Saturday, July 10, 2004

That Unfinished Oscar Speech THE QUOTE: "What kind of moral schizophrenia is it that allows us to shout at the top of our national voice for all the world to hear that we live up to our commitment when every page of history and when all the thirsty, starving, humiliating days and nights of the last 100 years in the lives of the American Indian contradict that voice?" - - Marlon Brando THE HISTORY: July 10, 1974 -- US Senator Edward J. Gurney, who was President Dick Nixon's lone defender on the Senate Watergate Committee, indicted in Jacksonville, Florida on charges of influence peddling & extortion. July 10, 1984 -- US President Reagan claims that his environmental record is "one of the best kept secrets" of his Presidency. When a reporter asks where Anne Burford fits in that record, Larry Speakes steps forward & orders the lights turned off. Reagan, believed by many to be the most powerful man on the planet, stands behind his aide, saying, "My guardian says I can't talk." July 11, 1905 -- The Niagara Movement, precursor to the NAACP, founded. Includes W.E.B. Du Bois among its founders. July 11, 1968 -- The American Indian Movement (AIM) founded, Minneapolis. RHINO HERE: This Weekend's Blog is dedicated to not only a great American actor, but in his time, a great American activist; Marlon Brando, who passed away last week. After a Eulogy written by Dave Zinn, Editor of the Prince George's Post in Prince George's County Maryland, the BOTTOM LINE is the unfinished speech to the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences written by Marlon Brando and attempted to be delivered by Shasheen Littlefeather.  Written during the 1973 siege at Wounded Knee led by the American Indian Movement, Ms. Littlefeather began the address to the Oscar ceremonies when Brando won Best Actor award for his role in "The Godfather." She was booed from the stage. Brando himself did not attend the event, and refused the Oscar.  The address is as applicable today as then, both in regard to indigenous Americans & the oppressed round the World. A Eulogy For Our Marlon Brando by Dave Zirin, CommonDreams.org , July 2, 2004 Marlon Brando's death at the age of 80 will begin a battle over how the "greatest actor of all time" will be remembered. Some will focus on his latter day isolation, his bizarre behavior, and the many personal tragedies that befell his family. Others will focus exclusively on his iconic status, and when it comes to Brando performances, icons abound. There was the 1950s motorcycle rebel from "The Wild One" (1954), or the brutal Stanley Kowalski in "A Streetcar Named Desire" (1951) or Terry "I Coulda Been a Contender" Malloy in "On the Waterfront" (1954). or his performance as Vito Corleone in "The Godfather."... ...But the Brando I want to remember, especially now, is the actor who pulled back in the 1960s to focus on supporting the Civil Rights Movement and the broader struggles against war and oppression. In 1959, he was a founding member of the Hollywood chapter of SANE, an anti-nuclear arms group formed alongside African-American performers Harry Belafonte and Ossie Davis. In 1963, Brando marched arm in arm with James Baldwin at the March on Washington. He, along with Paul Newman, went down South with the freedom riders to desegregate inter-State bus lines. In defiance of state law, Native Americans protested the denial of treaty rights by fishing the Puyallup River on March 2, 1964. Inspired by the civil rights movement sit-ins, Brando, Episcopal clergyman John Yaryan from San Francisco, and Puyallup tribal leader Bob Satiacum caught salmon in the Puyallup without state permits. The action was called a fish-in and resulted in Brando's arrest. When Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated in 1968, Brando announced that he was bowing out of the lead role of a major film and would now devote himself to the civil rights movement. Brando said "If the vacuum formed by Dr. King's death isn't filled with concern and understanding and a measure of love, then I think we all are really going to be lost.." He gave money and spoke out in defense of the Black Panthers and counted Bobby Seale as a close friend and attended the memorial for slain prison leader George Jackson. Southern theater chains boycotted his films, and Hollywood created what became known as the 'Brando Black List' that shut him out of many big time roles.  After making a comeback in Godfather, Brando won his second Oscar. Instead of accepted what he called "a door prize," he sent up Native American activist Sacheen Littlefeather to refuse befuddled presenter Roger Moore and issue a scathing speech about the Federal Government's treatment of Native Americans... READ IT ALL AT: http://www.commondreams.org/cgi-bin/print.cgi?file=/views04/0702-14.htm 7:35:02 PM    comment

RHINO'S BOTTOM LINE - That Unfinished Oscar Speech That Unfinished Oscar Speech By MARLON BRANDO, March 30, 1973 BEVERLY HILLS, Calif. -- For 200 years we have said to the Indian people who are fighting for their land, their life, their families and their right to be free: ''Lay down your arms, my friends, and then we will remain together. Only if you lay down your arms, my friends, can we then talk of peace and come to an agreement which will be good for you.'' When they laid down their arms, we murdered them. We lied to them. We cheated them out of their lands. We starved them into signing fraudulent agreements that we called treaties which we never kept. We turned them into beggars on a continent that gave life for as long as life can remember. And by any interpretation of history, however twisted, we did not do right. We were not lawful nor were we just in what we did. For them, we do not have to restore these people, we do not have to live up to some agreements, because it is given to us by virtue of our power to attack the rights of others, to take their property, to take their lives when they are trying to defend their land and liberty, and to make their virtues a crime and our own vices virtues. But there is one thing which is beyond the reach of this perversity and that is the tremendous verdict of history. And history will surely judge us. But do we care?... MORE: http://www.nytimes.com/packages/html/movies/bestpictures/godfather-ar3.html "RHINO'S BLOG" is the responsibility of Gary Rhine. (rhino@kifaru.com) Feedback, and requests to be added or deleted from the list are encouraged. SEARCH BLOG ARCHIVES / SURF RHINO'S LINKS, AT: http://www.rhinosblog.info RHINO'S OTHER WEB SITES: http://www.dreamcatchers.org (INDIGENOUS ASSISTANCE & INTERCULTURAL DIALOG) http://www.kifaru.com (NATIVE AMERICAN RELATIONS VIDEO DOCUMENTARIES) Articles are reprinted under Fair Use Doctrine of international copyright law. http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.html All copyrights belong to original publisher. Tell a friend about Rhino's Blog 6:37:28 PM    comment

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