realize how broken it is on every level. I’m talking about children in the foster-care system who grow up and have their own children. I think what drew me to the foster-care system was seeing how people who spent their childhoods in foster care were impacted as adults when the system failed them. All those things are what people in foster care want more than anything.

Persons: ROCKWELL, Terry, She’s, Inez

☆ On Reading ‘Beloved’ Over and Over Again
▼ + stars: | 2023-06-02 | by ( ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

For readers, a book’s meaning can change with every encounter, depending on the circumstances and experiences they bring to it each time. “I was sexually assaulted on a study abroad program in Kenya.” Tillet says. “And when I came back to the United States, I entered an experimental program that helped people who were sexual assault survivors, who were suffering from PTSD. And so … looking at what Morrison does in her novel, she’s dealing with trauma and she’s moving, going back and forth in time. So I actually experienced this on a personal level.”We would love to hear your thoughts about this episode, and about the Book Review’s podcast in general.

Persons: Gilbert Cruz, Salamishah, Toni Morrison’s, “, ” Tillet, Morrison Organizations: The Times Locations: Kenya, United States

Revisit some of the predominant trends in music that came to define a mercurial decade, from pop-rap and boy bands to aesthetic sadness and protest anthems. Rap goes the viral pop routeAt the beginning of the 2010s, rap stars had trouble scoring their own No. Dark and dreary pop blows upLana Del Rey helped to usher in a new era of downbeat and dark pop. Karl Walter/Getty ImagesBoth the Weeknd and Del Rey have pivoted since their debuts, with their images becoming more complicated than their indie origins belie. Del Rey, meanwhile, has only burrowed deeper into her niche, crafting intensely personal records that have matured with her listeners.

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