(upbeat music) (energetic music) (energetic music continues) - Hello, everyone, and welcome to the July edition of "Black Nouveau."

I'm Earl Arms.

Next week, Milwaukee will be the center of the 2024 presidential campaign as the Republican Party nominates its candidate for president.

James Causey speaks with a Black Milwaukee Republican who believes Black conservatives can make a difference in Wisconsin in 2024.

Among the new inductees into the Hollywood Walk of Fame is actor, director, and producer Glynn Turman.

We thought this might be a good time to remember our previous interview with him.

And it's always good to remember one of Milwaukee's best music ambassadors, Al Jarreau.

We went into the vaults for this interview with Liddie Collins.

Last month, public TV goers were treated to Leslie Odom Jr. starring in Ossie Davis's "Purlie Victorious" on PBS.

The Broadway production was directed by Kenny Leon.

In 2021, his True Colors Theater initiated a national monologue competition for students that was held at the Apollo Theater in New York.

A student representing the Milwaukee rep won second place.

This year, Raichel West, a senior at Marshall High School, brought home the gold.

She won first prize in the national contest.

Here is her monologue "One Second" by Rachel Lynett.

- Look at you.

You look like a walking insta-filter of a person.

And I'm 90% sure I have vomit on my collar.

This is not my finest moment.

Sorry.

Sorry.

I'm okay.

Honestly.

The vomit isn't even from drinking.

It's from accidentally drinking a milkshake, and I'm not supposed to have dairy, so you should go.

Seriously.

I'm okay.

Honestly.

I just...

It feels very stupid to say that getting older feels like a trap.

Like, one day I'll wake up, and I'll be 35 working my corporate job, looking outside my window thinking these were the good days and I'll, I'll be forced to wear heels and business suits and smile when I feel empty inside.

And just, if I'm doing that now, do I want a lifetime of that?

Right?

There should be a way to pause.

Like, I don't want to, I'm not thinking about, but there should be a pause button, you know?

I'm overwhelmed, I'm tired.

I feel like I am carrying this weight that was meant for someone so much stronger than me, and I am collapsing under the weight of, "It's gonna get better."

Does it really?

Because I've seen the news.

Everything just keeps getting worse, and there's no way to pause and collect yourself from the last bad thing because the next one's already here.

And there's just no way to say, "Stop, I cannot handle this right now!"

Is anyone anywhere actually okay?

How do we know we're gonna be okay?

The world's on fire.

I'm watching people younger than me die by the hands of the police.

We are stuck in the middle of a panorama trying to pretend like normal is something we've ever actually had.

I haven't had a normal in 18 years.

Have you?

I'm not gonna do anything, okay?

I'm not at risk or anything.

I just want a second, you know?

So that's why I'm hiding in my room at my party.

I just want one second to not have to be anyone, to not have to do anything, to just catch my breath.

Can you give me that?

- And Raichel West joins us now.

Raichel, thank you for being here.

Congratulations.

Talk about that monologue.

Why did you choose it?

- Well, the monologue, it's something that it deeply relates to me.

It talks about a girl, Minnie, who is getting out of high school soon.

You know, she's debating with life and how life is gonna take her.

And things are changing for her very rapidly.

And it's essentially, for her, it's a cry for help for her of how, you know, things are changing, and she just doesn't feel prepared for it.

Life moves fast, it doesn't wait for anyone.

And, you know, that relates to me as I am, you know, just starting out my adult life, getting out of high school and just, you know, getting ready for what is to come and preparing myself for that.

And that is something that I can understand and I relate to.

- So talk about this competition.

A lot of people from around the country.

What was your mindset going into it?

Did you think you could win?

- I didn't.

No, I didn't.

So a lot of talented people, they all competed, first place, second place.

It was first place and second place would go to New York, and then they all come from all over there.

People from New York, people from Boston, from all over.

All extremely talented young individuals.

And I truly didn't think that I would be able to win first place for both Milwaukee Regionals and for New York City.

So I was very grateful and very honored that I was able to do that.

- Clearly very talented.

So talk about your start in theater.

How did you get into it?

- I've recently, just about a year ago actually, I just started with theater.

It's, you know, something that I've always been attracted to, but not until about a year ago have I actually, you know, decided this is what I'm going to do with my life and with my career.

This is the career choice that I'm gonna make.

And it's been great so far.

So we're gonna keep on going with that.

And I have very high hopes for the future.

- Speaking of the future, what's next for you?

- I'm gonna go to school.

I'm gonna go to school.

I'm gonna, you know, I'm going to focus on my acting career as well, but, you know, with acting, it's always extremely flexible.

You have to be extremely flexible, and I am 100% open to whatever, you know, whatever opportunities will come my way.

But just for right now, I'm gonna focus on my career and see where that takes me.

- From Marshall High School, Raichel, thank you so much for joining us.

- Thank you.

(energetic music) (dice rattle) ♪ Stop in the name of love ♪ ♪ Before you break my heart ♪ - Where you going?

- I'd like to get through to the washroom, - Let the lady pass.

- Hey, mama.

Go walk someplace else.

- Why don't you gamble someplace else?

- Because we're gambling here, sweet thing.

- This is a restaurant, not an alley.

- Hey, hey.

Keep on stepping, baby.

If we want it to be preached to, we'd go to church.

- Y'all need to go to church.

♪ Hallelujah, ♪ hallelujah, hallelujah ♪ ♪ Hallelujah, ♪ hallelujah, hallelujah ♪ ♪ Hallelujah, hallelujah ♪ (chuckles) - That's a scene from Milwaukee filmmaker Michael Schultz's, "Cooley High" the 1975 film that became one of the change agents in American and Black cinema.

For me, who was then a product of Sandtown and Baltimore's West Side, it was one of the first times I saw someone like me accurately portrayed on screen.

And that actor joins us now, Mr. Glynn Turman, who's also added producer, director, and writer to his credit since then.

He's gonna talk about "Cooley High" and "The Legend of Glynn Turman," which is his new project.

Welcome to "Black Nouveau."

- Hey, Everett.

How are you?

Long time no see.

- How about that?

We did meet earlier.

You know, when you were making "Cooley High," were you aware of the potential the film held?

- Not at all, Everett.

We had no idea it would become an icon.

- Well, it did more than that.

I mean, for my generation, you portrayed something we hadn't seen on screen for a while.

That was very important to a lot of people.

Not just like me, but, you know, a lot of folks.

- Well, you know, it gave us a vehicle in which, and I say us, I mean, we as a Black people, it gave us a vehicle in which we could be proud to share with the rest of the world in telling our narrative in a way that had not been delved into before.

And so it made it stand apart for that reason, I think.

- That's true.

You know, and a number of the next generation of filmmakers after "Cooley High" talked about how important that film was to them in making those decisions.

One of my favorite memories from that film though, is Walter Benton's poem "Were I Pygmalion or God," "I would make you exactly as you are in all dimensions."

That was really very powerful and potent stuff and spoke to a side of us that a lot of people hadn't seen before.

- Absolutely.

That's the genius of Eric Monte, and that's who he was and is, a poet, an educated man, an aware man.

And you hadn't seen that side of us in a motion picture ever before.

And especially in a love story, you know, which it has stood the test of time.

- Yeah, absolutely.

Now, the film was not the first time that you worked with Michael Schultz.

He had also directed you on a stage play before then.

- Correct.

We had done a stage play at Lincoln Center, a Ron Milner play called "What the Wine-Sellers Buy."

And so we had worked together from that point and then collaborated again with "Cooley High."

- [Everett] "The Legend of Glynn Turman."

Do you talk about your start as a stage actor actually going back to the original production of "A Raisin in the Sun"?

- I do, I do.

I give an insight as to how that occurred.

How fate or kismet or whatever you wanna call it just made that happen.

My mother was a single mom, moved she and I from Harlem, New York down to the West Village in the late '50s.

And some of her friends became some of the greats of all time who were in the village at that time, from James Baldwin and Odetta and Charlie "Bird" Parker to Lorraine Hansberry, who was a neighbor and a dear friend of my mother's who lived around the corner and informed my mother that she had written a play, and that there was a part for a little boy in it.

And would I be interested in trying out for this part?

I didn't know that when trying out there would be other young boys there trying for the same role because I had never auditioned for anything before.

So I went to the meeting thinking that the part was mine and had no idea what those other kids were sitting in the hall waiting for, you know?

Because it was my part, they might as well go home.

(laughing) But that started me all my career in acting.

- And you've done a number of plays, some of them actually translated into films.

I mean, you in the film version of "Five on the Black Hand Side" and "The River Niger" you even did "Ceremonies in Dark Old Men" for television.

- Yeah.

You've done your homework, man.

Yes, you're absolutely right.

I'm fortunate to be a part of some of those wonderful, wonderful productions.

- Thank you very much for joining us.

- Thank you, Everett.

(energetic music) - The upcoming Republican National Convention is scheduled in Milwaukee from July 15th to the 18th, drawing more than 50,000 people who will also serve as a formal nomination for former President Donald Trump as the Republican presidential candidate.

Amidst this, there are discussions on the impact of the convention on Black conservatives.

Orlando Owens, who runs the program Project Move the Needle believes a strong RNC could swing the state in Trump's favor by November.

Owens joins us now.

Thanks for joining us.

- Thank you for having me.

- So what does the RNC mean for Wisconsin, and especially Black conservatives like yourself?

- Well, it's a great opportunity for us to contrast our platforms and our solutions to the other side, and for individuals to take a hard look at where their votes and their concerns may align with.

- So you grew up on Milwaukee's North Side, single parent.

You also attended a HBCU.

What influenced you to become a Republican?

- Well, like many Blacks, I thought I was a Democrat, but many Blacks, we have very conservative values, and we just don't call them conservative.

It's kind of how we were brought up.

We don't like big government or the man in our business.

We like our firearms, we like traditional families, we like being entrepreneurs.

And so having those values in my family, we just never called it conservative.

It's just how we were.

And when I started down the political process, I saw an alignment that better aligned with Republican conservative values.

- Trump recently made news calling Milwaukee a horrible city.

Will that hurt him at all in Milwaukee when he comes here?

- I think when we are honest about Milwaukee and all the negative indicators, I question how wrong President Trump really was in his assessment.

We're one of the leading neighborhoods in the country for high incarceration for Black males, high unemployment, dropout rates, all the negative indicators.

You know, Juneteenth just passed, we had a shooting a week ago, we had three murders in the weekend.

Some of that is factually correct, so I think it's an honest assessment.

- Okay, so Trump, who's a former US president, first to be convicted of felony crimes, 34 to be exact.

Will that hurt him at all?

- Again, when we are talking about African Americans, again, I go back to the previous statement.

We have a lot of felons in our city.

So felons are eligible voters in Wisconsin once you completed your probation.

These are good people.

And I think also it speaks to how the justice system can be injustice.

- Tell me about your program Project Move the Needle.

What is that about and what are you trying to do with that?

- We're trying to move the needle in the city of Milwaukee by anywhere from three to five percentage points because we understand we won't win Milwaukee or Milwaukee County, but we can move the needle, which means it plays a better position in the overall vote in the state of Wisconsin.

If we can win Wisconsin, we can win the country.

- So how many votes do you have to get this move that needle?

- Well, I would say anywhere between 7-10 thousand.

I'm ambitious so I wanna push, I wanna move the needle and also push the envelope because I think we can do it.

I think like no other time before, more Blacks and especially Black males, are very open to hearing another conversation.

- Are you targeting specific area codes or zones?

- We are.

We have different area codes and wards that we are focused on.

Mostly Black, Brown, under 35 years of age, renters, we are looking at the registered voters.

We are definitely targeting our efforts.

We can't cover the entire city, so we're targeting different wards that we think this message will resonate with.

- So Trump also said that he's done more for Blacks than former President Barack Obama and current President Joe Biden.

What's your statement on that?

- I think you look at, each president has always had their legacy pieces of legislation and policies.

I think the First Step Act was tremendous in justice reforms.

I think the support of opportunity zones, locking in of historical Black college funding for over a decade.

These are hallmarks of the Trump administration that he can look back very fondly of.

- So what makes Trump the best candidate?

- I think he has the best grasp of the economy.

He started the First Step Act.

I wanna see where that goes.

Opportunity zones are huge as far as, in Milwaukee in particular, the levels of Black male unemployment.

I think he has a better grasp of the economy and definitely a better grasp of where we are on world stage, you know, with the military.

So I think he has the components that we need right now in this time in history.

- Does Trump's age bother you?

- Not at all.

I think it's really about the individual.

I think you compare and contrast both Biden and Trump.

You see two men who are a few years apart, but how age has affected each one a little bit differently.

- Okay.

I've heard many Blacks refer to Trump as being a racist.

He has made some statements that are a little controversial.

Some people say a lot controversial.

What do you say when people say, you know, Trump is a racist and he will attack a lot of Black programs, he would attack things like that.

What do you say to that?

- I don't think his history shows that.

He's been president before and didn't show anything of attacking anything that, you know, would be harmful to African Americans.

On the other hand, I can talk about Joe Biden from the '84 Sentencing Bill, the '94 Crime Bill.

These things directly and still today in particular Milwaukee and urban areas to Black and Brown people still affect us today.

So we can look at one who may say something controversial versus who says things and actually does things in application.

I remember Joe Biden talking about the busing jungle, you know, so we can hold both men accountable and I think people are.

- Okay.

Well, thanks for joining us.

- Thank you for having me.

(gentle music) ♪ The first time ever ♪ ♪ I saw your face ♪ ♪ I thought the sun ♪ rose in your eyes ♪ ♪ And the moon and the stars ♪ were the gifts you gave ♪ ♪ To the dark ♪ ♪ And the endless ♪ skies, my love ♪ ♪ And the first time ♪ ♪ Ever I kissed your lips ♪ ♪ I, I felt the earth ♪ ♪ Move in my hand ♪ ♪ Like the trembling heart ♪ ♪ Of a captive bird ♪ ♪ That was there ♪ ♪ At my command, my love ♪ ♪ That was there ♪ ♪ At my command ♪ - [Liddie] Internationally known singer and Milwaukee Native Al Jarreau has been singing and writing for over 40 years.

He stayed in the business because he loves it and comes home to Milwaukee to rejuvenate.

We caught up with him while in town to perform at Potawatomi.

- Do you remember (indistinct) 99?

(chuckles) I come home and get my gas tank filled up.

- So you're still in contact with folks here?

- Yeah, I stay in serious contact with people here.

And I was touched by folks over at Lincoln High School.

♪ We hail the Fair Lincoln ♪ ♪ Our alma mater dear and far ♪ ♪ Within Wisconsin's prairies ♪ (laughing) Yeah, I'm a Comet, a Lincoln High School Comet, which is Lincoln High School target school for the arts.

- [Liddie] He said a lot of who he is is because of where he comes from.

His musical journey, or as he calls it, "his yellow brick road," also includes Ripon College up in Ripon, Wisconsin.

- And at Ripon College, who put some ideas inside my head that ended up in songs like ♪ I can be what I want to ♪ ♪ And all I need is to ♪ ♪ Get my boogie down ♪ ♪ You can be all you want to ♪ ♪ And all you need is to ♪ ♪ Get your boogie down ♪ And I sing that for kids in grade schools and in kindergarten, and teachers teach them what the meaning of that is.

I can be what I want to.

You can be what you want to.

And all you need is to get your feet together.

(laughs) - [Liddie] When you left the Midwest, you had a lot of talent to offer the entertainment, but you had a degree in your pocket.

Why was that important?

- Well, that's what I'm talking about right now.

Get prepared and the best thing that we can do, you know, all of us, center city and suburbs, is get our children prepared.

Get them into school.

That's still the answer to saving the middle class is getting to school, more and more important as we bring robotics and automation onto the scene, doing more to take our jobs than China.

(chuckles) - [Liddie] His yellow brick road was not always easy.

His college start was rough.

- I had a difficult time in school, and I was coming home.

After my first semester at Ripon, I was flunking everything.

I came home and started talking to Tom Cheeks, who had been my mentor, my teacher at school.

And he held my hand and looked at me in the eyes and said, "Al, we don't quit.

We don't quit.

We carry on and find a way."

- [Liddie] And that became his motto.

♪ Eyes on me ♪ - So I'm talking to me in the mirror every day saying those things.

"We don't quit.

We carry on.

We find a way."

I'm struggling, I'm struggling these days.

I got a few little health issues, but I ain't gonna quit.

I'm gonna sit on a stool out there tonight like I did all summer along and like I did all last year, and bring this music to people and say, "You don't have to quit."

And this is the best I can do here on this stool.

I'm gonna get up and shake it for a minute, but most of the time I'll be sitting down here.

Yeah, how you like me now?

(laughing) (scat bebob music) (music continues) (music continues) - You okay, Mark?

(music continues) - [Liddie] His latest album is a tribute to fellow musician George Duke.

(music continues) (music continues) - And that's our program for this month.

As always, be sure to check us out on all our social media platforms.

For the "Black Nouveau" team, I'm Earl Arms.

Enjoy the convention and the Olympic Games.

(energetic music)