*34 years have passed since the “School Daze” movie first came out, but nearly all Old Schoolers still remember the magical feeling in those days when it was just released. The film literally broke boundaries in Hollywood. It was the first one to go past the no-go-zones within the Black community and practically expose their wounds while also providing healing.
Filmmakers were surprised to learn that even predominantly African American colleges and their students had a story that, if told well, could pull significant figures at the box office.
“School Daze” was created by a mere 31-year-old Morehouse graduate, Spike Lee, reports iLoveOldSchoolMusic. But while the world enjoyed the film that addressed many social issues, little did people know that Lee himself tackled some of those issues on his own while he tried to create the film.
In the beginning stages of filming, he initially planned to shoot “School Daze” at his alma mater, Morehouse College in Atlanta, GA. Things went as planned for a while. But after a fortnight, Spike Lee and his entire cast and crew were shown the door out of Morehouse’s campus for a really sad, superficial reason.
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A lighter complexioned fella called Hugh Morris Gloster was by then the president of Morehouse. It is Gloster who kicked Spike and his team out. Ironically, they were kicked out due to the very issue the film was trying to highlight: Black-on-Black bias.
In a February 2018 interview with Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Lee revealed how he later had a “sad” meeting with Gloster after he was shown the door out of campus. He wanted to plead his case perhaps so as to be let in again.
“He said to me, ‘I don’t like the guy you cast as the college president (the late, great Joe Seneca). He looks too much like a sambo,'” Lee stated. “He said that to my face. When he said that, I said, I know what we were doing was right. Because I had the president of Morehouse telling me the man I cast as the president was too dark-skinned.”
Unable to win Gloster’s approval, Spike ended up relocating his production to Morris Brown College, just across the way from Morehouse. In another interview, Spike also said he was never again invited to Morehouse when Gloster was president.
However, time brought him sweet revenge:
“As a matter of fact, after this film came out, I wasn’t really invited back to Morehouse for several years. Really until the guy that was president left. But now I’m on the Board of Trustees, so it’s been a long while. But that was really hurtful at the time.”
He also explained that one of the reasons he wrote “School Daze” in the first place was to help shed light on the dangerous hazing that many a time goes unreported at HBCUs. The death of a fellow Morehouse student opened his eyes to what was going on.
“We show all the ills of these organizations. In fact, after I finished Moorehouse, a brother died pledging Alpha Phi Alpha. That’s one of the reasons why I wanted to get into this fraternity thing or this sorority thing for that matter. It always amazes me the amount of abuse and punishment people will put up with, just to belong to a group. To any organization. I mean they will fu*k you up.”
Listen to Spike Lee tell his story, here.
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