Euzhan Palcy
First Black Female Filmmaker
Euzhan Palcy is the first black woman filmmaker
to have directed a feature-length Hollywood film, A DRY WHITE
SEASON(1989). Like Palcy herself, the film is controversial,
and of uncompromising passion and conviction.
Growing up in Martinique, Palcy knew by
the age of ten that she wanted to be a filmmaker. Despite
the lack of film and theater in her country, the American
films she managed to see depicted a people who bore no relationship
or resemblance of the people she knew, either in color or
custom. By the age of fourteen, Palcy had grown angry about
the misrepresentations being perpetuated about black people.
That anger fueled her early decision to become a filmmaker.
In an interview with Ally Acker, Palcy spoke of the shock
that this brought to her family:
At this time, you have to realize, saying
to my father or people in Martinique, "I want to be a
filmmaker." It's as if your child today would say...
"I want to be a cosmonaut."
By seventeen, Palcy showed enough promise
to have the local TV station offer her a weekly poetry show.
She had already released an album of children's songs that
did well commercially. After Palcy undertook her first filmmaking
venture in Martinique, creating a film out of her own drama
LA MESSAGÈRE (1975), she knew it was time to leave
home for a real apprenticeship. "I knew I had to go to
Paris, but I was so afraid. Paris was 5,000 kilometers away...
so far!"
Her father, whom Palcy calls the first feminist
she ever knew, made her promise to take a more secure route
and continue her education. Following his advice, she decided
to pursue her undergraduate studies at the Sorbonne in French
Literature, and in art and archeology. She passed the very
competitive entrance examination at the renowned Louis Lumiere
School of Cinema (of which only about twenty in two hundred
are accepted), and went on to earn a photography degree.
Palcy worked as an assistant editor on films
with young African directors who were shooting in France.
She also spent her free moments writing and rewriting what
would become SUGAR CANE ALLEY(1983). She wrote the first draft
when she just was seventeen, based on the novel "Black
Shack Alley" (1953) by a Martinique author, Joseph Sobel.
In 1975 she met the man who would become her Parisian godfather
and would help her to realize her dream--François Truffaut.
Truffaut's daughter Laura asked for the script and promised
that if she liked it, she would pass it on to her father.
The next thing Palcy knew: "He called
me! I couldn't believe It. Truffaut called me. I remember
the man, with his intense, small beady eyes. Both he and his
assistant at the time, Suzanne Shiffman, loved my script.
He showed me how to rework it."
Truffaut's encouragement gave Palcy the
belief and determination she needed to go to battle. Even
with his help, it would take three long years to raise the
$800,000 she needed to make SUGAR CANE ALLEY (Rue Cases Nègres).
The film, a moving and beautiful piece, portrays the growing
pains and joys of a twelve-year-old boy living on a poverty-stricken
Martinique plantation of the colonial '30's. Receiving rave
reviews, it won over 14 international prizes, including the
Silver Lion for Best First Feature and Best Female Lead at
the Venice Film Festival, in France, the Cesar for Best First
Film, and in America, the First Prize Critics Award at the
Houston Film Festival.
After SUGAR CANE ALLEY, Hollywood beckoned
Euzhan Palcy:
They called me, and very few black directors
are called to Hollywood. But they wanted me to do their stories.
I said, "I appreciate your interest, but I am a Black
Filmmaker." "Your other white filmmakers can do
those stories." Palcy decided she wanted to do a film
about apartheid. "I also know that Hollywood would not
do a film about black people unless the main character was
a white man."
She chose as her second film, a story based
on a novel by Andre Brink. The protagonist of A DRY WHITE
SEASON (1989), Ben Du Toit (played with sensitive skill by
Donald Sutherland), is a wealthy, white South African, sheltered
from the horrific realities of apartheid. In the middle of
his life, when racial injustice shakes the very roots of his
existence, he cannot deny what he feels is right: to stand
up for the under class.
She found an ally in producer Paula Weinstein,
who supported the project throughout. A rejection from Warner
Brothers served as a reminder of the recent controversy over
another South African film "Cry Freedom" (1987),
which had bombed at the box office. Finally, Palcy and Weinstein
found a sympathetic ear with Alan Ladd at MGM, where the film
found a home. Marlon Brando deemed the film so important that
he ended a nine-year period of seclusion, (since "The
Formula" 1980) to play the role of the famous South African
lawyer, for which he was nominated for an Academy Award.
A DRY WHITE SEASON (1989) depicts the black
experience in South Africa-the daily life in the townships,
which Palcy portrayed not as slums but simply very poor places
where determined people struggle to live decently.
Palcy infuses her characters with her own
strong will. As a "fighter with a mission," she
has let nothing stand in her way and consequently, found herself
in 1989 in the unique position of being the only black woman
ever to direct a feature of all-star caliber and to create
a film about a black struggle that transcends itself into
a human struggle.
Her 1992 film SIMEON won awards at the Milano
and Montreal Film Festivals, and a Special Jury Prize at the
1993 Brussels Film Festival.
We salute Euzhan Palcy... A NABFEME Shero!
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