- Before Oprah, before Arsenio, there was Mr. SOUL. Ellis Haizlip ensures that the Revolution would be televised with "SOUL!," America's first "Black Tonight Show." From 1968 to 1973, the public-television variety show SOUL!, guided by enigmatic producer and host Ellis Haizlip, offered an unfiltered, uncompromising celebration of Black literature, poetry, music, and politics--voices that had few other options for national exposure, and, as a result, found the program an improbable place to call home. The series was among the first to provide expanded images of African Americans on television, shifting the gaze from inner-city poverty and violence to the vibrancy of the Black Arts Movement. With participants' recollections and illuminating archival clips, Mr. SOUL captures a critical moment in culture whose impact continues to resonate, and an unsung hero whose voice we need now more than ever, to restore the SOUL of a nation.—Melissa Haizlip
- The documentary explores the history of the series and the expression of Haizlip's expansive vision. We see archival footage from the series, including interviews with Amiri Baraka, Harry Belafonte, Sidney Poitier, Muhammad Ali, and James Baldwin, among others, as well as performances from Patti LaBelle, Ashford and Simpson, Al Green, Stevie Wonder, and Earth, Wind and Fire. We hear performances from The Last Poets and see the footage of Nikki Giovanni interviewing James Baldwin that recently went viral on social media, reflecting the series' key role in bringing the poetry, literature, and the Black Arts Movement to the attention of the public, even today. Haizlip's slyly-provocative interviewing style, and his ability to get his guests to open up, takes viewers into an intimate Black sphere that was ordinarily kept hidden from public view. SOUL was a signature cultural artifact of the Black Power era, and we hear many of the militant voices that defined the era, thrilling some listeners while outraging others. Mr. SOUL captures that critical moment in our nation's cultural rise, whose impact continues to resonate across generations and cultures. With the current ongoing Black Lives Matter movement, and with our nation on the eve of a great racial reckoning, Ellis Haizlip's vision, his show, and the artists to whom he gave a platform, have become even more important now than ever.—Melissa Haizlip
- Premiering in 1968, SOUL! was the first nationally broadcast all-Black variety show on public television, merging artists from the margins with post-Civil Rights Black radical thought. Visionary producer-turned-host Ellis Haizlip-openly gay and committed to charting new aesthetic territory-brought the avant-garde into the mainstream by foregrounding poetry and politics. Debuting icons like Patti LaBelle, Ashford & Simpson, Earth, Wind & Fire and Arsenio Hall alongside early legends such as Toni Morrison, James Baldwin, Stevie Wonder and The Last Poets, Haizlip's keen ear for talent propelled a cultural shift so powerful it pushed Nixon into action.
Tracking SOUL!'s evolution from local to national broadcast, the documentary presents what amounts to a biography of the path-breaking television series, woven together with biographical material from the life of Ellis Haizlip, whose expansive curatorial sensibility defined the series. A remarkable talent spotter, Haizlip introduced many soon-to-be iconic African American artists to a national audience. Even more important, it was Haizlip's singular contribution, derived from his own definition-defying life, to insist that the series embrace the full range of the African American experience: his series included gospel singers and Black Panthers, poets and jazz artists. Appearing at a transformative cultural moment, SOUL! helped re-define what it meant to be Black for a generation of African American viewers, while re-defining the white audience's view of Black culture as well.
Questlove, Harry Belafonte, Nikki Giovanni, Stan Lathan, Kathleen Cleaver, Amiri Baraka, Sonia Sanchez and more reflect on this lost chapter of pop culture history and revisit their time on SOUL! With original music by Robert Glasper, take a deep dive into these unseen yet urgent archives and learn about Ellis Haizlip, the complex man and unsung hero who was behind the SOUL! of it all. Mr. SOUL! is not only a tribute to Haizlip for championing Black culture, but another reminder that the African-American experience still needs to be told now more than ever.
Mr. Soul! won the Peabody ifor Best Documentary, 2022 and was nominated for the 2022 News & Documentary Emmy Awards, for Outstanding Achievement in a Craft in News and Documentary Programming - Sound Craft in News and Documentary Programming - Sound. The film is streaming on Max.
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