Monday, August 31, 2015

A00536 - Melvin Van Peebles, Sweet Sweetback's Creator

Melvin "Block"[1] Van Peebles (born August 21, 1932) is an American actor, director, screenwriter, playwright, novelist and composer.
He is most famous for creating the acclaimed film Sweet Sweetback's Baadasssss Song, which heralded a new era of African-American focused films. He is the father of actor and director Mario Van Peebles.

Early life[edit]

Born Melvin Peebles,[2] in Chicago, Illinois, to a black tailor, he joined the Air Force in 1954, thirteen days after graduating in literature (B.A., 1953) from Ohio Wesleyan University, staying for three and a half years in the Force.[3] He married the German actress and photographer, Maria Marx. They lived in Mexico for a brief period, where he painted portraits, before coming back to the United States, where he started drivingcable cars in San Francisco.[3]

Career[edit]

Peebles began writing about his experiences as a cable car driver. What evolved from an initially small article and a series of photographs was Van Peebles' first book, The Big Heart.[3]
One day, a passenger suggested that Peebles should become a filmmaker. He shot his first short film, Pickup Men for Herrick, in 1957, and made two more short films during the same period. About these films, he says: "I thought they were features. Each one turned out to be eleven minutes long. I was trying to do features. I knew nothing ." As he learned more about the filmmaking process, he found out that "I could make a feature for five hundred dollars. That was the cost of ninety minutes of film. I didn't know a thing about shooting a film sixteen to one or ten to one or none of that shit. Then I forgot you had to develop film. And I didn't know you needed a work print. All I can say is that after I did one thing he would say, 'Well, aren't you gonna put sound on it?' and I would go, 'Oh shit!' That's all I could say."[3]
After Peebles completed his first short films, he took them with him to Hollywood to try to find work, but was unable to find anyone who wanted to hire him as a director. In New York City, he met a man who saw his films and wanted to screen them in France. In 1959 the family went to the Netherlands, where he worked for the Dutch National Theater. In the Netherlands, Peebles added the "Van" to his name.[2] The marriage dissolved, his wife and children went back to America, and Peebles was invited to Paris by Henri Langlois, founder of the Cinémathèque Française, on the strength of his short films. He learned French, and was hired to translate Mad magazine into French. He began to write plays in French, utilizing the sprechgesang form of songwriting, where the lyrics were spoken over the music. This style carried over to Van Peebles' debut album, Brer Soul.[3]
He published four novels and one story collection in French and made another short film, Cinq cent balles (1965). It was here that he made his first feature-length film, The Story of a Three-Day Pass (La Permission) (1968), which caught the attention of Hollywood producers who mistook him for a French auteur.[4] His first Hollywood film was the 1970 Columbia Pictures comedy Watermelon Man, written by Herman Raucher. The movie told the story of a casually racist white man who suddenly wakes up black and finds himself alienated from his friends, family and job. In 1970 Van Peebles was also to direct filming of the Powder Ridge Rock Festival, which was banned by court injunction.
It was after the resulting bad experience directing Watermelon Man that Van Peebles became determined to have complete control over his next production, which became the groundbreaking Sweet Sweetback's Baadasssss Song (1971), privately funded with his own money, and in part by a $50,000 loan from Bill Cosby. Van Peebles not only directed, scripted, and edited the film, but wrote the score and directed the marketing campaign. The film, which in the end grossed $10 million, was, among many others, acclaimed by the Black Panthers for its political resonance with the black struggle. His son Mario's 2003 filmBAADASSSSS! tells the story behind the making of Sweet Sweetback's Baadasssss Song; father and son presented the film together as the Closing Night selection for Maryland Film Festival 2004.
In the 1980s, Van Peebles became an options trader on the American Stock Exchange while continuing to work in theater and film.[5][6]

at the Zebulon in June 2011
In 2005, Van Peebles was the subject of a documentary entitled How to Eat Your Watermelon in White Company (and Enjoy It). Also in 2005, Van Peebles was the subject of the documentary Umstoppable, which also featured Ossie Davis and Gordon Parks in the same room. It was moderated by Warrington Hudlin.[7]
In 2005, it was announced that Van Peebles would collaborate with Madlib for a proposed double album titled Brer Soul Meets Quasimoto. However, nothing has been said about this project since it was announced.[8]
In 2008, Van Peebles completed the film Confessionsofa Ex-Doofus-ItchyFooted Mutha, which was the Closing Night selection for Maryland Film Festival 2008, and appeared on All My Children as Melvin Woods, the father of Samuel Woods, a character portrayed by his son, Mario.[9][10]
In 2009 Van Peebles became involved with a project to make Sweet Sweetback a musical.[11] A preliminary version of this was staged at the Apollo on April 25–26, 2009. As well, he wrote and performed in a stage musical, Unmitigated Truth: Life, a Lavatory, Loves, and Ladies, which featured some of his previous songs as well as some new material.[12][13]
In 2011, Van Peebles started doing shows in NYC with members of Burnt Sugar, under the name Melvin Van Peebles wid Laxative.[14] Van Peebles has said that the band is called Laxative because they "make shit happen".[15] At least one of their shows have been listed as "must-sees" by a blogger from Time Out New York.[16] In November, 2011, Melvin Van Peebles wid Laxative performed his song "Love, that's America" atZebulon Cafe Concert, two weeks after the venue showed the original video for this song involving Occupy Wall Street footage,[17] which was uploaded to YouTube in October 2011.[18][unreliable source?]
On August 21, 2012, he distributed a new album, on vinyl only, called Nahh... Nahh Mofo.[19][20][21][22] This album was distributed at his birthday celebration at Film Forum.[23] On November 10, 2012, he released a video for the song Lilly Done The Zampoughi Every Time I Pulled Her Coattail to go with the album,[24][25] which was announced on his Facebook page.[26][unreliable source?]
On May 5, 2013 he returned to the Film Forum for a screening of The Kid (1921) and was a judge at the Charlie Chaplin Dress-Alike Contest that was after the screening. He wore a bowler hat and baggy pants in honor of Charlie Chaplin.
In September 2013, Van Peebles made his public debut as a visual artist, as a part of a gallery featured called “eMerge 2.0: Melvin Van Peebles & Artists on the Cusp".[27] It features “Ex-Voto Monochrome (A Ghetto Mother’s Prayer)," one of many pieces of art he created to be on display in his home.

Bibliography[edit]


Van Peebles in 2008
  • (As "Melvin Van".) The Big Heart. San Francisco: Fearon, 1957. With photographs by Ruth Bernhard, a book about life on San Francisco's cable cars. "A cable car is a big heart with people for blood. The people pump on and off — if you think of it like that it is pretty simple" (p. 21).
  • Un Ours pour le F.B.I. (1964); A Bear for the F.B.I. Trident, 1968.
  • Un Américain en enfer (1965); The True American. Doubleday, 1976.
  • Le Chinois du XIV (1966). (short stories)
  • La Fête à Harlem (Harlem Party) (1967). (novel)
  • La Permission, (1967)
  • Sweet Sweetback's Baadasssss Song. Lancer Books, New York 1971.
  • Ain't Supposed to Die a Natural Death. Bantam, New York 1973.[28]
  • Don't Play Us Cheap: A Harlem Party. Bantam Books, New York 1973.
  • Just an Old Sweet Song. Ballantine, New York 1976.
  • Bold Money: A New Way to Play the Options Market. Warner Books, New York 1986, ISBN 0-446-51340-7 (nonfiction)
  • Melvin and (his son) Mario Van Peebles: No Identity Crisis. A Fireside Book, Simon & Schuster, New York 1990

Filmography[edit]


Peebles' 1971 film Sweet Sweetback's Baadasssss Songreceived acclaim from black rights groups for its political resonance with the black struggle and grossed $10 million.

As director[edit]

Other writing credits[edit]

As Himself[edit]

  • Unstoppable (2005)
  • How to Eat Your Watermelon in White Company (2005)

Other acting-only credits[edit]

Plays[edit]

Discography[edit]

Studio albums[edit]

Soundtrack albums[edit]


_________________________________________________________________________________

Melvin Van Peebles, original name Melvin Peebles   (born August 21, 1932, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.), American filmmaker who wrote, directed, and starred in Sweet Sweetback’s Baadasssss Song (1971), a groundbreaking film that spearheaded the rush of African American action films known as "blaxploitation" in the 1970s. He also served as the film’s composer and editor.
After graduating from Ohio Wesleyan University (B.A., 1953), Van Peebles traveled extensively in Europe, Mexico, and the United States, working a variety of jobs that included painter, postal worker, and street performer along with a stint in the air force. While living in Paris, he wrote several French-language novels, including La Permission (1967), which he turned into his first feature film. The romantic drama was released in France in 1967 and in the United States (as The Story of a Three-Day Pass) the following year. Van Peebles made his Hollywood directorial debut with Watermelon Man(1970), a comedy about racial bigotry. He then turned to his pet project, Sweet Sweetback’s Baadasssss Song. Using mostly his own money and relying largely on nonprofessional actors and technicians, Van Peebles told the story of one black man’s battle against white authority. Violent, sexy, and angry, the film scored a huge success with African American audiences (it was one of the top box-office earners that year) while angering many white critics.
Van Peebles had begun a musical career with the album Brer Soul (1969), which featured a mostly spoken vocal style that prefigured rap. He subsequently moved into Broadway musical theatre, adapting some of his recorded songs for the production Ain’t Supposed to Die a Natural Death (1971) and one of his novels for Don’t Play Us Cheap! (1972; film 1973). Thereafter he continued to write, act, compose, and direct for films, television, and the stage. Subsequent films in which he appeared includeO.C. and Stiggs (1985), Boomerang (1992), The Hebrew Hammer (2003), and Peeples (2013). With the comedy Identity Crisis (1989), he ended a 16-year hiatus from screen directing, and he later wrote and directed Le Conte du ventre plein (2000; Bellyful) and Confessionsofa Ex-Doofus-ItchyFooted Mutha(2008); none of these efforts, however, were widely seen. In addition to his entertainment career, Van Peebles became involved in commodities trading in the 1980s and was the first African American to hold a seat on the American Stock Exchange.
Van Peebles’s son Mario, who played the character Sweetback as a boy in the 1971 film, became a noted film actor and director in his own right. Besides directing his father in such films as the westernPosse (1993), Mario cowrote, directed, and starred in the feature Baadasssss! (2003), about the making of Sweet Sweetback’s Baadasssss Song.
_________________________________________________________________________

 Melvin Van Peebles, original name Melvin Peebles   (b. August 21, 1932, Chicago, Illinois), American filmmaker who wrote, directed, and starred in  Sweet Sweetback's Baadasssss Song (1971), a groundbreaking film that spearheaded the rush of African American action films known as "blaxploitation" in the 1970s. He also served as the film’s composer and editor.

After graduating from Ohio Wesleyan University (B.A., 1953), Van Peebles traveled extensively in Europe, Mexico, and the United States, working a variety of jobs that included painter, postal worker, and street performer along with a stint in the air force. While living in Paris, he wrote several French-language novels, including La Permission (1967), which he turned into his first feature film. The romantic drama was released in France in 1967 and in the United States (as The Story of a Three-Day Pass) the following year. Van Peebles made his Hollywood directorial debut with Watermelon Man (1970), a comedy about racial bigotry. He then turned to his pet project, Sweet Sweetback’s Baadasssss Song. Using mostly his own money and relying largely on non-professional actors and technicians, Van Peebles told the story of one African American man’s battle against European American authority. Violent, sexy, and angry, the film scored a huge success with African American audiences (it was one of the top box-office earners that year) while angering many European American critics.

 Van Peebles had begun a musical career with the album Brer Soul (1969), which featured a mostly spoken vocal style that prefigured rap. He subsequently moved into Broadway musical theatre, adapting some of his recorded songs for the production Ain’t Supposed to Die a Natural Death (1971) and one of his novels for Don’t Play Us Cheap! (1972; film 1973). Thereafter he continued to write, act, compose, and direct for films, television, and the stage. Subsequent films in which he appeared include O.C. and Stiggs (1985), Boomerang (1992), The Hebrew Hammer (2003), and Peeples (2013). With the comedy Identity Crisis (1989), he ended a 16-year hiatus from screen directing, and he later wrote and directed Le Conte du ventre plein (2000; Bellyful) and Confessions of a Ex-Doofus-Itchy Footed Mutha (2008); none of these efforts, however, were widely seen. In addition to his entertainment career, Van Peebles became involved in commodities trading in the 1980s and was the first African American to hold a seat on the American Stock Exchange. 

 Van Peebles’s son Mario, who played the character Sweetback as a boy in the 1971 film, became a noted film actor and director in his own right. Besides directing his father in such films as the western Posse (1993), Mario co-wrote, directed, and starred in the feature Baadasssss! (2003), about the making of Sweet Sweetback’s Baadasssss Song.
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