A Rage in Harlem (film)
Encyclopedia
A Rage in Harlem is a 1991 film starring Forest Whitaker
, Danny Glover
, Badja Djola
, Robin Givens
and Gregory Hines
and loosely based on Chester Himes
' novel of the same name.
, eventually credited as an executive producer, got the project started when he optioned the rights to Himes' novel. Hornberg, a first-time producer approached John Toles-Bey, a Chicago-based actor with no screenwriting credits, to draft the film's first script; the development effort gained steam after Hornberg met Kerry Boyle of Palace Productions, and through the efforts of Boyle and Stephen Woolley
, the film was sold to Miramax Films
and given the green-light.
According to publicity leading up to the start of principal photography
, Forest Whitaker
was the first of the two lead actors to commit to the film, described as an action-comedy with "very dark" comedy. Whitaker among others, was consulted as Boyle and Woolley sought an African American to direct the film, doing so because they believed "maintaining the cultural integrity of the novel demanded a black director"; they also wanted "someone who was older and secure enough to collaborate and make a picture that we could distribute widely, but who still had a passion for the material." They chose Duke in part for his experience directing Hill Street Blues
, experience that was key "because of the way that series mixed humor and violence." Duke later cast Robin Givens
to play the female lead after considering 300 women for the part.
The film was shot in the Cincinnati, Ohio
neighborhood of Over-the-Rhine
, whose "un-gentrified area
of the old downtown
lower depths stood in quite nicely for ... 1950s Harlem." About midway during production, it turned out that Duke and Woolley had undiscussed differences about the tone the film was going to take:
in its Grand Palais, receiving a "five-minute standing ovation
." It was also shown at the 2nd Stockholm International Film Festival
.
Vincent Canby
, reviewing the film for The New York Times
, called it "painless, occasionally funny" but with a "heedlessly incomprehensible plot"; according to Canby, "because the screenplay is so thin, the characters are revealed entirely by the actors who play them. Miss Givens does particularly well as a doxy with a heart of gold as well as a trunk full of it. She looks great and shows a real flair for absurd comedy.Mr. Hines, Mr. Whitaker and Mr. Glover also are in good form, as are Badja Djola, who plays Imabelle's intimidatingly large former lover, the guy she's stolen the gold from, and Mr. Toles-Bey, who, in addition to working on the screenplay, appears as one of the bad guys."
According to Box Office Mojo
, the film grossed about $10.4 million in the United States.
Forest Whitaker
Forest Steven Whitaker is an American actor, producer, and director. He has earned a reputation for intensive character study work for films such as Bird and Ghost Dog: The Way of the Samurai, and for his recurring role as ex-LAPD Lieutenant Jon Kavanaugh on the gritty, award-winning television...
, Danny Glover
Danny Glover
Danny Lebern Glover is an American actor, film director, and political activist. Glover is perhaps best known for his role as Detective Roger Murtaugh in the Lethal Weapon film franchise.-Early life:...
, Badja Djola
Badja Djola
Badja Medu Djola was an American actor. D’jola appeared in 47 films and TV shows during his career. His best role was as Leon Isaac Kennedy’s cellmate in the movie "Penitentiary." D’jola played the bad guy character "Half Dead." He showed exceptional acting talent in the movie, which lead to more...
, Robin Givens
Robin Givens
Robin Simone Givens is an American model and film, television, and stage actress. She is best known for her role as Darlene Merriman on the television series Head of the Class.-Early life:...
and Gregory Hines
Gregory Hines
Gregory Oliver Hines was an American actor, singer, dancer and choreographer.-Early years:Born in New York City, Hines and his older brother Maurice started dancing at an early age, studying with choreographer Henry LeTang...
and loosely based on Chester Himes
Chester Himes
Chester Bomar Himes was an American writer. His works include If He Hollers Let Him Go and a series of Harlem Detective novels...
' novel of the same name.
Cast
- Forest WhitakerForest WhitakerForest Steven Whitaker is an American actor, producer, and director. He has earned a reputation for intensive character study work for films such as Bird and Ghost Dog: The Way of the Samurai, and for his recurring role as ex-LAPD Lieutenant Jon Kavanaugh on the gritty, award-winning television...
- Jackson - Gregory HinesGregory HinesGregory Oliver Hines was an American actor, singer, dancer and choreographer.-Early years:Born in New York City, Hines and his older brother Maurice started dancing at an early age, studying with choreographer Henry LeTang...
- Goldy - Robin GivensRobin GivensRobin Simone Givens is an American model and film, television, and stage actress. She is best known for her role as Darlene Merriman on the television series Head of the Class.-Early life:...
- Imabelle - Zakes MokaeZakes MokaeZakes Makgona Mokae was a South African-born American actor.-Life and career:Mokae was born in Johannesburg, South Africa, moved to Great Britain in 1961, and to the United States in 1969. He turned to acting at the same time as playwright Athol Fugard was emerging...
- Big Kathy - Danny GloverDanny GloverDanny Lebern Glover is an American actor, film director, and political activist. Glover is perhaps best known for his role as Detective Roger Murtaugh in the Lethal Weapon film franchise.-Early life:...
- Easy Money - Badja DjolaBadja DjolaBadja Medu Djola was an American actor. D’jola appeared in 47 films and TV shows during his career. His best role was as Leon Isaac Kennedy’s cellmate in the movie "Penitentiary." D’jola played the bad guy character "Half Dead." He showed exceptional acting talent in the movie, which lead to more...
- Slim - John Toles-Bey - Jodie
- Tyler CollinsTyler CollinsTyler Collins an American R&B singer.-Biography:Collins was born in Harlem, New York and raised in Detroit, Michigan. Collins began taking lessons in dance and theatre, and performing with the children's theatre group, Willow Opera Workshop in Los Angeles, CA.Her professional music career began...
- Teena - Ron TaylorRon Taylor (actor)Ronald James Taylor was an American actor, singer and writer. He grew up in Galveston, Texas and later moved to New York to attend the American Academy of Dramatic Arts. After graduating, he began working in musical theater, appearing in The Wiz , before getting his break with the 1982...
- Hank - Samm-Art WilliamsSamm-Art WilliamsSamm-Art Williams is an American playwright and screenwriter, and a stage and film/TV actor. Much of his work concerns the African-American experience....
- Gus Parsons - Stack PierceStack PierceStack Pierce is an actor who prior to becoming an actor was once a boxer and then later on a pro baseball player -Acting career:His acting career mainly began in the early 1970s with film roles in Night Call Nurses , Fred Williamson's film Hammer and Cool Breeze as well as many acting roles in...
- Coffin Ed - Willard E. PughWillard E. PughWillard Earl Pugh is an American actor with numerous film and television credits. He has appeared in notable mainstream Hollywood films such as The Color Purple and Air Force One as well as genre films such as RoboCop 2 and Mil Mascaras vs. the Aztec Mummy...
- Claude X - Helen MartinHelen MartinHelen Dorothy Martin was an American actress of stage and television who is perhaps most well known for her role in the sitcom 227 as Marla Gibbs' neighbor Pearl.-Early life and education:...
- Mrs. Canfield - Wendell PierceWendell PierceWendell Pierce is an American actor, best known for his work in HBO dramas, including his portrayal of Detective Bunk Moreland in The Wire and trombonist Antoine Batiste in Treme.-Life and career:...
- Louis - T. K. CarterT. K. CarterThomas Kent Carter better known as T. K. Carter, is an American comedian and actor. He is best known for playing Michael "Mike" Fulton, an elementary school teacher, on the NBC series Punky Brewster and Mylo Williams on the Disney Channel series Good Morning, Miss Bliss as a supervisor, whose...
- Smitty - Jalacy Hawkins - Screamin' Jay Hawkins
Development and production
William HorbergWilliam Horberg
William Horberg is a noted Hollywood film producer and blogger. His films include Anthony Minghella's adaptations of the novels The Talented Mr. Ripley and Cold Mountain...
, eventually credited as an executive producer, got the project started when he optioned the rights to Himes' novel. Hornberg, a first-time producer approached John Toles-Bey, a Chicago-based actor with no screenwriting credits, to draft the film's first script; the development effort gained steam after Hornberg met Kerry Boyle of Palace Productions, and through the efforts of Boyle and Stephen Woolley
Stephen Woolley
Stephen Woolley is an English film producer and director. He is best known for his work with director Neil Jordan, which has resulted in a number of critically acclaimed films including the Oscar-winning The Crying Game....
, the film was sold to Miramax Films
Miramax Films
Miramax Films is an American entertainment company known for distributing independent and foreign films. For its first 14 years the company was privately owned by its founders, Bob and Harvey Weinstein...
and given the green-light.
According to publicity leading up to the start of principal photography
Principal photography
thumb|300px|Film production on location in [[Newark, New Jersey]].Principal photography is the phase of film production in which the movie is filmed, with actors on set and cameras rolling, as distinct from pre-production and post-production....
, Forest Whitaker
Forest Whitaker
Forest Steven Whitaker is an American actor, producer, and director. He has earned a reputation for intensive character study work for films such as Bird and Ghost Dog: The Way of the Samurai, and for his recurring role as ex-LAPD Lieutenant Jon Kavanaugh on the gritty, award-winning television...
was the first of the two lead actors to commit to the film, described as an action-comedy with "very dark" comedy. Whitaker among others, was consulted as Boyle and Woolley sought an African American to direct the film, doing so because they believed "maintaining the cultural integrity of the novel demanded a black director"; they also wanted "someone who was older and secure enough to collaborate and make a picture that we could distribute widely, but who still had a passion for the material." They chose Duke in part for his experience directing Hill Street Blues
Hill Street Blues
Hill Street Blues is an American serial police drama that was first aired on NBC in 1981 and ran for 146 episodes on primetime into 1987. Chronicling the lives of the staff of a single police precinct in an unnamed American city, the show received critical acclaim and its production innovations ...
, experience that was key "because of the way that series mixed humor and violence." Duke later cast Robin Givens
Robin Givens
Robin Simone Givens is an American model and film, television, and stage actress. She is best known for her role as Darlene Merriman on the television series Head of the Class.-Early life:...
to play the female lead after considering 300 women for the part.
The film was shot in the Cincinnati, Ohio
Ohio
Ohio is a Midwestern state in the United States. The 34th largest state by area in the U.S.,it is the 7th‑most populous with over 11.5 million residents, containing several major American cities and seven metropolitan areas with populations of 500,000 or more.The state's capital is Columbus...
neighborhood of Over-the-Rhine
Over-the-Rhine
Over-the-Rhine, sometimes shortened to OTR, is a neighborhood in Cincinnati, Ohio. It is believed to be the largest, most intact urban historic district in the United States. Over-the-Rhine was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1983 with 943 contributing buildings...
, whose "un-gentrified area
Gentrification
Gentrification and urban gentrification refer to the changes that result when wealthier people acquire or rent property in low income and working class communities. Urban gentrification is associated with movement. Consequent to gentrification, the average income increases and average family size...
of the old downtown
Downtown Cincinnati
Downtown Cincinnati is the central business district of Cincinnati, Ohio, and one of its 52 neighborhoods.-Geography:Downtown Cincinnati's streets are arranged in a grid configuration. It is bisected by Vine Street....
lower depths stood in quite nicely for ... 1950s Harlem." About midway during production, it turned out that Duke and Woolley had undiscussed differences about the tone the film was going to take:
About halfway through we [Woolley and Duke] were looking at a scene, and I turned to Bill [Duke] and said 'You know, that wasn't quite as funny as it was in the script. And I don't know why. And he said to me, 'We're not making no god-damn comedy.' I'd raised the entire money for this film on the basic that it was a comedy. It was Chester Himes, it was supposed to be funny. And a shiver went down my spine...I hoped that Bill was joking. But I realized he thought we were making Porgy and BessPorgy and BessPorgy and Bess is an opera, first performed in 1935, with music by George Gershwin, libretto by DuBose Heyward, and lyrics by Ira Gershwin and DuBose Heyward. It was based on DuBose Heyward's novel Porgy and subsequent play of the same title, which he co-wrote with his wife Dorothy Heyward...
.
Reception
The film premiered in competition at the 44th Cannes Film Festival1991 Cannes Film Festival
- Jury :*Roman Polanski *Férid Boughedir *Whoopi Goldberg *Margaret Menegoz *Natalia Negoda *Alan Parker *Jean-Paul Rappeneau *Hans Dieter Seidel *Vittorio Storaro...
in its Grand Palais, receiving a "five-minute standing ovation
Standing ovation
A standing ovation is a form of applause where members of a seated audience stand up while applauding after extraordinary performances of particularly high acclaim...
." It was also shown at the 2nd Stockholm International Film Festival
Stockholm International Film Festival
The Stockholm International Film Festival is an annual film festival held in Stockholm, Sweden. It was launched in 1990 and has been held every year in the second half of November...
.
Vincent Canby
Vincent Canby
Vincent Canby was an American film critic who became the chief film critic for The New York Times in 1969 and reviewed more than 1000 films during his tenure there.-Life and career:...
, reviewing the film for The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
, called it "painless, occasionally funny" but with a "heedlessly incomprehensible plot"; according to Canby, "because the screenplay is so thin, the characters are revealed entirely by the actors who play them. Miss Givens does particularly well as a doxy with a heart of gold as well as a trunk full of it. She looks great and shows a real flair for absurd comedy.Mr. Hines, Mr. Whitaker and Mr. Glover also are in good form, as are Badja Djola, who plays Imabelle's intimidatingly large former lover, the guy she's stolen the gold from, and Mr. Toles-Bey, who, in addition to working on the screenplay, appears as one of the bad guys."
According to Box Office Mojo
Box Office Mojo
Box Office Mojo is a website that tracks box office revenue in a systematic, algorithmic way. Brandon Gray started the site in 1999. In 2002, Gray partnered with Sean Saulsbury and they grew the site to nearly two million readers when, in July 2008, the company was purchased by Amazon.com through...
, the film grossed about $10.4 million in the United States.