The Academy Film Archive celebrated director Spike Lee’s 1989 film Do the Right Thing with a Silver Anniversary screening last Friday. Set in New York’s Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood “the film about racial tension reaches a boiling point on a scorching summer day in Brooklyn.” President and Mrs. Obama joined the celebration via videotape where they talked about seeing Do the Right Thing on their first date. The president said: “So Spike, thank you for helping me impress Michelle, and thank you for telling a powerful story. Today, I’ve got a few more grey hairs than I did back in 1989. You don’t look like Mookie anymore. But Do the Right Thing still holds up a mirror to our society, and it makes us laugh, and think and challenges all of us to see ourselves in one another.” You can read the entire NPR article here.
Laura