Vonetta McGee

Turn off all ads on VICE.com Exclusive New VICE Documentaries Member Exclusive Features & Columns Turn off all ads on VICE.com Exclusive New VICE Documentaries Member Exclusive Features & Columns Turn off all ads on VICE.com Exclusive New VICE Documentaries Member Exclusive Features & Columns 4 Magazines Delivered to Your Door In 1988, the Chicago Tribune described actress Vonetta McGee as a heroine from a “bygone era” of film. This was a fair statement—in the previous decade, McGee scored leading roles in a series of hit US films. She held her own opposite heavyweights like Klaus Kinski, Clint Eastwood, and Sidney Poitier, while her Zoe Saldana-esque beauty was heavily documented. McGee charmed Western audiences, but by the time the Chicago Tribune published said article, the star’s prowess was largely forgotten—perhaps because McGee also had no time for industry racism. As a Black woman in Hollywood, her job security was precarious, but she openly condemned her industry’s prejudice nonetheless. McGee was born in 1945, an objectively awful time for African-American actresses. Before the late 60s, roles were rare, and pretty insulting. “There weren’t many multidimensional roles for [Black women] beyond ‘The Mammy’ or ‘The Exotic Other,’” says Yvonne D. Sims, the author of Women of Blaxploitation: How The Black Heroine Changed American Popular Culture , pointing to Hattie McDaniel’s loyal ‘mammy’ in Gone With the Wind and Dorothy Dandridge’s recurrent exoticized roles in movies like Sundown and Tarzan’s Peril. This environment served as the backdrop to McGee’s years at San Francisco State College. She studied pre-law and acted with racially conscious Black theatre group Aldridge Players West. Eventually, McGee dropped out of college and jetted abroad to seek acting work. In 1968, she landed major roles in the Italian films Faustina and The Great Silence . Her risk had paid off—though director Alex Cox, who cast McGee in his 1984 film Repo Man , speculates that her international start may have hindered her longevity. “She began her career in Europe, in a film which no one outside Italy, France and Germany saw,” Cox tells Broadly. Not strictly no one . Hollywood honcho Sidney Poitier spotted McGee in The Great Silence and secured her roles in two US films: Guess Who’s Coming To Dinner (1968) and The Lost Ma n (1969). Poitier had great timing—he showcased McGee’s talent on the cusp of the blaxploitation era. Inspired by the civil rights movement, the emerging genre sought to right the racist wrongs of Hollywood; Black heroes stuck it to The Man, funk soundtracks reigned supreme, and titles like Boss Nigger were totally acceptable. Moreover, the casts were mainly Black. “There hasn’t been another time in the film industry when so many African American-oriented movies were created by and for African American actors,” Sims says. In just three years, McGee snagged five leading roles in huge blaxploitation films, including Detroit 9000, Shaft in Africa , and Blacula . Blacula was one of McGee’s first blaxploitation classic, and with it she imprinted herself in the public imagination. In Blacula ’s first scene, McGee is a pastiche of African fashions—she sports intricate Masaai jewelry, Cleopatra-like makeup, and a gown lined with Ghanaian kente cloth. She’s striking, yet demonstrates what Cox calls an “understated, naturalistic American style of acting.” Blaxploitation films boosted Black visibility, but they were not free from criticism. Junius Griffin, a National Association for the Advancement of Coloured People (NAACP) representative, coined the term from the words “Black” and “exploitation” and, along with many others, denounced the genre’s regressive side. In 1973, African-American magazine Ebony asked whether blaxploitation films were “culture or con game.” One Ebony writer commented: “In almost total disregard for Black women, such films for the most part, have shunned realistic images in favor of stereotypes.” McGee d