HOLLYWOOD SHUFFLE

US, 1987, 81 minutes, Colour.
Robert Townsend.
Directed by Robert Townsend.

Hollywood Shuffle is a short, small-budget, independent comic satire. It was written, produced and directed by Robert Townsend who also stars. Townsend appeared in several Hollywood films in supporting roles and was the director of the Eddie Murphy concert filmed as Raw. Townsend is a strong screen personality, skilful in acting, turning on charm and sentiment as well as being an excellent mimic and able to send up many film genres.

The film is a satire on Hollywood, auditions and dreams, productions especially as regards black actors and actresses, their traditions and their being put on screens in demeaning roles. Various forms of satire are used - parodies of films and styles, fake commercials and television shows, send-up of popular movies.

The pace and the timing work well so that the audience is always aroused while getting the point.

1. Amusing and engaging satire? on the cinema, on American attitudes, on black actors and actresses in the films, the roles that they are expected. to take - and their reactions? The universal message - as spelt out at the end?

2. The work of Robert Townsend: acting, writing, production and direction? Style, humour, message?

3. California, ordinary people's lives and homes, workplace? The studio and the auditions? The send-ups of situation comedies, film review programmes, commercials, the movies? Score and songs?

4. The title, Hollywood dreams, the reality? The role of black actors and actresses?

5. Robert's character: the initial rehearsal and his voice and manner, his real voice and manner? Hopes, prompting by his brother? Relationship with his brother, mother and grandmother? Support? His job and his colleagues and their suspicions, his getting time off? The satire on the franchise for fast foods? His imagining their failure, his imagining his success with them? His girlfriend at the hairdresser? The audition, the range of people waiting and rehearsing? His own audition, his being asked to come back? The effect on him? Anxiety, imagination, the nightmare? The satire on black actors and actresses pretending that they were grateful for ugly roles? His being denounced by everybody, including family and girlfriend? The actual filming, the satire on the demeaning role? His stopping (and somebody rushing in)? The final advertisement about the Post Office and the regular job? American charmer and dignity?

6. The family and their support, his girlfriend? Scenes at home, their going to the filming, his imagining them turning against him?

7. The auditions and the range of style, the good and bad actors and actresses and their performance? The panel and their behaviour, attitudes? The actors and actress performing in the movie send-ups?

8. The diner and the characters? The sit-com star arriving and the satire on the clean image and the drugs?

9. How clever were the parodies of television sit-coms with There's a Bat in the House, the parody of The Naked City and the private eye with Robert going through the Bogart-style emotions, the two reviewing films in the cinema – sneaking into the cinema, the previews, their jive talk and remarks, the criteria for their judgments?

10. The ad for the school of acting, whites initiating blacks into shuffles, the stereotype and the satiric criticism, the Mandingo and Uncle Tom image? The parody with the picketing of the filming and Robert imagining
people turning against him?

11. The parodies of the films: Dirty Harry, Indiana Jones, Rambo, Amadeus, the zombie horror film?

12. An effective independent cinema work, humour, expressing frustration?

13. The comment on the American film industry, the system, American attitudes, the place of black actors and actresses?