Independent Lens
Trailer | Mr. SOUL!
Premiering in 1968, SOUL! was the first nationally broadcast all-Black variety show on public television, merging artists from the margins with post-Civil Rights Black radical thought. Mr. SOUL! delves into this critical moment in television history, as well as the man who guided it, highlighting a turning point in representation whose impact continues to resonate to this day.
TRANSCRIPT
- [Man] Today, whites have every hour on television.
Blacks have none.
(television set clicks off)
- [Man] James Baldwin.
- [Woman] Patti LaBelle.
- [Woman] Toni Morrison.
- [Woman] Al Green.
- [Man] Earth, Wind & Fire.
- [Woman] Stevie Wonder.
- Yo, this was every day!
(upbeat funk music)
- [Man] Ellis came at a time when there were so few
positive African American images on television.
- There is nothing, nothing we cannot do.
- That on national TV was revolutionary.
- [Ellis Haizlip] There is no alternative to SOUL!
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