Friday and Ride Along Actor Ice Cube Wants Reparations From Hollywood Studios
Jorge Arenas
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Former NWA Rapper, and now family film actor Ice Cube detailed that he wants Hollywood production studios to pay reparations to black artists, directors and writers.
Ice Cube specifically is demanding the reparations “for all the damage they’ve done to black people.”
The Friday actor made his demands known in an interview with The Breakfast Club earlier this week.
Towards the end of the interview, Ice Cube is asked by Angela Yee, “And another thing you talk about is representation in the entertainment industry and reparations for that as well. So, I would love for you to expand on that because that is something you know way more than us.”
Ice Cube responded, “Virtually all the studios who contributed in our narrative, in our pain, in our misrepresentation in stealing our history and giving it to white people for over a 100 years… So I think these studios that we know and love should kick in to a studio that’s ran by black people with no outside influences, and whose movies and projects are owned by those black people.”
He continued, “Those black artists, those black directors and writers, and people who put the projects together should own the projects, and these studios they can license the projects, the movies, or the TV shows or whatever — or they don’t have to, we can put them on our own streaming services.”
“It’s a form of reparations from the entertainment industry if they all had to invest a certain amount of money into the studio each year as payment for all the damage they’ve done to black people,” he added.
He then explained why, “Because you are not a real artist if you are not controlling the narrative of your art. That’s just it. An artist not true if he cannot control his own narrative. It’s more of a project and something like that.”
He later added, “We should have a place to go where we know our movies are going to be done right. That don’t mean we don’t ever do another movie with a MGM, or Warner Bros., or Universal, or whoever. That don’t mean we never do another movie with them.”
Ice Cube continued, “That means artists who…every artist I know, every great actor or director or writer has 10 projects they can’t get made because some white people don’t understand what they are trying to make. And that’s a shame. So, we need our own place.
“And I know we are doing it. I’m extremely proud of Tyler Perry and what he is doing. But that man had to do that with his own two hands. And I just think there needs to be a place where Hollywood pays for what they’ve done to our people,” the Boyz n the Hood actor stated.
He elaborated, “Because cops learn how to kick our ass watching TV when they are little. That’s where they learn it. And they grow up and become cops and say, ‘Look, I saw this on NYPD Blue, this is how you are supposed to do them. Or I saw this on The Wire or some other shit that show’s us going to jail. So it’s Hollywood burden as well. They are not innocent and they can’t get away with just ‘Ain’t never hurt nobody.’ That’s bullshit.”
Later in the interview he would be asked by Charlamagne tha God, “I read Kareem Abdul-Jabbar’s article and I heard what Charles Barkley had to say. And since you are talking about Hollywood, they said some of the things you said were anti-Semitic, what has been the response from some of your Hollywood connects about that.”
Ice Cube responded, “I didn’t say anything. They can’t point out nothing I said. They are clumping everybody together instead of looking at everybody as an individual. We are all clumped in this wake.”
He later stated, “They are going to shoot arrows at me because of the Contract with Black America. Do not get it twisted. It’s because I have a bigger plan. I have something that can really change things financially for black people.”
He continued, “And a lot of these companies are what I call cookie jar companies. Cookie jar companies are companies where we caught your hand in the god damn cookie jar. We know you’ve been making money off of our pain. And you are going to pay for it. And we going to hunt you down. And we are going to hunt every company down that’s been doing it. Unless you come up with a plan to pay for your sins. That’s really why I am being attacked.”
Charlamagne tha God would then ask, “As a black man who has accomplished so much, do you do you truly feel free in America?”
Ice Cube responded, “No. No. There is no way to feel free in America because I’m connected to our people, so I actually feel the pain.”
He continued, “You feel it in your bones,…That’s how I feel when I see something happen to one of us in the street. I feel it in my bones, and so I don’t feel free. I feel like that person. I feel like that can happen to me [and] that can happen to one of my sons, that could happen to my daughter, that can having my nephews, nieces, my father. It can happen to my mother.”
He later stated, “How the hell you going to feel free in this country just because you got money? That ain’t shit. It’s what you need. But it don’t bring freedom. It just allows to you maneuver a little better. It don’t allow freedom.”
As Ice Cube mentioned his comments come after he announced A Contract With Black America. He revealed an updated version to this contract on Twitter.
He wrote, “We’ve been working with a lot of experts and great people during these last few weeks. The document is much stronger and much more detailed. We will continue towards perfection.”
A Contract With Black America claims black Americans are an “oppressed people.”
It begins, “After 400 years of unequal treatment, Black Americans have had enough with ‘gradual’ reform in a nation that prides itself as the world’s greatest democracy. While well-intentioned solutions may have been tried; it is simply too much to ask an oppressed people to stay ‘patient.'”
The document specifically outlines demands from Hollywood.
As you can see below those demands include “mandatory funding of ‘Black Studios’ by the largest Hollywood studios, record companies, Television studios, and Networks to compensate for years of lack of support, stereotyping, and damage to black culture.”
It also calls for “licensing of public airwaves to broadcast networks such as NBC, Fox, CBS, and ABC MUST require Black produced content equal to 20% of the total content on the network as measured by time.”
Finally it wants a “minimum 13.4% Black cast and crew on all major Television and Film productions.”
Ice Cube currently is in pre-production with Last Friday where he will reprise his role of Craig Jones alone side Mike Epps and Tommy “Tiny” Lister.
What do you make of Ice Cube’s comments? Do you think Hollywood should provide reparations “for all the damage they’ve done to black people?”