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SnowMan Jones

Black Frankenstein stories, Young argues, effect four kinds of racial critique: they humanize the slave; they explain, if not justify, black violence; they condemn the slaveowner; and they expose the instability of white power. The black Frankenstein’s monster has served as a powerful metaphor for reinforcing racial hierarchy—and as an even more powerful metaphor for shaping anti-racist critique. Illuminating the power of parody and reappropriation, Black Frankenstein tells the story of a metaphor that continues to matter to literature, culture, aesthetics, and politics.

Sweet Sweetback’s Baadasssss Song

The musical score of Sweet Sweetback’s Baadasssss Song was performed by Earth, Wind & Fire. Van Peebles did not have any money for traditional advertising methods, so he released the soundtrack album prior to the film’s release in order to generate publicity. Initially, the film was screened only in two theaters in the United States. It went on to gross $4.1 million at the box office. Huey P. Newton celebrated and welcomed the film’s revolutionary implications, and Sweetback became required viewing for members of the Black Panther Party. The movie is an important work in the history of American cinema because it created a market for independent black films. According to Variety, it demonstrated to Hollywood that films which portrayed “militant” blacks could be highly profitable, leading to the creation of the blaxploitation genre, although some do not consider this example of Van Peebles’ work to be an exploitation film.

Vonetta McGee, an actress whose big-screen heyday during the blaxploitation era of the 1970s included leading roles in “Blacula” and “Shaft in Africa,” has died. She was 65.

McGee died Friday at a hospital in Berkeley after experiencing cardiac arrest and being on life support for two days, said family spokeswoman Kelley Nayo. Although McGee had been diagnosed with Hodgkin’s lymphoma at age 17, Nayo said, her death was not related to the disease.

McGee was described as “one of the busiest and most beautiful black actresses” by Times movie reviewer Kevin Thomas in 1972, the year she appeared opposite Fred Williamson in the black action movie “Hammer,” and had starring roles in the crime-drama “Melinda” and the horror film “Blacula.”

She went on to appear with Richard Roundtree in “Shaft in Africa” (1973), and co-starred with Max Julien in “Thomasine & Bushrod” (1974).

McGee also appeared with Clint Eastwood in the 1975 action-thriller “The Eiger Sanction,” prompting The Times’ Thomas to write in his review: “Her parrying with Eastwood, verbally and otherwise, is enough to scorch the screen.”

“I was pleased to see her get a role with Clint Eastwood,” said Williamson, who knew McGee before they made “Hammer.” “Not many black actors had that opportunity to be in a movie where color doesn’t matter.

“Vonetta McGee was like a lot of actors and actresses at that time, like myself, Jim Brown, Richard Roundtree, Billy Dee Williams and Pam Grier, in that we had more talent than we were allowed to show because everything was perceived as a black project. Once they categorize you, your marketability becomes limited.”

McGee was no fan of the “blaxploitation” label that was attached to many of the films featuring black casts in the ’70s.

That label, she told The Times in 1979, was used “like racism, so you don’t have to think of the individual elements, just the whole. If you study propaganda, you understand how this works.”

Although The Times reported that McGee “calls herself one of the lucky graduates of the black-film genre,” she pointed out that there was a difference between someone like Diana Ross and other potentially marketable black actresses.

“She has had the luxury of a studio behind her,” McGee said. “This is where a lot of us fell short. We all needed a certain amount of protection. But we were on our own.”

Among McGee’s other film credits are “The Lost Man,” “Detroit 9000,” “Brothers” (in which she played an activist based on Angela Davis), “Repo Man” and “To Sleep with Anger.”

In the ’80s, her career turned primarily to television.

That included playing Sister Indigo on Robert Blake‘s short-lived 1985 dramatic series “Hell Town” and playing a social worker who takes a con man played by Jimmie Walker into her home in the syndicated 1987-88 sitcom “Bustin’ Loose.”

She also played a recurring role on “L.A. Law” and appeared in several episodes of “Cagney & Lacey” as the wife of detective Mark Petrie (played by Carl Lumbly).

McGee and Lumbly were married in 1986 and had a son, Brandon, in 1988.

Born Lawrence Vonetta McGee in San Francisco on Jan. 14, 1945, she was attending what is now San Francisco State when she got involved with a local acting group.

She launched her film career in 1968 in Italy, where she appeared in the spaghetti western “The Great Silence” and played the title role in the comedy “Faustina.”

In addition to her husband and son, she is survived by her mother, Alma McGee; three brothers, Donald, Richard and Ronald McGee; and a sister, Alma McGee.

A memorial service is pending.

dennis.mclellan@latimes.com

Copyright © 2010, The Los Angeles Times

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The Afro-Squad loves women, but we are not sold on marriage.  So here are some of our favorite quotes on the topic of love and marriage! 

SnowMan Jones

Remember, if you smoke after sex you’re doing it too fast. —Woody Allen

Getting married for sex is like buying a 747 for the free peanuts. —Jeff Foxworthy

I had some words with my wife, and she had some paragraphs with me. —Sigmund Freud

There’s a way of transferring funds that is even faster than electronic banking. It’s called marriage. —Sam Kinison

Bachelors know more about women than married men; if they didn’t they’d be married too. —H.L. Mencken

Why does a woman work ten years to change a man’s habits and then complain that he’s not the man she married? —Barbra Streisand

When a man talks dirty to a woman, it’s sexual harassment. When a woman talks dirty to a man, it’s $3.95 a minute. —Anonymous

The most effective way to remember your wife’s birthday is to forget it once. —Ogden Nash

My wife and I were happy for twenty years. Then we met. —Henny Youngman

A good wife always forgives her husband when she’s wrong. —Rodney Dangerfield

I haven’t spoken to my wife in years. I didn’t want to interrupt her. —Rodney Dangerfield

There’s two theories to arguing with a woman; neither one works. —Will Rogers

After marriage, husband and wife become two sides of a coin; they just can’t face each other, but still they stay together. —Hemant Joshi

I’ve had bad luck with both my wives. The first one left me, and the second one didn’t. —James Holt McGavra

Harpo, she’s a lovely person. She deserves a good husband. Marry her before she finds one. — Oscar Levant

Getting married is a lot like getting into a tub of hot water. After you get used to it, it ain’t so hot. —Minnie Pearl

Some of our “Army” work in the adult film industry, and were so inspired by our work that they decided to make a “big butt” movie with the Afro-Squad theme in mind.  Already being called the cure for impotence, this movie is already one of our favorites.

Special thanks to Ivan for making it happen!  www.iamivan.com

Click this link for the PG-13 rated trailer on Youtube:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hdJDQiT8fBo

The owner looks at the TV set, then looks at the stoner, and says, “I don’t sell stuff to potheads.” So the stoner tells the owner that he’ll quit toking and will come back the next week to buy the TV. A week later, the stoner comes back and says, “I quit smoking pot. Now, how much for that TV set in the window?”

And the owner says, “I told you I don’t sell to potheads!” So the stoner leaves again.

He comes back a week later and says, “How much for that TV?”

The owner says, “I’m not going to tell you again, I don’t sell to potheads!!!”

The stoner looks back at the owner and says, “How can you tell I’m a pothead?”

The owner looks back and says, “Because that’s a microwave.”