Spike Lee: fast forward

American Visions, Oct-Nov, 1995 by Sharon Fitzgerald

The walls of 40 Acres and a Mule Filmworks fairly shout how far Shelton "Spike" Lee has traveled, and how quickly. Mounted, framed and hanging opposite the front door are three courtside tickets to the NBA championships, a leisure status symbol of modern moviemakers. At $550 a pop, the VIP value of seat 9, row AA, court 28 at Madison Square Garden is indisputable. Extended alongside last season's tickets ire front-page clippings confirming that this spectator is a headliner.

New York City's leading tabloids are all represented here. Newsday quotes "Spike Lee on Reggie Miller: I Thought the Brother Had More Class." The Post exclaims, "Spiked!" The Daily News retorts, "Thanks a Lot, Spike." All three refer to Lee's trash talk with the Indiana Pacer - court-to-curb action that spurred Miller on to a fourth-quarter, 25-point miracle in last year's NBA Eastern Conference playoff games against the Knicks.

Between 40 Acres' second-floor office and third-floor conference room, assorted posters present more of Lee's tastes and accomplishments. In gilded frames are the signs of 1970s film fare, such as Hit Man, Mandingo, The Education of Sonny Carson and Combread, Earl and Me. A Jurassic Park poster is inscribed, "For Spike - Roarrr," and signed by Steven Spielberg; the one from Taxi Driver is autographed by Robert De Niro. Although the hometown advantage is maintained by posters from such Spike Lee joints as Malcolm X, Mo' better Blues and Do the Right Thing, there is also an array of retro images promoting French translations of American films.

The large, well-lit office is a multipurpose expanse without walls to separate the staffs wood desks or to interrupt their nonstop activities. Topics of conversation - the sizes of promotional T-shirts, phone calls to be made or answered, schedules and guests for movie screenings, the quality of that day's cord of edited film - continually shift. On a front burner bubbles Girl 6, which opens next year; the story of baseball legend Jackie Robinson simmers in pre-preproduction. Not surprisingly, the background music is the 40 Acres and a Mule Musicworks soundtrack of Clockers, Lee's current movie release.

On the room's horizon, upon a slightly elevated platform, is the desk of the 38-year-old mastermind. Lee's is a panoramic view of the creative kingdom - a director's view. Separate but not inaccessible, he can work the phones, review the paperwork, and make eye contact with everyone who enters. On first take, he appears relaxed with his roles both in and out of the spotlight.

It helps that he has chosen a low-key demeanor and raised it to an art form, an expertise revealed when he is the focus of a camera. To start with, he does very little blinking. This is a rather tricky fact to observe behind those dark-frame eyeglasses that ID him as clearly as the goatee, baseball cap and diamond stud in his left earlobe. When they do move, his heavy eyelids fall and rise on a low shutter speed.

Second, Lee's fashion choices, at least on this day, appear to be influenced by the what-you-see-is-what-you-get school of design: wrinkled T-shirt, denim shorts, tube socks and sneakers. It is a cool inner tempo that keeps him on point, his arms folded behind him, while a makeup artist dabs, a photo assistant adjusts, and a photographer begins clicking away.

After taking several sphinxlike shots, the photographer tries livening things up. "Hey, Spike," he says, "you can be animated if you like." Lee's right eyebrow arches slightly as he considers the invitation. He shifts one pound of body weight from his right to his left foot. A smile starts - and stops - at the left comer of his mouth. "That's as animated as it gets," he says.

It has been 10 years since the summer of 1985, when this stealth bomber surprised Hollywood body counters with She's Gotta Have it, The exploits of Nola Darling, a homegirl with sexual attitude, rocked and tantalized audiences. However, the lion's share of attention was paid to the film's director-producer-writer-co-star, a hefty hyphenate, even by Hollywood standards. Lee's pithy Brooklynese invited comparisons to fellow Knicks fan Woody Allen, but the folklore embellishing his against-the-odds achievement was more akin to the spin that propelled Sylvester Stallone. Not since Rocky had American filmgoers been as stunned by the arrival of a heavyweight.

Still, for young black filmmakers, Spike Lee represented more than a bankable name; he was a torchbearer, a homey who brought some to get some. He seemed to open the door for a league of independent directors: John Singleton, Robert Townsend, the brothers Hudlin and Hughes.

With characteristic aplomb - outspoken yet soft-spoken - Lee separates fact from fiction. "In every interview I do," he says, "this whole thing comes up about a black renaissance. The way I see it is this: I'm not the first African-American filmmaker. Those who torched this path for me were people like Oscar Micheaux, Gordon Parks, Michael Schultz, Melvin Van Peebles, Ossie Davis. I just picked it up.