Dreamgirls a DISSapointment

I finally saw Dreamgirls, after hearing about it since the early 80s and having Jennifer Holiday's "No-no-no-NO WAY!" in my ears for far too long, the only relief being Will Smith's hilarious, biting and telling imitation. She sings it with unparalleled drama, and the cast of the original and the film version obviously are wonderful artists all around, but to what effect? With what lesson do we come away from the theater?

I didn't know the plot or the purpose until I saw the DVD the other day. Now I see it is a typical Broadway manipulation of the audience's emotions. I'm reminded of Jonathon Kozel's remark that in the 1980s he saw people leaving "Les Miserables" in tears over the portrayal of the poor suffering people of revolutionary Paris, yet snarling at the real poor begging outside the Broadway theater.

But it's more than manipulation. Dreamgirls' manipulation is made all too easy by having a heavyset African American woman with little chance of success get up there and "pour her heart out", in the process losing all sense of self-worth and dignity. Quite a difference from the message in Beyonce's "Irreplaceable" in which she declares her independence and determination not to be stepped on. We've come a long way - sort of.

People in New York have long been willing to pay good money to see colored folks lose their dignity and pride and minds on stage. The most incongruous moment was when Eddie Murphy as James Early drops his pants in the middle of his last song; just didn't make sense. Are we expected to believe that's what black folks do when they get too excited, even when they're on national tv?

I for one did not finish the DVD inspired or uplifted. My impression is that this is a typical example of West Side Story syndrome: a few European American folks got together and wrote up a storyline of life in the ghetto, a modern Porgy and Bess. I wonder if African Americans would have written the story and the music and the lyrics in just the same way? And if they hadn't, would Broadway still have invested in the show?

At least one other observer has found Dreamgirls to be somewhat racist.