Queen Latifah is no fan of movie classic Gone With the Wind. The rapper-turned-actress disagreed with the decision by HBO Max bosses to reinstate Gone With the Wind following a massive backlash.
HBO removed Gone With the Wind from its movie lineup earlier this month following weeks of Black Lives Matter protests and unrest around the country.
But many criticized the streaming giant’s decision to ban the classic 1939 film that depicted the horrors of the Civil War.
Filmmaker Spike Lee urged HBO Max bosses to reconsider and now the film will return to the site’s lineup with an introduction from Jacqueline Stewart, a Black Cinema and Media Studies professor at the University of Chicago in Illinois.
But Latifah, who portrayed Gone With the Wind star Hattie McDaniel in Ryan Murphy‘s Netflix hit Hollywood, feels viewers should also be educated on the racial prejudice McDaniel endured, even as she made history for winning the Academy Award.
“They didn’t even let her in the theater until right before she got that award. Someone came outside and brought her into the auditorium. She wasn’t even allowed to sit in there.
“And then she had to read a speech that was written by a studio. You know that’s not what the hell she wanted to say… Then after that, all she could do was play the same kinds of roles…, so the opportunities at that time and the way that those in power in that business were relegating us and marginalizing us and not allowing us to grow and thrive after that was just terrible. And a lot of that is still around today.”
