"Queen Sugar": A TV landmark for women directors
CBSN
In its seven seasons, the TV series "Queen Sugar" has explored modern flashpoints, from #MeToo and race relations to police brutality. But at heart, it's a drama about three Black siblings struggling to hold on to their late father's Louisiana sugar farm. Director Aurora Guerrero (Instagram)
The show's creator, executive producer Ava DuVernay, said, "I've been trying to communicate a core idea, and the core idea is that family in American television should not only mean White families. 'The Sopranos,' 'Little House on the Prairie,' 'The Waltons,' 'Thirtysomething,' 'Friday Night Lights' – this is a family who plays football, this is a family that's in the mob, this is a family who owns a funeral home. Like, it goes on and on, but what are none of them? Black."
DuVernay has long fought to add diversity to Hollywood, directing socially-conscious works like "Selma" and "When They See Us." With "A Wrinkle in Time," she became the first Black woman to direct a live-action film with a budget of more than $100 million.
The story of America can be told through the lyrics of folk music – songs of the Great Depression, the civil rights era, and the social revolutions of the 1960s. As folk singer Pete Seeger put it in 1967, "A song isn't a speech; a song is not an editorial. If a song tries to be an editorial or a speech, often it fails as a song. The best songs tell a story, paint a picture, and leave the conclusion up actually to the listener."