The “exploitation film” is, at its core, about empowerment and fantasy. In particular, the exploitation films that have made Pam Grier (Coffy, Jackie Brown) a legend did so due in part to an audience of marginalized people who needed the strength cultivated by seeing the oppressor brought to their knees.
And, certainly, these films feel good during a particularly hostile election season.
“There is no humanity,” Pam Grier said of this year’s roster of GOP politicians while attending a Denver-area Gay and Lesbian Task Force benefit last Thursday.
Yet, Grier does not subscribe to any violent- or even radical- ideas as to how to tackle the despotic and invidious agenda of the right. The actress, most frequently envisioned en-afro and gun-in-hand, believes passionately in the capabilities of love, community, and pragmatism to enforce change– and Grier has an abounding history to justify her approach.
“My family is from the underground railroad, [and later] we suffered through Jim Crowe,” the 63 year-old (and still stunning) Sheba, Baby star said, continuing with a story about not being allowed in “whites only” gas stations, “We silently, and with dignity, said that we would start our own market. You don’t go up to the fence with your fist, you’ll break it. Find a way around that fence!”
Unfortunately, being a black actress in the 1970s would challenge Grier with many more fences. Even as Grier was hot off the heels of Foxy Brown, many in the entertainment industry doubted her appeal. Even Gloria Steinem faced opposition to putting Grier on a 1975 cover of Ms. Magazine. Critics told Steinem, already an influential journalist and feminist activist, that a cover featuring an African-American woman simply wouldn’t sell.
“And it did!” Grier smiled.
Her smile, laughter, and warmth, even as she recounted experiences with racism and spoke of prejudice and bigotry, is integral among her tools to fight down these very injustices. Grier explains that the key to making a difference is telling your story. And the way to get your story heard is to be kindly and do it with love.
“Do your thing, people gravitate to the laughing person in the room,” she said when being asked about how to face down hatred, “We have voices [to tell our stories], we can vote, we can write letters. We’re unique, and we’re not afraid.”
Grier went on the explain that this was the very reason for taking her role on The L Word.
Portraying Kate “Kit” Porter on the Showtime lesbian drama, Pam Grier played a straight woman with various romantic entanglements- one of which was with a heterosexual female impersonator. Grier took the role in hopes she would be able to bridge the gaps between gay and straight, black and white, and black and gay. “{The L Word was] a small step, so in a small way, I was working for the gay community,” she shared a during a Q&A at the NGLTF event, “I thought, ‘Maybe they’ll [those who still hold anti-LGBTQ sentiments] find a story… that resonates with them.’”
“Tell stories,” she emphasized again, “because people don’t like to be preached to.”
Stories are Pam’s weapon of choice going forward, of which she has many. A recent and poignant one being of her female neighbors in her rural Colorado community who are being bullied out of casting a vote for Barack Obama in November. Grier shared that a number of women have approached her saying their husbands are threatening them, presumably by saying they will take their mail-in ballots or block them from getting to their nearest polling place, as a means to sway their support behind Mitt Romney. It was only while telling this story did Grier’s voice hint at outrage, implying that, despite her optimism, she knows how many battles for justice and equality are still being fought.
But Pam Grier thinks we’re getting better.
“I understand exclusion and inhumanity,” she reassured, “But if you take small steps, you are still moving forward.”
Pam Grier’s memoir, Foxy: My Life in Three Acts, is available now; her new film, The Man with the Iron Fists, is slated for release in early September. Grier will also start shooting her next film, a motion picture about her life, with Universal Studios soon. “It’ll be a women’s movement,’ she said of the project.
(Portions of this report were derived from a one-on-one chat during a reception at the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force’s annual Denver Summerfest event. Other quotes are sourced from an interview and Q&A hosted by Eden Lane at the same event.
For more information on Eden Lane, and her interview with the incredible Ms. Grier, please visit here.)
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