It is no surprise that Peter Farrelly’s hit movie Green Book continues to delight Israeli audiences:
The real story behind it has deep Jewish roots, not only because of Jewish involvement in the US civil rights movement but because U S Postal Service employee, Victor Hugo Green, who conceived and published The Negro Motorist Green Book, later named The Negro Travelers’ Green Book, was influenced by similar guides published for Jews, who sometimes faced similar discrimination.
So now the Internet is awash with information about the real story of Don Shirley and his chauffeur companion, Tony Lip (really Frank Anthony Vallelonga) it is odd that no Jewish website I have read has referred either to the Oscar winning Gentleman’s Agreement or to the coincidental irony of increased recent antisemitism among the African American community nor yet that holiday rental operator Airbnb coincidentally announced a stop on listing rental accommodation on Israel’s West Bank.
If I can see these links why doesn’t anyone else? “Why”, I hear myself demand, “does such injustice persist”?
But there are further, more pertinent paradoxes. First, while I appreciate why Dr Shirley’s family should be anxious to guard his artistic and personal reputation, they also seem determined that the movie be viewed as a factual documentary rather than the fine if flawed work of art that is the end result.
Then as I watched Mahershala Ali’s superb Don Shirley first help to smooth some of Tony Lip’s (Viggo Mortensen) roughest edges before physically swapping seats in their shared car, I began thinking of the present and immediate past incumbents of the White House.
They, too, have ‘swapped places’ and it struck me that despite the many tenable reasons for President Trump to be so hated, few people look at his many achievements during the past two years. That, too, is most unjust!
Of course, the real Dr Shirley was not only an enormously talented ‘cross-over’ classical-jazz pianist and composer. He spoke eight languages, was a trained psychologist and a fine painter.
One of his best known musical pieces was the version of Water Boy he played with the Don Shirley Trio. I’ve taken a brief look at the piece here.
© Natalie Wood (19 February 2019)
No comments:
Post a Comment