HILL HARPER
A New Book, A New Focus An Interview with Sergio A. Mims
2009-09-09
By Sergio A. Mims
Actor Hill Harper, who’s currently seen every week as Dr. Shelton Hawkes on the hit CBS series CSI: New York, is definitely somebody with a lot on his mind. The Iowa City native with a law degree from Harvard University and a Masters degree from the Kennedy School of Government with more than 65 TV and film roles in his careerto date and who has continued to develop his activist spirit by authoring two best selling and lauded books, Letters to a Young Brother and Letters to a Young Sister. And now if his busy acting schedule weren’t enough, Harper now has a new book scheduled for release in early September - today in fact - The Conversation (Gotham Books/Penguin Group), in which he bravely tackles the thorniest, trickiest issue of all, black male and female relationships, why have things gone so wrong and how to get it back on the right track.
Recently EbonyJet.com had an opportunity to talk to Hill about his new book, several of the issues that it raises, the conscious choice of presenting a positive black image in the media and those pesky rumors about a possible political run for office.
EBONY: Of course, I’m sure the first question oneverybody’s mind about your book is…
HARPER: What does Hill Harper know about relationships? (laughs)
EBONY: Exactly! If it were someone who had been married for 20, 30, 40 years then that would have been expected and understandable, but why you? What makes you the “fount of all wisdom”, as they say, regarding this matter?
Well I’m not claiming that I am in any way a relationship expert. But I am more like the people who aren’t in relationships. I’m a single man and if we’re really going to deal with this crisis that we see in African-American relationships, then the single peopleare going to have to deal with it.
A lot of people are married and that’s great. But it’s the single people who have to start looking at themselves in the mirror and saying: “O.K. why am I single?” “Why am I not with someone and what’s going on in my life that’s keeping me from being with someone?” And if we don’t discuss these issues then we will bear witness as single people to the extinction of the black family and I personally will not stand by and be silent about that.
Which of course leads to the obvious question, it was more common with our parents or grandparents to have marriages that lasted 20, 30 40, 50 years. Now that sort of relationship or commitment seems nearly impossible today. What went wrong?
Well you can’t just blame it on our generation and say times have changed, things are not the way they usedto be. When you look at other races and cultures in terms of marriage and relationships they are in significantly higher numbers than to African Americans. Our numbers are so low, so there’s something else going on amongst us, among black and black women that’s distinctly different and thegoal of my book is to bring to light all those issues.
Such as?
I would say that our generation and younger have really failed in terms of making successful relationships an adequate priority in our lives. You know: “We don’t need partners” “We got this on our own” “We can handle it” History shows, even current day shows us by looking at the Obamas that effective partnering raises the quality of your life. Period! So we have to start figuring out ways to solve the problem and I believe that solutions come from us having cross-gender conversations about it.
Well something you mention in your book which is so true and should be so obvious and yet is something that doesn’t even occur to many people is friendship. Is the person you’re in a relationship with your friend? I’m even amazed at the number of people involved or even married to someone who’s not their best friend or let alone even like them. When did friendship stop being a major factor in relationships?
You’re absolutely right and how it happened, at least in our community, is because black men and black women increasingly stopped becoming friends. If you look at the music nowadays, what we say to each other, it’s become all this “he say, she stuff” stuff. It’s almost as if we are not friends anymore and that, among many other things, could be the real root or crux of the problem and the lack of respect. Tell me how often do you hear black men running around talking about how wonderful, magnificent, and beautiful black women are? And conversely do I hear or you hear black women running around talking about how wonderful, genuine and great black men are? We, as a community, in many ways talk about each other so poorly that it almost plants subconscious seeds in our minds that says: “I really don’t want to be this person’s friend.” And if you don’t have friendship then there’s no way you can have a long standing relationship. And this becomes clear looking at my ancestors, who were together 50, 60 years. My grandparents, both sets, were married 50 plus years and they would say that each other were their best friend. And I guarantee you that my grandfather and my grandmother on both sides never went around saying her husband or his wife as “a this or a that”. We really got to check ourselves.
Which in some ways goes back to the first part of your book about looking in the mirror…
Right, which circles around to your first question. I start out the book by saying that I’ve got to look in the mirror myself to see if I’m part of the problem because I am part of the problem. I’m a single, very eligible black man, right? I could and should be married Why am I not? So that’s why I’m the perfect person to write this book.
In the book of course you deal with the Obamas as an example of a relationship that really works, but isn’t the message with them that black women, particularly young black woman, ought to be looking at intelligent, studious brothers who some might call derisively “geeks” or nerds, as potential partners instead of being infatuated with so called “thugs”?
Well many women - though many they say they don’t but they do - if we’re going to “look in the mirror and be honest”, when I gave them a profile, which is the exact profile of the Obama courtship, all the details that when he met he had a hole in the bottom of his car, Harvard grad all that, the fact she was significantly ahead in her career than where he was at the time, they all take a pass. They all said they wanted to date their equal. So then the question becomes how do you define your equal? Do you define your equal as someone having a lot of
flash and cash or is it someone who is your intellectual equal?
I choose not to use the term dating “nerds”. (laughs), I would say dating “potential”. You look at other factors besides the exterior and the bank account to make a determination on whether someone is worthy And that’s part of the problem is that you have a large number of women, that choose to date a small percentage of men. A lot of women argue me about this, but I’m telling you, you have95% of women trying to date 5% of the men. No one likes to think of it that way, but it is. And then as a result that reinforces the idea that all black men are players. But there’s a whole percentage of men who aren’t running around on anybody.
But as I say in the book, the Obamas’ relationship is something that appears very familiar to us because
it’s our grandparents’ relationship. It’s a throwback relationship. There’s no question in
anyone’s mind that he would not be where is he if not for her and she would not be where she is if not for him. So it’s a serious, progressive, loving partnership.
To move away from the book for a second, I think one thing that most people will agree with me about you, is how you always make a conscious effort to carry yourself with intelligence and integrity. We see so much “coonery” today by so many black celebrities too numerous to mention, that you’re actually a breath of fresh air. Is this a conscious decision on your part and if so is it a “burden’ to constantly present, let’s call it, a “positive” black male image in the media?
Wow, that’s a great question and I’ve never been asked that question before and I appreciate it. You’re absolutely right, your intuition is correct. It’s very purposeful on my part, very purposeful and, two, you’re right there is a “burden” aspect to it and I’ll tell you why. Sometimes I would like to play certain character something weird, totally out there, but it seems that I need to uphold and to counteract some of the negative images that I end up passing on certain things. I mean I’ve played bad guys before and it’s still about the character in the long run but I would be more much wealthy today if I had chosen some of the roles that were offered to me early on in my career that made other people quite successful and quite famous. I have a respect for those actors and I’m not going to say what they were, but I chose not to play those roles because I felt they didn’t represent us in a way that I wanted to be a party to. If you have to make sacrifices to your spirit, your character, then getting here isn’t worth it.
Finally, to clear up something, there have been these persistent rumors that you are planning to leave acting for good to pursue a career in politics. Any truth to the rumors?
It is not true (laughs). I’m going to do whatever I can make the most significant impact. If I end up living in a community one day where I believe politically I could make a difference, then I would definitely consider it. But for right now I believe that best change I can make is in entertainment. I mean I love acting. And I still have some goals I want to reach. I want to do projects that paint on big canvases, I want to work on projects that get nominated for Academy Awards and I haven’t done that yet. So I have dragons to slay in my career as an actor I haven’t done yet. And maybe once I’ve done those I may consider doing something else, and I’m not saying it’ll be politics, but right now I am not planning to run for any political office. (laughs) I am not announcing my candidacy today (laughs) But I promise when I do I’ll give you the scoop (laughs).
Read excerpts from Hill Harper’s new book at www.theconversationonline.com
