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WHow did he teach us that British history was just the history of whites? And how much knowledge and understanding have we all lost due to such attitudes? Steve McQueen’s Little Ax is the epic and intimate answer to these questions. The five-film series, airing on the BBC tomorrow, takes its title from a West Indian proverb about collective struggle (“If you are the big tree, we are the little ax”) and contains true stories from the end of the years. 1960s to mid 1980s. There is tragedy and shocking injustice here, but these films are also, just as important, a celebration. There is friendship, family and food, with great music constant everywhere, like the background rumble of a distant sound system on Carnival weekend.
In addition to showing those who have already grown up, like Star Wars’ John Boyega, Black Panther’s Letitia Wright and Oscar-winning McQueen himself, these films are a platform for emerging talent (Amarah-Jae St Aubyn, Sheyi Cole and Kenyah Sandy are all brilliant), and an appreciation for stage and screen supporters who have yet to receive the recognition they deserve (Llewella Gideon, Robbie Gee, Gary Beadle – take a bow). There is so much richness on display that any attempt to extract influence and inspiration can only scratch the surface.
Even so, in the nocturnal spirit of its second installment, Lovers Rock, here are some ideas for where you might take the next party.
Mangroves
This isn’t the first time the story of Frank Crichlow’s restaurant has been told on screen. In 1973, three years after the Mangrove Nine’s historic court victory – they were arrested while protesting police harassment of the Notting Hill restaurant, but the case ended with the first official recognition of police racism – the director Franco Rosso made a documentary short film, The Mangrove Nine, about the events that led to the trial. Look for some excerpts on YouTube or go to the BFI Player for Rosso’s seminal 1980 film Babylon, featuring a soundtrack from all-round reggae great Dennis “Blackbeard” Bovell.
If you recognize Aunt Betty episode one as actor Llewella Gideon, maybe you were also a fan of her groundbreaking 1990s sketch show The Real McCoy? All five series are currently available on iPlayer; sketches like Misery’s, about a West Indian restaurant with a very unique approach to customer service, are more fun than ever.
A more serious history of the African diaspora is found in the writings of CLR James, a Trinidadian scholar and mentor to many of the Mangrove Nine. It is his 1938 book The Black Jacobins, on the Haitian revolution, which Darcus Howe (Malachi Kirby) is reading when he quarrels with Barbara Beese (Rochenda Sandall). Their son together, Darcus Beese, would grow up to be president and CEO of Island Records, responsible for signing Amy Winehouse and Dizzee Rascal.
The real Barbara Beese and Darcus Jr feature prominently in Paul Trevor’s photographs of the anti-racism protests of the 1970s and 1980s. Kirby can also be seen as the lead in the 2016 television adaptation of Alex Haley’s 1976 novel Roots.
Lovers Rock
You can’t talk about this romantic reggae genre without saying goodbye to the glory of Janet Kay’s 1979 hit Silly Games, written by Babylon’s Dennis Bovell. Or even throw down some a cappella attempts of that famous high note, as the partygoers do in Lovers Rock. Other big names on the “blues party” scene of the late 1970s and early 1980s included Louisa Mark (a West London girl whose 1975 single Caught You in a Lie is considered to be the first rock single for lovers) , Junior English and Gregory Isaacs, as listed by Martha (Amarah-Jae St Aubyn) when a charming new friend, Franklyn (Micheal Ward), asks her what kind of music she listens to (“So, are you a rude girl or a soul ? “).
When the recruiter plays Revolutionaries’ Kunta Kinte (named after the same Roots character played by Mangrove’s Malachi Kirby and quoted in Kendrick Lamar’s 2015 song King Kunta), dancefloor feelings of a different kind are released. It’s a collective catharsis scene that’s beautifully captured by Antigua cinematographer and first-time McQueen collaborator Shabier Kirchner, who made some eerily similar moments in Crystal Moselle’s 2018 teen drama Skate Kitchen.
While this is St Aubyn’s brilliant debut, Ward is already a Bafta Rising Star, having made a name for himself in the 2019 rap morality tale Blue Story and Top Boy (now on Netflix). If you are moved by the fabulous story of Martha and Franklyn as Clifton (Kedar Williams-Stirling) is from below, you will enjoy Sareeta Domingo’s new British romance novel If I Don’t Have You and Bolu Babalola’s bestselling short story collection Love in Color .
Red white and blue
Police racism is an inevitable theme throughout Small Ax, but this biopic of former Met Superintendent Leroy Logan (John Boyega), has a fascinating look on the other side of the thin blue line. As with Lovers Rock, it is co-written by Courttia Newland, whose debut novel The Scholar has trampled similar coming-of-age territory, and also serves as a reminder that young Caribbean London is a diverse community in its own right.
It’s probably fair to say, for example, that the rigorous, career-focused young Logan wasn’t as big on reggae as some of the other Small Ax stars. It was apparently more focused on ’80s pop-soul played by the band Imagination of his childhood friend Leee John. Their biggest hit was 1982’s Just an Illusion, which should be an instant addition to any playlist titled Music to Wear Sequins to. Logan’s memoir Closing Ranks: My Life As a Cop, was released earlier this year and continues past the point where the film stops, describing his involvement in high-profile cases and his election. as first president of the National Black Police Association.
This is what happened next. For context on how police attitudes used to be, there are some fascinating clips in the BFI’s free and permanent archive of Black Britain on Film, including vox voices on a main street in the Midlands around 1966 (“We’ve had enough before working without putting them in the police force! “) and a short interview with Astley Lloyd Blair, who made history by becoming Britain’s first black special agent in 1964.
Alex Wheatle
Alex Wheatle MBE is the author of 16 books for young adults, but his own story is told here. Wheatle’s early years were tough: he was abandoned by both parents as a child, grew up in a battered children’s home and spent time in prison, which helped inspire his successful literary career, particularly early novels. Brixton Rock (1999) and East of Acre Lane (2001).
Wheatle’s experience of finding a black identity in 1970s Brixton after a childhood spent in predominantly white communities has parallels with Shola Amoo’s 2019 film The Last Tree. In one of this episode’s many tragicomic moments, young Wheatle is introduced to the barbershop as a community center, most famously depicted in Desmond’s classic Channel 4 sitcom (recently added to Netflix). The overcrowding of black communities also echoes in George Amponsah’s documentary The Hard Stop (2015).
In prison, Wheatle’s cellmate (Robbie Gee, another Real McCoy alumni) insists on the importance of self-education as a supplement to a system that often disappoints black students. That means a second recommendation for The Black Jacobins – it’s really a must-read – but also some other additions to the reading list. Among the books Wheatle read in prison that contributed to his changed worldview are Chester Himes crime novels and Native Son, Richard Wright’s 1940 short story of a young black man living in poverty in Chicago. There’s also a fascinating four-minute video of Wheatle’s Guardian in melancholy mode, reminiscent of the pre-gentrification Brixton market: “What I’m missing is that constant reggae pounding … I really miss it!” he says.
Education
None of Small Ax’s true stories are well known, exactly, but the scandal of the de facto segregation of education in London’s Haringey neighborhood is perhaps the most underestimated. Twelve-year-old Kingsley (Kenyah Sandy) is an enthusiastic science and astronomy student (he probably would have loved Octavia E Butler’s Xenogenesis trilogy), but is considered a troublemaker by prejudiced teachers, while his overworked parents are too exhausted to protest.
The dynamic is specific to the UK school system, but ways racism can manifest itself in education were previously explored in the fourth season of The Wire and Chana Joffe-Walt Nice White Parents podcast. If, like Kingsley, you’ve had an unsatisfactory education that failed to mention pan-African feminist icons like Notting Hill Carnival co-founder Claudia Jones, then Carole Boyce-Davies has written several books that can fill in the gaps. The story of the 16th century warrior queen Hausa that motivates Kingsley to improve her reading was also an inspiration for JS Emuakpor’s recent historical fantasy novel Queen of Zazzau.
Any future film adaptation of Queen of Zazzau would offer a good starring role for 28-year-old actor Naomi Ackie, perhaps? She plays an activist in Education, but had her breakthrough in the unusually multi-ethnic drama Lady Macbeth (2016). Or maybe Tamara Lawrance would be a better casting? She plays Kingsley’s older sister and already has an exciting role coming up in the thriller Silent Twins, another story in the recent history of black British.
Mangrove, the first of the Small Ax films, will air on BBC One on Sunday 15 November
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