|
The Other Denzel on The Great Debaters
By Fred Topel | Image property of TWC.
The Great Debaters is a dramatization of history, but there are characters based on real people. Denzel Whitaker plays James Farmer, Jr., the youngest competitor in Wiley College's debate team in 1935.
Denzel Whitaker One of The Great Debaters
"First of all, I think there’s a little pressure with wanting to do the actual person justice, playing the role," said Whitaker. "Just playing in a time period where African-Americans weren’t accepted in society, it’s hard. It’s kind of devastating to see. Of course, I’ve learned about it in our history books and what not but to actually play the character is a little different because you could relate to what your ancestors were going to. We’re thrown into situation, especially like the lynching scene or the pig farmer scene and we’re thrown into situations where they’ll pull a gun on us or we’re sitting in a car scared for our lives and we feel it as actors. Emotionally, we have a sense of disturbing images and kind of being scared in that situation. For me, it just brought me closer. It helped me to understand what I learned in the history books. It’s not just text anymore. I could say that part of me kind of lived it. It’s sad what America did. I look back on it and I definitely have a shame for America, a shame for human society as a whole. I’m glad were coming far away and we’re progressing ahead but things today like nooses and prejudice overall is still holding us back and, hopefully, with this film and other things in the future, we can overcome that."
Even early screenings of the film have impacted the interest in debate teams across the country, so the film is achieving Whitaker's goal. "I'm glad we're finally getting our message out. I mean even now, there's a higher rate of enrolment, people are becoming interested in debate, and the message we're really trying to get out is that we're trying to get out intelligence and it's powerful and that it's great, and sometimes even cool to be intelligent. So to see high enrolment rates already rising and people interested in school, I think we're already getting what we were set to do."
The Great Debaters
The Great Debaters
At 17, Whitaker sees a lot of things that need changing in the education system. "Right now, I’m trying to fill out my aps for colleges. For me it would have to be SAT’s, the reason being is it’s an important test, it’s a great test. Let me set it up for you. I go to a very good public school and sometimes they’d even say the curriculum is better than the private schools around my area. I’m fortunate and glad to be there but, at the same time, people, in order to come from my school and go to a good college you either have to take advanced placement classes and come out of there with a 4.something GPA, and I’m working with a 3.6 right now which I get basically all A’s, maybe a few B’s here and there in my classes. I was looking at my ap the other day and I had a pretty impressive application. I do a lot of activities in the community, as lot of community service and what not, but I was looking at it and I was like, ‘What they’re really going to base my test off of is my essay and my SATs and it’s really depressing that they are going to judge my life on a test that I’m going to spend four hours on one day when you can look on my whole academic career my whole life over the course of 18 years and not see anything remarkable in that.'"
With a system like that, perhaps it is film's job to educate the public. "Knowledge is power. That's always the message in life but I kind of reallyunderstand it from doing this movie, and I really want to get that across, just for kids even my age, and my peers. I was watching Chris Rock the other day, and he was talking about some people take pride in being dumb. I thought it was funny, I thought it was a joke but then when you really look at it, some people do. Some people don't take education seriously. Just like in that time, education was their only way out. Knowledge was the only way they were going to overcome, and getting everybody's voice out. It was up to these debaters to get their voice out and let America know what we were feeling. Nowadays, with so many outlets, you got podcasts, you got the internet, of course. Even in school, you have so many resources to get your voice heard, and yet I don't feel we're taking the opportunity to get our opinion out there, let it be known. Really, we're not even striving for education as much as we want to. So for me, just get out that education is important, knowledge is power."
The Great Debaters is out in theaters now.
For the trailer, posters, review and more movie info, go to The
Great Debaters Movie Page.
Fred Topel
Sources: Image property of TWC.
Contact
© 2004 Minds Eye One, All Rights Reserved
The Can Magazine™ is a trademark of Minds Eye One
All movie titles, movie icons, movie stills/clips/trailers/other media... are registered trademarks and/or copyrights of stated holders
CanMag.Com banners contain movie/gaming icons that were created by individual holders
Home > Movies > The Other Denzel on The Great Debaters
|
|
|
Add to Heffee!
