It's either a mix of Obama's near-candidacy and the fortieth anniversary of MLK's assassination or pure fluke, but lately many artists have been poking holes into our flawless icons and getting away with it. Don't get me wrong, I'm all for hole-poking. In fact, I prefer my black iconic leader full of holes and getting down and dirty with the real like the rest of us. My question is: Is there any point where humanizing our five-star leaders crosses the line?
This week is real big in the New York theater scene, particularly for artists of color. The musical Passing Strange is sweeping up awards left and right. There's big buzz about Laurence Fishburne possibly walking away with a Best Actor Tony for his role as Thurgood Marshall. And Adrian Bailey, the severely injured cast member of Broadway's Little Mermaid, is bravely suing Disney for the big big duckets. But more interestingly this week two plays about Martin Luther King Jr. written by female playwrights receive their highly-anticipated presentations. One such play happened last night. The Mountaintop by talented newcomer Katori Hall where Rev King's morality is put to some serious heat.
In Katori Hall's world, MLK is at the Lorraine Motel the night before his murder and the motel sends up a maid to deliver coffee. Initially, their interactions are mundane. But quickly Katori turns up the heat on King and the maid and suddenly they're drinking whiskey, sharing cigarettes and oh yes, flirting. And I don't mean one of those innocent subtle flirts between a handsome man and an attractive woman, but the kind that involves full-out body scanning and near lip-to-lip interaction. And what made things even more interesting, the maid, a former prostitute, uses so much profanity in front of the esteemed Christian minister, it borders on what some may call sacrilegious. Once she tells King that God is one funny a** motherf***er. Oh, and that God was not only a woman, but also black and PROUD. I must admit, I was on Cloud 9. A battle of ideas in black.
I won't reveal what happens in the play or who the maid really represents because the play is still in its development stage. But I will say what Ms. Hall accomplishes is interesting. With much thought, she places our beloved icon in an environment where he's forced to navigate sexual connotation, extreme profanity, accusations of being egomaniacal and a male chauvinist. No. Ms. Hall doesn't let our greatest Civil Rights leader get away with being charming or accommodating. She knocks him down to his everyday knees and challenges our need to keep him romanticized and perfect.
There were several people in the audience who enjoyed the hole-punching of our great king; others were disturbed by it. Certainly keeping leaders like King in a glass case reminds us of the depth of our struggle and in a way, he's our trophy for social resilience. But I wonder if it's two-fold. That holding on to our great leaders as flawless beings actually keeps us passive. That as long as someone from the community earned a trophy, we can pat ourselves on the back, relax and say we've earned it as well. But if an icon exposes their dirty laundry we might just be forced to let go of that security blanket called Icon, realize everyone's a fricking human being, and then empower ourselves to help make change.
Is there any point where humanizing our icons is a problem?
