My 16yr old daughter has dreams of becoming a big star through acting one day. Like almost all teenagers she has the fantasy of living in Hollywood and living the glamorous life. But for her, it’s more than a fantasy; she has already started along a path to make this a reality. She has taken acting classes and is currently looking into enrolling at one of this countries prestigious school of the arts upon High School graduation. Oh to be sixteen again and have big dreams I tell ya. I love my daughter and it pains me that I have to tell her to give up any hope of success outside of being in a Tyler Perry movie; what father wants to do such a thing. But according to the good folks over at Vanity Fair there’s no future in Hollywood for black women or women of color – at least for the next decade, as evidenced by the obvious absence of any black women on the cover of their March “Young Hollywood” issue. Nine women on one cover and they couldn't at least photoshop a black person/woman into the shot?
The real irony of this is that they pulled this crap right at the beginning of Black History Month. The nerve of these people! They put a “brother” on the cover who doesn’t even consider himself black one month before Black History Month posing like an iron pumping convict in prison. And the next month they throw up a cover with nothing but white chicks as representative of the future decade of Hollywood? See what you did Soul Plane? Lemme guess, there’re no young black actresses to throw into the mix? Oh my bad, Gabourey Sidibie who played the lead in Precious is just a tad bit on the too dark and over-weight side, right? Yep, and that’s not good for Hollywood unless you win an Oscar because then you can be airbrushed like another plus size entertainer recently. That is, unless your mom and dad are Tina and Mathew Knowles, and you wear padded underwear when you perform on stage to make your booty look bigger than it actually is.
So I really don’t know how to really go in on this one, folks. Parts of me wants to take the route of my man “Buggin Out” the nice looking angry Negro fella in my blog header and scream at the top of my lungs “How come ain’t any black people on the wall,” and then grab my man “Radio Raheem” and wreck a pizza joint. But then there’s this side of me that thinks “Who gives a shit.” Hollywood isn’t important nor is the presence of black women, or people of color for that matter. What’s important is Essence Magazine having the audacity to put Reggie Bush’s ass on the February black love issue when everybody knows he’s currently dating a white woman. But then again, can’t really get too mad; white folks aren’t exactly bitching about being on the covers of Ebony and Jet magazine these days.
