Director Dawn Porter has added another unique distinction to her far-reaching career achievements as for the first time she brings two documentaries to this year’s Tribeca Festival, which got underway yesterday (6/5) and runs through June 16. Selected to compete in the Spotlight Documentary program are her Luther: Never Too Much and Power of the Dream.
The former takes an in-depth look into the life and career of Luther Vandross as he overcomes personal and professional challenges to become an all-time great vocalist. And Power of the Dream follows a WNBA story where activism and sports converge, helping to profoundly change the course of U.S. politics.
Porter is no stranger to Tribeca. At the 2011 Tribeca Festival, her Gideon’s Army–which introduced us to three Black public defenders in the South–received the Tribeca Film Institute’s Tribeca All Access Creative Promise Award For Documentary. Also making the Tribeca cut over the years have been Porter’s Trapped, and The Lady Bird Diaries. Trapped, which won the Sundance Special Jury Prize in 2016, explored TRAP Laws (Targeted Regulation of Abortion Providers) that regulated abortion clinics in the South. The Lady Bird Diaries tapped into Lady Bird Johnson’s audio diaries to tell the story of one of the most influential and least understood First Ladies in history.
As a native New Yorker, Porter said that the Tribeca Festival holds a special place in her heart. Being able to share her films in theaters with New York audiences has meant a great deal to her in the context of the festival. And to be able to share two films this year is especially gratifying.
Power of the Dream was a late addition to the Tribeca lineup. Porter said it wasn’t clear at one point if there would be a festival window for the film. To have it at Tribeca is akin to “the icing on the cake” for Porter who noted that it and Luther: Never Too Much are decidedly different films, which speaks to the power of the documentary discipline that can take so many varied forms.
Porter is an unabashed WNBA fan, particularly of the New York Liberty. Power of the Dream presented the opportunity to tell a sports story which is also a political story. She described the WNBA players as “fearless” on the court and off with social justice being an essential part of their DNA. When Georgia Senator Kelly Loeffler, a co-owner of the WNBA’s Atlanta Dream franchise, objected to the basketball league’s support of Black Lives Matter (BLM), star players pushed back. They condemned Loeffler’s stance–which included her appearance on Fox News denouncing BLM as “divisive” and “Marxist”–and then they dedicated the WNBA season to the memory of Breonna Taylor, the Louisville, Ky. medical worker killed by police. Next, assorted WNBA players showed their support for the Rev. Raphael Warnock, the Democratic Party candidate who was in a runoff election against incumbent Republican Loeffler. Star players–initially from the Atlanta Dream and Phoenix Mercury–began wearing black shirts with an all-caps message in white on the front: “VOTE WARNOCK.” The garb spread through the WNBA like wildfire and generated a social media buzz, bringing momentum to the Warnock campaign. In many circles the WNBA movement was cited as being a key contributor to what became an historic win for Warnock. Coupled with Democrat Jon Ossoff’s win against incumbent Republican Senator David Perdue in the state’s other runoff race, Georgia flipped from red to blue in 2021 and gave control of the U.S. Senate to the Democrats.
Porter noted that Warnock himself credited the Atlanta Dream with putting him on the map. Power of the Dream chronicles the activism of the WNBA. Porter described the WNBA players as “regular people, not politicians” and they simply did “what they thought was right.” They are living examples, she continued, who counter many people’s notion that their voice or vote doesn’t matter. Their voices do count and can have a positive impact.
Meanwhile the draw of the Vandross documentary for Porter was self-evident. Sony Music Entertainment has a deep history with so many artists in its catalog. And when Vandross’ name came up, Porter was immediately intrigued based on “how important his music is not just to R&B but to all American music.” When she got a look-see at the archival cornucopia available to her, including interviews and rehearsal footage, she realized, “Luther can star in his own film even though he’s not with us here anymore.”
Vandross’ story is multi-dimensional, continued Porter. “He struggled so much, more than people know” and he contributed “to so many different kinds of music. He sang backup for Bette Midler, Carly Simon, James Taylor, was discovered by David Bowie. In the early days it was clear he had been inspired by Black women vocalists” like Dionne Warwick. “He gave credit to them for inspiring him. He was clear about celebrating the music that influenced him.”
There was a lot to discover about Vandross, continued Porter, who learned, among other things, that he was on Sesame Street, and that he sang jingles. Having the archival resources enabled her to bring viewers “back in time” to connect with a virtuoso artist.
Power of the Dream and Luther: Never Too Much add to Porter’s body of work which ranges far and wide–from the News & Documentary Emmy-nominated Gideon’s Army to Trapped as well as to Deadlocked: How America Shaped the Supreme Court (a four-part Showtime series), The Way I See It, about photojournalist Pete Souza who served as chief official White House photographer for President Ronald Regan and President Barack Obama, the docuseries Bobby Kennedy for President, and Cirque du Soleil: Without a Net, highlighting the return of Cirque du Soleil after the Montreal-based entertainment company was shuttered during the COVID pandemic.
In 2020 Porter received the Critics Choice Association’s Impact Award which recognizes documentarians whose work has resulted in tangible societal changes. That came just two years after she was a Critics Choice Documentary Award nominee for John Lewis: Good Trouble, which examined the late Congressman Lewis’ pivotal role in the Civil Rights movement and decades of political and social activism on vital issues including voting rights and immigration laws. Porter said she saw Lewis’ spirit among the rank and file of the WNBA during the course of making Power of the Dream.
Porter was celebrated at AFI Docs, the American Film Institute’s documentary film festival, as the 2021 Charles Guggenheim Symposium honoree. The Guggenheim Symposium honors a master of the nonfiction art form. That year AFI Docs screened Porter’s Rise Again: Tulsa And The Red Summer followed by an in-depth conversation with the documentarian. Rise Again: Tulsa And The Red Summer followed award-winning Washington Post journalist DeNeen Brown as her investigation into a mass grave in her home state of Oklahoma led her to dig deeper into the racial violence of the early 20th century. The film came 100 years after the Tulsa Massacre of 1921, during which hundreds of Tulsa’s Black residents were murdered and thousands were displaced.
Porter is also exploring shorter form endeavors in the commercialmaking and branded content world via Institute, filmmaker Lauren Greenfield’s production company which is designed to open up opportunities in the advertising space for women directors and other underrepresented voices spanning different ethnicities. Porter looks forward to her work in this field and discovering how it may inform her ongoing documentary filmmaking. She at press time was directing a short for A&E Television.
Porter has been involved in short-form fare over the years. Her Bree Wayy: Promise Witness Remembrance for MTV explores Breonna Taylor’s legacy from the artwork she inspired. That artwork has helped Taylor’s mother, Tamika Palmer, to heal after her daughter’s death. Bree Wayy also introduces us to artist Amy Sherald and a portrait she created that became the centerpiece of an art exhibit in a Louisville museum paying tribute to Taylor. The film examines how art can serve as a means of protest as well as a way to realize some measure of comfort in the midst of grief.
John Antonio James, Bill Mack
Also selected for Tribeca’s Spotlight Documentary lineup is Black Table directed by John Antonio James and Bill Mack. In the wake of the Supreme Court’s decision to abolish affirmative action, this film thoughtfully looks back at the largest class of Black students at Yale University in the 1990s, the dining table that bonded them, and how their story informs our future.
Regarding the genesis of the film, James shared, “My first film premiered during COVID, so I had a lot of time indoors to think about my next project. I kept returning to my college days at Yale in the mid-’90s. There was the golden age of hip hop, Clinton, the L.A. riots, and Newt Gingrich’s ‘Contract with America.’ One memory that stood out was the so-called ‘Black table’ at Yale, where Black students gathered daily to share meals in the University Commons. In the fall of 2020, we rented a mansion on the Hudson River to recreate Yale’s Gothic background for some test filming. Most of the crew were just happy to socialize and get outside for a while. We invited friends and fellow graduates of the class of 1997–one of the largest classes of Black students that Yale had ever recruited–to tell us about their experience at Yale and the significance of the table. Three years later, those conversations evolved into a feature about a class interacting at a university dining hall table during the advent of America’s culture wars, at a time when the civil rights movement appeared to be losing momentum. Our curiosity about why all the Black students gathered at Yale’s dining hall in the mid-1990s led us down different paths. The table, it turned out, was a lens for talking about dog whistles in American politics, affirmative action in higher education and the OJ Simpson trial, among other things. Ultimately, our journey was a lesson in grace, healing, and reconnecting with old friends.”
Mack related, “The Black table in the Yale commons dining hall has always been a sort of paradox for me. Arriving as a freshman at Yale in the fall of 1991, I found the table to be a solace most similar to a dinner table at my godmother’s house in Harlem. There we ate, laughed, and discussed the highly racialized politics of New York in the ’80s. At Yale, the table was similar. But despite the laughter, there was a serious tone because the sophomores had experienced a racial incident starting at a pizza parlor that mushroomed into protests, a boycott and heightened racial tensions on campus. The melancholic tone around this incident clouded my experience for two years until the fall of 1993 when the class of ‘97 set foot on campus. This class, with the largest number of Black students to date, was so diverse, and their enthusiasm was contagious. Cut to 20 years later, my classmate John James showed me a sizzle reel with preliminary interviews, and I was immediately engaged by the project. I was willing to participate in any capacity because frankly I hadn’t seen this in the ‘Black stories’ that are currently being told.
As for the biggest challenges that Black Table posed to them, James cited “bringing the table to life…Navigating Yale’s Manuscripts & Archives collection during COVID was tricky due to staff shortages and lengthy turnaround times. Our search for archival photos and videos often felt like an impossible task. Eventually, we hit a wall and turned to crowdsourcing. We relied on a small group of dedicated Yalies from the class of ‘97 to share their personal archives and send us everything they had. Bill and I said from the start that there must have been a couple of students walking around Yale with cameras on their necks, and that we just had to find them. We did!”
Mack added, “Regarding personal images, we literally had folks bring their photos to the interview shoots and scanned them while we filmed. We also brought scanners to peoples’ homes and places of business if they were not comfortable sending them to us. Also I think, a creative challenge we addressed in postproduction was trying to create an atmosphere in the film where the audience feels like they are sitting at the Black table. We wanted those who may never have sat there to be a part of that conversation.”
Asked about their biggest takeaway or lessons learned from making Black Table, James observed, “For me, learning about the racial gauntlet Black students faced in higher education in the ‘90s, was eye-opening. Although I had a vague idea of what I might hear from the cast, I wasn’t prepared for some of the stories. They hit hard. I’m not a particularly religious person, but sometimes the stories felt like prayers.”
Mack related, “The Black Table project for me confronted the unexpected racial issues I faced as a student and in various situations prior and since. Interviewing the cast of students and experts was like going to church and the entire congregation shouting a resounding ‘Amen.’ In a way, the end of affirmative action takes away the excuse that we’ve heard why we got something or someone else didn’t. Although the subjects of the film faced hardships, they continued to strive personally and for the greater good. I hope this spirit of the film inspires those who have–and haven’t–sat at a Black table.”
The inclusion of the film at Tribeca means a great deal to the filmmakers. James said, “The process of making documentaries can be time-consuming and tedious when the camera isn’t rolling. It requires patience and perseverance. Tribeca is a moment to pause and appreciate the collective effort. I can’t think of another way to get so many people together in one place like Tribeca can in an era when festivals–and multiplexes–are under such pressure. Tribeca gives filmmakers the exposure they need to establish a body of work, find an audience, and chart a course.”
Mack said he was “honored that Tribeca selected Black Table for the Spotlight program. I think the subject matter is timely as the conservative Supreme Court recently decided to end affirmative action for university admissions. Premiering at Tribeca will get the film seen and hopefully start to demystify the Black table phenomenon that people encounter at school, work and other social gatherings.”
Rodney Lucas
Having his Black Hercules selected for the Shorts program at Tribeca marks what director Rodney Lucas described as a “full circle moment” for him. He recalled a friend sneaking him into one of the festival screenings some 15 years ago. At the time, Lucas was homeless, living in New York City. “At that point, I never thought one day I’d have a film premiering at the same festival.”
Lucas feels that making the Tribeca cut this year represents “love coming full circle,” allowing him in a sense “to give honor and gratitude to every restaurant in New York City that I worked at, every couch I slept on, every park bench I slept on in New York City. The festival is a New York-born thing and I always wanted to be accepted by New York personally and as an artist.”
Additionally, Lucas affirmed that “whenever work is recognized by an institution as underground, as organic and New York-led as Tribeca, it means the world.”
Born in Chicago, Lucas moved to New York some 20 years ago, inspired by the Malcolm X biography and the work of Spike Lee. Lucas was drawn to “the level of Black energy and creativity happening in Harlem,” as talked about by Malcolm X.
Black Hercules is described in the Tribeca program as “a soulfully candid pilgrimage into the life and times of street bodybuilder Craig Monson–and the social dichotomy of Black L.A. that made him into a legend.”
Monson’s story resonated with Lucas. “There’s a Black Hercules in every Black community,” said Lucas, referring to Blacks who would go to prison and “come out ripped.” Lucas was fascinated by this body building reflecting a level of self-care that these men exercised even in bondage.
Lucas first came to know about this upon reading Huey P. Newton’s book, “Revolutionary Suicide.” Body building to this extent was “a revolutionary act” according to Newton. Lucas explained, “Confined to a small physical space, they find enough self-importance and self-love to be able to stay in shape, to keep the body almost at its peak performance. It was a way to show prison guards and the authorities that even though you can lock, cage, even abuse me, you can’t control my body. That’s the genesis of Black Hercules…my personal love letter so to speak to the brothers who were in the system.” It’s a high level of beautiful Black-self care through exercise regimen. “Black Hercules became our super heroes to some degree, representing the silent power within a man. Craig represented the alpha Omega of that.”
The film was so meaningful and personal to Lucas that a part of him wanted to keep it to himself. However Rhea Scott, president of Little Minx, the production company which represents him for commercials and content, wasn’t about to let that happen. Lucas recalled Scott telling him the project was too beautiful to keep under wraps, that it had to get out to the public.
Lucas took her advice. “I see Black Hercules on the streets of Brooklyn and Harlem. I admire those brothers so much. They have given me knowledge and information that can only be transferred between Black men. It is time to present that to the world. I didn’t want to let those conversations go.”
The experience of making Black Hercules reaffirmed for Lucas the collaborative nature of filmmaking. The short wouldn’t have come to fruition without the support of a tribe of dedicated people. “That group believed in Black Hercules as much as I did.” Acknowledging that earlier on he tended to be kind of “a lone ranger,” Lucas said that filmmaking got him to fully realize “the importance of a team and giving glory to that team.”
On the alluded to advertising front, Lucas has directed short documentaries, commercials and branded content for the likes of Nike, Amazon, Beats by Dre, NOWNESS, Vice, Upworthy, Dicks Sporting Goods, Facebook, Clarks Originals and Toms, among others. He’s cited as being the only Black director who had a spot on the 2023 Super Bowl, NFL’s “We See You.” His most recent work includes Wieden+Kennedy’s first campaign for Ancestry.com, about families who pass down their passions through generations including The Hughes, who are Black cowboys, and the Serrano family who nurture a passion for low riding and vintage cars. Lucas also directed a brand short for Under Armour’s “Protect This House” campaign featuring Maro Itoje, a Nigerian-born rugby player raised in England who never lost sight of his roots and prides himself in being a role model.
Lucas also recently received a Daytime Emmy nomination for Best Director on the strength of Searching For Soul Food, a documentary/reality-TV series on Hulu. The Huffington Post wrote that “Soul Food crosses borders–geographic and cultural. It’s not just about the African American experience but also about the spirit of the Black diaspora including South Africa, Peru and Jamaica. It’s also not even just Black, as [Chef Alisa Reynolds] visits the Choctaw tribe in Oklahoma, white folks in Appalachia, and Italians in Naples, Italy.”
Michael Marantz
Director Michael Marantz is returning to Tribeca. The first go-around came in 2021 for his thriller short, We Do This Once. Fast forward to the 2024 fest and he’s about to unveil another short, The White Rabbit, which he wrote, directed and scored.
At press time, Marantz was looking to avoid any disclosure that could spoil The White Rabbit narrative for prospective viewers. Suffice it to say that the story involves a Brooklyn couple with two sons who move to New Jersey, end up living next to a mobster–and there’s a murder. “All is not what it seems,” related Marantz who first heard the tale from a producer while directing a Starbucks commercial about a year and a half ago. The producer said the story was true–and variations of it have been told by stand-up comedians, who’ve passed it off as their own, since the 1950s.
Marantz said he was blessed with a talented cast headed by Kate Arrington and Danny Burstein who portray the Brooklyn couple, with Max Casella as the mobster. Casting was done by Avy Kaufman (casting director on such TV series as Succession, Ripley and Fellow Travelers, feature films Nyad and Rustin) and Leeba Zakharov (casting associate on the feature The Eyes of Tammy Faye, and TV series including Interview with the Vampire).
The White Rabbit was a labor of love–for Marantz, the cast and crew. “You have got to want to do it. There’s no way to make your money back with a short so it has to come from a passionate place,” he said, adding that you’re asking favors from all these people,” which translates into additional pressure in that you want “to make sure it’s good and they’re proud of what you made.”
As for his biggest takeaway from The White Rabbit, Marantz shared, “A deep profound love for filmmaking once again. It continually amazes me how beautiful a process it is, a process I absolutely adore.”
An alumnus of SHOOT’s 2015 New Directors Showcase, Marantz is repped by m ss ng p eces for commercials and branded content. He noted that his commercialmaking experiences continue to inform his overall filmmaking, which includes not just shorts but his first feature currently in pre-pro. Commercials have given him the opportunity to explore, helped to make him more and more comfortable on set over the years. “Every day on set is incredibly valuable. You always learn new things.”
Marantz’s alluded to first feature film is titled Two Roads, which he wrote and will be directing, with casting by Kaufman and Zakharov. The storyline involves a haunted podcaster who in a race against time delves into a labyrinth of lies and family secrets to unearth the truth behind his sister’s disappearance, crossing paths with a resilient woman facing her own dark past, together challenging fate in a quest for redemption and healing.
