Alderman, pastor go head-to-head over Spike Lee's 'Chi-raq'
Dahleen Glanton, Reprinted Chicago Tribune 10:48 pm, July 9, 2015, Chiraq video link, City Club
Published: July 13, 2015
Spike Lee might be wrapping up filming of his controversial movie "Chi-raq," the moniker given to violence-torn neighborhoods on Chicago's South and West sides, but the debate over whether the city should support the project isn't going away.
Click on Chiraq link to see the City Club video of the Chiraq discussion: Chiraq
The Rev. Michael Pfleger and 4th Ward Ald. Will Burns gave new life to the issue Thursday, speaking to a room of movers and shakers at the City Club of Chicago. Burns, who opposes the city providing any financial incentives for the film, claims that it will harm the city's image and have long-term economic impact on areas where investors already are fearful of going.
Pfleger, pastor of St. Sabina Catholic Church on the South Side, has worked closely with Lee on the movie, which is filming in Englewood and other neighborhoods. He says efforts to stop the production have been tantamount to the city closing its eyes to the violence that residents live with every day.
"(Lee) is taking on a subject no one else has had the courage to take on: black-on-black crime," said Pfleger. "To trivialize what he is doing is to trivialize the people who have lost their lives."
Pfleger, clearly emotional as he opened the panel discussion, said he felt disrespected and insulted by comments the alderman made in a recent interview. To show that he is not alone in his support of the film, Pfleger asked the mothers of slain children invited to the event to stand. About a dozen women, including Cleopatra Cowley-Pendleton, whose 15-year-old daughter Hadiya was killed in 2013, were in the audience.
Burns, placed on the defensive, sat quietly as Pfleger spoke. When Burns' turn came, he explained that he is interested in finding long-term solutions, which is challenging in some communities.
"The market is still reticent about investing in these communities. When you have the stigma of these communities … and let's be honest, a lot of it has to do with race … and you lay upon it the pejorative assumptions of what it is to live and work and be in those communities, you are adding that much more of a barrier to finding solutions," Burns said.
"I'm not interested in people who want to exploit our pain and suffering for their own financial gain, and I don't believe the public should have to invest in that," he said.
Burns said the name Chiraq is not embraced by most people in the neighborhoods. He said people tell him every day that they don't like the name attached to the communities where they bought homes and are raising families.
Pfleger countered by pointing out that he is one of those who works hard as part of the community, having lived in the same spot for 40 years. Before starting the film, Pfleger said Lee met with him, along with 60 men from the neighborhood and more than 50 parents who have lost children to gun violence.
"He ran the name 'Chi-raq' by them, and they all said that's the name by which we live," Pfleger said.
"We're not talking about the good people in Chicago ... what we're talking about is a reality that in this country, we have a violence and we have to stop being in denial. It's real. People are dying."
Pfleger said that for a city facing a financial crisis and whose schools are in dire financial shape, the title of a movie is the last thing city leaders should focus on.
And to assertions that the movie would hurt tourism, Pfleger responded: "In my 40 years at St. Sabina, I've never seen a trolley full of tourists coming to the South Side."
dglanton@tribpub.com