Spike Lee to reprise 'Mookie' role in new 'Summer' film
theGRIO REPORT - Fans of Spike Lee should be all smiles today, because a new 'Spike Lee Joint' is on the way...
Fans of Spike Lee should be all smiles today because a new “Spike Lee Joint” is on the way.
At 5:30 a.m. this morning Spike Lee tweeted details on his new film project.
“Wake Up. I been up since 430am. On the way to the set of THE NEW SPIKE LEE JOINT.Today is 1st Day of Shooting.Awwwwwwwwwwww Sheeeeeeeeeeeeet”
The new “Spike Lee Joint” is reportedly titled Red Hook Summer.
Few plot details of Lee’s new film are known, but sources are saying that the story is about and man from Atlanta who comes to spend the summer in the Red Hook section of Brooklyn, NY.
According to Blackfilm.com, in Red Hook Summer Lee will reprise his famous role as ‘Mookie’ from his 1989 film Do the Right Thing, which was nominated for an Academy Award for best screenplay. In the film Lee played a pizza delivery man in Brooklyn, who clashes with his boss over racial issues.
Lee’s last major feature film was 2008’s World War II drama Miracle at St. Anna. The war movie received mixed reviews and grossed less than $8 million in domestic box office sales. The director made headlines last week when he scored big along with fellow producers of the film. A French production company, Tf1 Droits Audiovisuels was ordered to pay $46 million dollars to Miracle at St. Anna producers for failing to distribute the World War II film internationally.
In 2006 Lee produced and directed the crime-drama Inside Man starring Denzel Washington, Clive Owen, Willem Defoe and Jodi Foster. In a recent interview with Charlie Rose, Lee acknowledged Inside Man as his most successful film and also explained why he hasn’t made a film in years.
”Inside Man was my most successful film [financially], but we can’t get the sequel made. And one thing Hollywood does well is sequels. The film’s not getting made. We tried many times. It’s not going to happen.”
Lee added, “First of all, what in this world does not revolve around money? But money is a big part of film, unlike a lot of other art forms.”
Lee went on to explain why he feels that Academy Awards don’t matter.
“In 1989, Do the Right Thing was not even nominated [for best picture],” said Lee, with some mock outrage. “What film won best picture in 1989? Driving Miss mother f**kng Daisy! That’s why [Oscars] don’t matter,” said Lee. “Because 20 years later, who’s watching Driving Miss Daisy?”
“There are many times in history where the best work does not get awarded,” he said. “And I’m not even talking about my own work. So that’s why [the Oscars] don’t matter.”
Although as of late, he hasn’t produced feature films for the big screen, Lee has stayed busy over the last few years working on the documentaries Kobe Doin’ Work as well as If God Is Willing and Da Creek Don’t Rise, a follow up to his acclaimed Hurricane Katrina documentary When the Levees Broke: A Requiem in Four Acts.
Recently Lee teamed up with Carmelo Anthony to make the mini-movie Be Heard about the basketball star’s return to the Brooklyn streets where he once lived.
Last month Lee announced that he was joining Mike Tyson, Doug Ellin, and John Ridley to direct a drama series titled Da Brick for HBO. The series is said to be inspired by Tyson’s youth and is being described as a “contemporary exploration of what it means to be a young, black man in supposedly post-racial America.”
The cast of Red Hook Summer has not been announced.
