TV One’s documentary series “Unsung Hollywood” profiles African-American Hollywood legends who may not have gotten their due in their heyday. Based on the network’s “Unsung” music series, “Unsung Hollywood” will profile Pam Grier on Wednesday, February 26th’s episode. While presenting “Unsung Hollywood” to the Television Critics Association, one journalist asked why Jackie Brown didn’t have the reinvigorating career boost that many Tarantino movies had for their actors.
Grier said, “The dynamics of gender are different than for Sam Jackson and John Travolta and myself. I’m a female and when observers, audience watch they’re watching for a certain reason, of sexuality attraction, for the acceptance of being strong and intelligent. But I also chose not to do a lot of roles because they didn’t interest me, because they were victimization, and I just didn’t want to do them. Would I have done the roles that Meryl Streep did? No, they were going to have Meryl Streep do those roles. It’s a business. It’s not about art or politics, so Sam Jackson got all the roles that I wanted to do, and I thought if I could look like Sam, hey, I’m in, but it’s completely different.”
I had booked some time to speak with Grier one on one after the panel. I planned ahead. I saw Pam Grier was going to be there so I already had questions I wanted to ask Pam Grier exclusively about Foxy Brown, Coffy and up to movies like Above the Law and 2001’s Bones. I added a follow-up question to her panel answer and met Grier backstage in TV One’s green room.
CraveOnline: I’m really glad they’re doing an “Unsung Hollywood” on you, but when we talk about Foxy Brown and Coffy, those aren’t unsung, right? Those are sung.
Pam Grier: Right, right. Well, there’s a private life, so if people wanted to see what I was about and why I chose to be an actor for 40-some years, each decade has something new to bring to film. They are the only ones I felt comfortable that they would do it right, because they had had a tenure of doing great shows. So I could trust them.
Was Antonio Fargas unsung?
I don’t know.
I noticed him from Foxy Brown and Cleopatra Jones but haven’t heard much about him lately.
And you know what, maybe he doesn’t want anyone to know. There’s a lot of people that don’t publicize their private life so I don’t know. You’d have to ask him.
Do you have good memories of working together?
Yes, I do. As a matter of fact, we stay in touch.
Any fun stuff you can share from Foxy Brown?
Uh, no. [Laughs] He was a theater trained, theatrically trained actor so he enjoyed the experience, the rehearsal process, the work. He really enjoyed that. He could play a role 20 different ways. He’s just brilliant, just brilliant.
When you said Samuel L. Jackson got a lot of the roles after the Tarantino movies that you would have liked to play, would you have done Snakes on a Plane?
Probably because I like snakes. [Laughs]
Oh man, that could have been both of you teaming up!
It could’ve been but males have more of a larger box office following than females. Males only see females for sexual content like Angelina Jolie, and sometimes for men they don’t see as a sexual content but they think of themselves as funny and humorous and strong. There’s different dynamics of how and why people see people in films.
