HOLLYWOOD SHUFFLE
A film review by Mark R. Leeper
Copyright 1987 Mark R. Leeper
Capsule review: TV situation comedy punctuated with hilarious skits. Robert Townsend produced, directed, and starred in this comedy about the lack of roles for black actors in Hollywood. The story could have been better but the humor of the skits was right on target.
What should I tell you about HOLLYWOOD SHUFFLE? I saw it with an audience that loved it. Three people I was with were darn insulting to me because I did not love it too. Should I say positive things to tell you what was good about it or say negative things to tell you why it wasn't great? Some of both, I suspect.
Bobby Taylor (played by Robert Townsend, who also produced and directed) is a talented black actor doing what a lot of talented black actors do. He's working at a fast-food restaurant and desperately trying to find an acting job. There are few actings jobs for blacks at all and they are all as street pimps, muggers, servants, or slaves. Not that Bobby wouldn't love to get one of these roles, but deep down he wants to play great dramatic roles, like starring in ripoffs of RAMBO and INDIANA JONES. As Bobby goes through the frustrating life of an aspiring black actor, he imagines skits relevant to his situation.
The film is structured perhaps not so much as a story but as a set of skits with a connecting story. The skits, while not always entirely original, are funny. They are very funny. One is as ad for the "Black Actors School" that is great. And another, a take-off of review programs, is magnificent. The problems with the film are all with the connecting story. I am not saying it is actively bad. It just is not particularly good. yes, it makes a serious point--that there are few good Hollywood roles for black actors--and further, it suggests that black actors should refuse to take the stereotyped roles that have traditionally been given to blacks. But the story is just not done on a very high level. There is too little time left after the skits to do a story of any more depth than an episode of THE JEFFERSONS. What's left is manipulative and sentimental. Talk about stereotypes: there is Bobby's sweet but cantankerous grandmother and his adorable little brother. Without the skits the story might be good enough to play on TV, on ABC, maybe. With the skits, the film is quite worth seeing. Rate it a +1 on the -4 to +4 scale.
Mark R. Leeper
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