I think a tagline, or alternative name, for this blog could be “Susan’s Deep Dives.” My latest deep dive relates to the Netflix documentary Descendant. I found it so compelling and want to also share some related media that others may be interested in learning about as well.
First, this is the short article I saw in People magazine back in the fall that turned me on to the film. After watching I also put the book Barracoon on hold at the library, as parts of it were read aloud throughout the film.
Barracoon: The Story of the Last “Black Cargo” was published in 2018. The inside of the book reads, “In 1927, Zora Neal Hurston traveled to Plateau, Alabama, to visit eighty-six-year-old Cudjo Lewis, a survivor of the Clotilda, the last slaver known to have made the transatlantic journey. Illegally brought to the United States, Cudjo was enslaved fifty years after the slave trade was outlawed.”
Hurston shares Cudjo’s stories in his words. Readers hear about different parts of Cudjo’s life, including about his family in west Africa prior to capture at age 19, being kidnapped and transported, being enslaved for five years, and life after emancipation.
I finished the book yesterday and my interest in the story was reignited. I looked up so many things and here is what I found most fascinating:
1. Musican Amir “Questlove” Thompson is also a descendant of ancestors brought on the Clotilda.
One of the articles I read mentioned that Questlove is a descendant of ancestors brought on the Clotilda and that he came on as an executive producer during post-production. I liked watching this 24 minute YouTube video of a panel put on by Film at Lincoln Center with the director, Margaret Brown, Questlove, and others involved in the film. Googling more I came across this clip where Questlove learns about this part of his family history on the PBS show Finding Your Roots. (I love the show and had watched this episode- I just didn’t connect it when I watched the documentary).
2. All of the 110 kidnapped Africans on the Clotilda were between the ages of 2 and 25.
This fact was shared during the panel pictured above. Maybe it was included in the documentary, but hearing it said again was sobering.
3. Kamau Sadiki, pictured on the panel on the far left, is a scuba diver featured in “Descendant” who was also part of the National Geographic Podcast “Into the Depths.”
I was familiar with Black scuba divers searching for slave ship wrecks in the Atlantic from the National Geographic Podcast Into the Depths. I listened to the podcast over a year ago and would be interested to re-listen having more knowledge of the Clotilda, which is one of several slave wreckages discussed.
4. Margaret Brown, the director, is white.
I was expecting to find that the director of the film was Black. I was surprised to see she is a white woman (she’s the blond one in the picture above). I found this IndieWire article really interesting: “‘Descendant’ Isn’t the Movie Director Margaret Brown Had in Mind.” It delves into her being from Mobile, Alabama, as well as how her previous documentary set in Mobile led her to this story. I also appreciated this article in the Guardian.
5. Brown’s 2008 documentary “The Order of Myths,” which explores segregated Mardi Gras celebrations in Mobile, is really the precursor to “Descendant”.
I hadn’t heard about her previous documentary, “The Order of Myths” until the IndieWire article. This 2008 documentary is now also on Netflix. I watched it last night and also recommend. The film highlights the two Mardi Gras celebrations that happen every year in Mobile- one for white people and one for Black people. Each celebration has a king and queen. The white queen that year was Helen Meaher, whose ancestor Timothy Meaher is the white slave trader who brought the Clotilda. And the Black queen was Stephanie Lucas, who had enslaved African ancestors on the Clotilda. Brown didn’t know about the the Clotilda or the two queens connections to the ship until later into filming.
I noticed that the sentence on the movie poster for “Descendant” (pictured at the very top of the post) is: The past is always present. It seems completely on point for the “Order of Myths” as well.
Have you seen either documentaries? I’ll be keeping my eye out to see if “Descendant” gets nominated for an Oscar this year. The Obama’s production company, Higher Ground, acquired the film and a previous documentary of theirs, “American Factory,” won the feature documentary category in 2020.
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