In this episode, host Brandon Jenkins speaks with filmmaker, actor, and martial artist Michael Jai White. They discuss the intersection between kung fu and Blaxploitation, his film "Black Dynamite," and what it's like to bring such an iconic era of film to a new generation. This Episode's Blaxploitation Watch List: Dolemite Is My Name (2019) Black Dynamite (2009) Superfly (1972) Willie Dynamite (1973) Trouble Man (1972) Shaft (1971) Cleopatra Jones (1973) The Mack (1973) Dolemite (1975)
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Brandon: Welcome back to There's Something About Dolemite. I'm Brandon Jenkins and this week we'll be talking about kung fu fighting pimps.
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Brandon: That was a scene of Rudy Ray Moore's Dolemite fighting off FBI agents attempting to arrest him. Moore was a huge fan of kung fu and made sure it had a role in all of his films, including Dolemite and its sequel, The Human Tornado. Dolemite wasn't the only one getting in on the action, either. His all-girl gang could throw kicks, too.
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Brandon: I can remember being a kid and going to the theater to see Jackie Chan's Rumble in the Bronx. I was electrified by the one-two punch of Jackie's grace and force. Like, "Damn, he packed everybody up and looked cool while doing it." I'd go on to learn that that youthful enthusiasm that I felt wasn't unique to my personal experience. If you haven't realized by now, it all goes back to the money. When Hollywood producers saw how much profit they could make off of Blaxploitation films, they realized they could do the same with low-fi foreign films, too. So they would often set up double features showing martial arts films and Blaxploitation films back-to-back in theaters. The effect was a crossover appeal that filled an appetite for kung fu among black film fans. International stars like Bruce Lee rose out of these foreign flicks like Way of the Dragon, Fist of Fury and, most notably, 1973's Enter the Dragon.
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Brandon: It was in Enter the Dragon that we saw the inclusion of black actors like Jim Kelly strengthening the cultural crossover even more. Martial arts took on a much different life in Blaxploitation movies. At times the scenes could be a little goofy. Like sometimes the sound effects for the kicks, punches and slaps would be completely off of the action. Today we still find kung fu references in various corners of black culture, like in 2009's Black Dynamite.
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Brandon: Black Dynamite follows the Blaxploitation formula to the T. The title character's a former CIA agent who sets out to avenge his brother's death. Although Black Dynamite means business, the film provides a lot of hilarious moments which feels like a nod to Rudy Ray Moore's Dolemite. Black Dynamite was played by Michael Jai White who created and wrote the film. White was inspired by the films of the seventies that played in theaters during his childhood, a childhood that also involved him learning the martial arts, a practice that he maintains today. With the combo of martial arts, filmmaking and fandom, Michael Jai White is really our modern-day avatar for the Blaxploitation era, which makes him the perfect person for this week's episode to discuss the deep relationship between black culture and kung fu.
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Brandon: Michael Jai White, thank you so much for joining us today.
Michael: Oh, thank you. Thank you.
Brandon: We're going to talk a little bit about your career and Blaxploitation a little later on, but I want to start by going back to when you were a kid and you were first introduced to martial arts. Do you remember how you got started?
Michael: Well, I started when I was about seven, seven or eight years old. You know, I started in what's really popular now, which is jiujitsu. I grew up in tough streets and, you know, I wanted some armor, basically. And it's a spartan society, so we tend to look toward things that are empowering, you know, because we're coming from the generation before us which felt like they were really downtrodden and really oppressed. And so as you noticed how when we started making the movies, there was a bit of an overcorrection, you know. And so, you know, we had the supermen. We had Superfly, The Mack, Willie Dynamite and Dolemite on our walls. And I said, "Wait a second, these were pimps," you know [laughs]. So [laughter] I had to really look at that. And I said, well, my goodness. And, you know, we had these movies where, you know, here's black men who were just slaughtering, like, 70 white people on the street with [laughs] nothing happening to them. And they were not meant as comedies. To me, that's funny as hell. And so [laughter] to treat it accurately is, you know, providing the comedy.
Brandon: Yeah. You know, you mentioned having these figures on your wall, which, when you think about it, is kind of crazy, but I like it because you position them as superheroes. Did any of the fighting in martial arts that you saw in these films attract you? Were you able to kind of evaluate and say, "Oh, this is this," or "This is that," or "Maybe it's not this good," or "Maybe it's better"?
Michael: Well, I mean, as a martial artist, I was influenced by the top martial artists, which were never represented in the Blaxploitation era because, you know, those two didn't kind of match up. There was some quotient of it in some of the Blaxploitation movies, but nowhere near the Shaw Brothers movies that influenced me martial arts-wise.
Brandon: Hmm. What do you think brought martial arts to Blaxploitation in the first place? Like, just this sort of cultural exchange that you see, whether it's true to form or not, there's still a presence. Like you said, there's a small quotient of it in there. What allowed that factor to permeate not just Blaxploitation films, but, ultimately, black culture?
Michael: Well, I tell you, the truth of the matter is, the first great martial artists all came from the hood. There's no disputing this. Martial arts was introduced in the black communities first. Think about it for a second: You had people coming in from Okinawa and Japan, you know, GIs stationed in Korea, all those different places, coming back to teach, you know, and train in this brutal—At that time, make no mistake, it was very brutal. This is something that you cannot sell in Beverly Hills. They had to open up in the hood first. So some of the greatest martial arts fighters came from the ghetto—there's no mistake about this—and then flourish from there. So honestly, there was a deep connection even before the movies.
Brandon: You know, you mention that martial arts came to the hood. I'm wondering in how that affected the neighborhood. I'm wondering how the reverse affected that; the fact of it landing in the hands of these black and brown people in what amounts to isolated areas and how that affects the way that we see it in the streets, see it in film and television; how someone like myself can grow up in a world where, you know, I had a black Taekwondo instructor.
Michael: Right. I mean, man, there was no other place for anybody to teach that. People who grew up and had to fight for a living and for their existence, they were the first students. And at that time, that's why the powers that be were quite afraid of it. And that was a time when people had to register their hands as weapons because, you know, you were a weapon at that time. There's no way you could get a black belt without damn near losing some teeth.
Brandon: Jesus.
Michael: Yeah. It was really rough then. So these are the images I grew up with. When I'm seven years old, those are the images I saw in the adults and what fighting really looked like. And so, you know, you had to be a tough person.
Brandon: I'm wondering why in these films, you said, like, it's sort of art imitates life and maybe a little bit of the reverse effect, as well. But you know, you see these films and various forms of violence or fighting or conflict are prevalent, whether it be a simple argument all the way to, like, the use of, like, guns. But in a lot of them, you do see martial arts. And I just wonder what that gravitational pull is that says, "Hey, this is going to be the way we depict conflict. This is going to be the way we depict alpha males. This is the way—alpha female. This is going to be the way we depict authority."
Michael: It will always be. As a human animal, if we want to look for something that represents the closest thing to super heroics, is that not the marital arts? That is the closest thing to somebody being able to tap into a strength that's usually beyond what we normally expect. You know, if you looked at Bruce Lee, if you looked at Sonny Chiba, those type of people, they were tapping into an internal manifestation of martial arts, more so than people might understand today. In the seventies, it was more so of the internal fortitude that you saw than anything else. Look at Jim Kelly. Jim Kelly, when you really dissect what he does, right, somebody—and I hate to sound like this, but look at the way Jim Kelly kicks. Look at a lot of his techniques. It's not particularly advanced. But his attitude is. That is really what, you know, people come away with, you know. And that's the spirit of martial arts. And so that spirit always spoke louder than anything else.
Brandon: Well, what would we say about your character in Black Dynamite? You know, Black Dynamite drops in 2009. It's been about a decade. You both wrote it and starred in it. Can you kind of tell us about the fires that forged that film.
Michael: Well, I mean, my heroes, man, my heroes were people like Robert Hooks. Man, he was the man to me. And you know, he played in this movie Trouble Man. And, my God, I never saw a more strong and cooler image in my entire life. Even to this day. To me, Robert Hooks was, like, he was the ultimate. And for Black Dynamite, you know, it was like a combination of, you know, Robert Hooks, Jim Brown, Fred Williamson and Jim Kelly. That's kind of who I kind of concocted to be Black Dynamite, but then as a loving homage to the entire genre. Sometime I want to say Blaxploitation, but I mean, Shaft could not be a Blaxploitation movie; Shaft was an action movie. Cleopatra Jones was an action move that starred black action stars. Unfortunately, that kind of Blaxploitation, you know, title gets spread on, you know, legitimate action movies that starred black people. But, you know, of course, there was an exploitive part of it when Hollywood found out that they can exploit this genre and get money from them.
Brandon: So then I wonder, what term would you denote to Black Dynamite?
Michael: Well, I mean, Black Dynamite was, you know, it's an homage to that era where there was Blaxploitation—you know, which brings us back to what we're talking about today—that represented every spectrum of those movies. Where you got the Dolemite movies which were movies that were, like, you know, "I'm going to get this done," type of movie [laughter], you know. Any way possible. And of course, there's funny things that occur when you're just doing a movie on a absolute shoestring budget. And then you got the other end of the spectrum where you got The Mack, you know, which, you know, you had, you know, Max Julien and Richard Pryor. That could have been nominated to me.
Brandon: Won awards.
Michael: Yeah. Because. I mean, to me, Hustle & Flow was just a updated version of The Mack, you know, to some degree.
Brandon: [Whistles] Wow.
Michael: But you know, so you had the whole spectrum. So Black Dynamite, I want to do a homage to all of that.
Brandon: And the fact that you've wrote it, as well, you know, it's like you really put your heart and soul into making this happen. Why was it such a focus? I mean, it's one thing to have a passion for these things and to enjoy them, but to decide, "Hey, it's 2009. I'm going to make sure that people see this and I'm going to incorporate a little bit of everything. There is going to be action. There is going to be heroics and alpha males. And there is going to be humor. All of these things baked into one film." And in an era that's decades after essentially the run of the core of Blaxploitation.
Michael: Yeah. Well, I mean, it was so alive at that time. Look at the layers of it. See, I wanted to do the movie and make it feel exactly like the first time you're seeing one of those movies. You see that same element with Stranger Things. You're watching Stranger Things and you swear…
Brandon: Word.
Michael: …you're reliving the experience of watching an eighties movie. And they put all kinds of elements of the eighties into that movie. This is exactly what I was doing with Black Dynamite where, you know, you've got the boom mic showing up in the shot, yet the producers think, "Okay. Nobody's going to notice that," you know. You know, I borrowed that from Dolemite and Rudy Ray Moore, you know. There's a lot of stuff I borrowed from Dolemite in the movie, you know. Like, there's the boom mic thing and there's also, I mean, my favorite line from any Dolemite movie I had to stick in Black Dynamite, which was, "Where is Bucky and what have he had?" [Laughter] Which, to me, was just—I would just play that sometimes. It's just hilarious.
Brandon: I got to tell you—I don't want to interrupt, but the line in Black Dynamite, "When it's euphoria, shut the up," that is the one that we've been running back over and over and over again. And the passion you have for that line is sort of the passion that I have for this line. It's like comedic gold.
Michael: Well, thank you. Thank you. I mean, you know, I love that genre. And it really spoke of a time that was so electric, right? And it only existed for, like, really, four-and-a-half, five years.
Brandon: Yeah.
Michael: You know? And so, you know, I wanted to put that up, you know, at a time where we could reflect on it and extract what was so beautiful and funny at the same time.
Brandon: What about the martial arts that we find in the film? You know, it's some really amazing fight scenes. Can you kind of talk to us about your decision-making and why you chose to incorporate what you incorporated.
Michael: Well, yeah. If you're going to have a badass black superhero, you got to have him doing kung fu, even if they could barely kick, you know [laughter], which was really always pretty damn funny. But of course, with this character, yeah, I mean, since I am a martial artist I, you know, definitely had to put that stuff in there.
Brandon: Yeah.
Michael: Yeah.
Brandon: You mention Rudy Ray Moore in Dolemite. In what ways did he influence the film outside of just maybe comedic timing or leaving the boom mic in the shot?
Michael: Well, I mean, luckily, I actually met Rudy Ray Moore. When I met him, I really was trying to figure out, was he serious? You know, like, where did Rudy Ray Moore end and Dolemite begin? Like, is that the same character? Is he doing a Andy Kaufman type of thing? But you know, it was like he just was moving forward. He had the gumption to get these movies done. Though he wasn't the smoothest cat in the world and he had this awkwardness that I thought was hilarious, but a lot of that was not intentional. It was just him just moving forward, you know. Just getting it done. Like, when you see him doing the martial arts, there was this thing that he would do. And I don't know if you've seen, I think it's Avenging Disco Godfather, where he kind of goes, "[Makes noise]." And so I really wondered, like, where did that come from? But he was kind of serious.
Brandon: So is it fair to say that Dolemite had, I mean, clearly, an effect on you, but what do you think about his lasting legacy and sort of impact on Blaxploitation, but also just, like, his work in black film in culture?
Michael: Yeah. I mean, you know, here is a guy who, you know, he did his albums and what have you and he just had that fortitude to get these movies done. And so that's very heroic on his side. And then have a following that, you know, I mean, you really couldn’t take your eyes off of it. You know, it became its own kind of animal, you know?
Brandon: Sort of like a movement.
Michael: Yeah. His delivery, all of that. And even though it's crazy, like I say, you can't take your eyes off of it. And so, you know, I was really happy about, you know, Eddie doing this story about him because, you know, I found him to be a fascinating character. But you know, what would that movement be like without that guy?
Brandon: We're thinking about the work you've done, not just, you know, sharing your story here with us but, you know, like, to make these films and not just star in them; to decide, "Hey, I want to keep this style going. I want people to have this information in this new era so that both they can enjoy this film, but also look backward and say, 'Hey, like, this is a piece of this history and culture.'" Do you feel like you're carrying a torch for Blaxploitation or really just that era at large?
Michael: Absolutely. Look, I mean, I could watch a piece of the action right now and feel as connected to it as the time when I first saw it. It actually even means more now, you know. And you know, it's still relevant. You know, it's a shame that you have to go back to find these images, these all-powerful images of black folks. To this day there has not been anything like that. You know, I just invite anyone to just kind of do a comparison contrast.
Brandon: Kind of just look into it.
Michael: Yeah, yeah. It's interesting. You know, if there's an evolution, what happened to our badasses, you know?
Brandon: I mean, maybe that's why there's such that love for Black Dynamite, right? You know, it's like working as much as you can outside of the system, as well as what I was reading about your upcoming film, you know, working outside the system so that you can make something that isn't diluted, right? Something that feels true to the essence that you want to portray.
Michael: Well, I've had so many opportunities to do it the other way. But no, I'm going to look at myself in the mirror for the rest of my life. I'm going to be true to me. Because guess what, Jim Brown, Fred Williamson, those guys, they're friends of mine. And there's something that I have a kinship with and that's about being true to myself. And I wouldn’t sell that for anything. Anything. I can give you horror stories and [laughs] all kinds of stuff about, you know, about offers and stuff that, you know, for me to do things that were, you know, beneath me. But you know, I continue to be the happiest person I know, or one of them, and I think it's because you know, I'm staying true to who I am. And I'm being blessed to be able to continue with my art. And I'm not going to change.
Brandon: Yeah. And my final question for you: What's on your Blaxploitation watch list? What's the films that anyone listening to this podcast, they got to go watch?
Michael: Well, you got to watch The Mack. I mean, my goodness, it's, like, look at these movies when people called each other Brother and they really meant it. And nobody had to, you know, comb, shuck and jive or anything. And it's some great entertainment. I would say start there. And then kind of celebrate what was beautiful about them.
Brandon: Yeah. Michael Jai White, thank you. Thank you for the conversation. Thank you for your time.
Michael: Well, thank you. Thank you.
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Brandon: Thank you all so much for tuning in. Before we go, we got a quick message from Wesley Snipes who stars as D'Urville Martin in Dolemite is My Name.
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Brandon: Remember, check out Dolemite is My Name out now on Netflix. Share your thoughts about the show by tweeting our friends at Strong Black Lead. This show is a collaboration between Netflix' Strong Black Lead and Pineapple Street Studios. Special thanks to executive producers Jasmine Lawson [phonetic 00:19:32], Jenna Weiss-Berman and Max Linsky. Shout out to my producers Agerenesh Ashagre and Jess Jupiter. Our original music is by Daoud Anthony. Tell your friends about the show and make sure to rate and subscribe to There's Something About Dolemite on Apple Podcast, Spotify and wherever you get your podcasts. And that's it. That's our show. We'll see you all next week.
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