Smokey Robinson has been seen recently fussing about the movie Dreamgirls. Personally, I wondered what took him so long. I expected that somebody in the Motown camp would get irked at some point. Frankly, I expected it to be one of Berry Gordy’s daughters, or perhaps one of his grandchildren. After all, the character most like Gordy in the movie is the villain of the piece. Vicious and cruel, he shows little concern for the well being of his artists. When I saw the play I didn’t associate the character of Curtis Taylor with Berry Gordy. Something different happened when I saw the movie.
I
saw the original play on Broadway 3 times and I enjoyed it very much. I saw the
movie and I enjoyed that experience as well. The play told a far more generic
story about a girl group in the 60’s. It could have been any group really,
these kinds of things happen all the time in show business. The director of the
movie made the story far more Motown-like stealing bits and pieces of Motown
trivia to move the story far closer to the Supremes than the original. There
were many things, I will name 4. During the talent contests when the Dreamettes
are announced, the announcer makes a mistake and calls them the Primettes, the
original name of the group that became the Supremes. Martha Reeves of Martha
Reeves and the Vandellas worked at Motown as a secretary until the opportunity
to record came up, the same as the Dream who replaces Effie. The pictures of the
Dreams album covers that hung in the offices of the record company are all rip
offs of famous Supreme album covers. The converted record company in the movie
is designed to mimic Motown’s famous Hitsville
studios in Detroit, where the majority of the company’s 60’s hit records
were recorded. Although Eddie Murphy’s character is James Brown-like in
performance, it was Marvin Gaye who used to drop his trousers in performance and
who struggle to make relevant music when Gordy wanted him to make pop ballads.
Gaye won this battle and eventually made the landmark album “What’s Going
On.”
The movie mirrors certain events in the Supremes history but gets all the facts wrong. Then it converts one of the most visionary men in black music and business history, since Motown was the largest black-owned business in the country for at least 10 years, into a cruel manipulator and a criminal. The man is still alive, and he has children and grandchildren as well. This not exactly respectful. Since people don’t know, or remember much about the original, the lie replaces the truth as many newspapers across the country misreported the story as being about the Supremes, calling Beyonce’s character Diana Ross-like (not), and Hudson’s character the Florence Ballard character. Again, wrong. Even Jennifer Hudson compares Effie’s story to Florence as if they are the same. Except Ballad was with the Supreme through the years when they were the most successful on the charts. Effie is kick-assed out before the Dreams have any success.
The events in the movie rip off the lives of living legends and weave a fantasy that’s a lot of fun, but disparages the characters of some of the people they are based on. How would you feel if someone stole your life, re-arranged the facts to fit their own goals, mimiced your style and hood and sold it to a national audience. I wouldn’t like it, so I get why Smokey is annoyed. He and Berry are great friends. I am surprised it took him so long. The movie is great fun. Hudson is a joy. We’ve never seen Murphy like this. STILL, I hope it inspires black folk to check out their history and go learn more about Motown. We are far too ready to toss the best of our past out with the trash. We can do better than that. AND we can get off on Jamie, Eddie, Jennifer, Beyonce, and Anika Noni Rose in a fun little film. Walk and chew gum children, walk and chew gum.
Read more of Smokey’s words here:
Listen to the NPR story here:
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