I saw a great film: The Green Book. Directed by Yoruba Richen. Stop, you say. Wait a minute. You’re wrong. Peter Farrelly directed the Green Book. It won the Oscar. Best Picture. Other awards.
Not the picture I saw, though. I saw The Green Book: Guide to Freedom. I talked with Yoruba Richen briefly. Hadn’t seen her for more than twenty years. She hasn’t won an Oscar, but she has won a bunch of awards.
The venue was WXY Studio. Architects and Urban Planners, not movies. Yoruba and Adam Lubinsky, a principal at WXY (note the name), are old friends. Yoruba and her films had fans at WXY. The fans and the friend set up the showing of the which can also be seen streamed by the Smithsonian Channel.
I learned from the film. Also, from being in an audience that was minority white.
- Victor Hugo Green, creator of the Green Book was a postal worker with a genius for marketing and branding. He wasn’t the first to write a guide for Negroes looking for safe accommodations, but was the most successful – especially through his distribution through ESSO gas stations. His reliance for information on the network of Negro postal workers was part of his genius.
- The disdain African Americans have for the Oscar winning movie, done from the perspective of the white driver, is palpable.
- Conversations about issues are likely to include a discussion of reparations.
One last thought. Yoruba Richen’s film is, in a way, about the consequences of success. The growth of integration meant the end for many of the businesses black Americans found through the Green Book. Finding a way back for these businesses or businesses like them is a challenge.