Jeffrey Wright Goes Beyond the Photo Op in Sierra Leone
Forest City Ratner’s divisive $4.9 billion “urban renewal” development—which promises 16 residential high-rises and a 18,500-seat stadium in Prospect Heights to house the incoming New Jersey Nets—was given a green light in 2010. Opponents, like Wright, have criticized Mayor Bloomberg’s endorsement of the project. “He operates from extreme cultural bias and arrogance,” Wright said. “Bloomberg selling the idea that the outer boroughs should be Manhattanized shows the disconnect between him and anything outside of his bubble… Nobody moved to Brooklyn to be closer to T.G.I. Friday’s or eat Domino’s. We moved here because of places like Di Fara, which serves the greatest pizza in the history of man.”
Wright chose Fort Greene in large part because of the cultural foothold maintained by the African-American community there, which he says “has been diluted considerably.” He makes it a point to frequent “old-school” establishments like Brooklyn Moon Café, insisting “there are still Americans who want their service personalized.” He is nostalgic for a time when he could hear music wafting out of brownstone windows as he strolled the streets of Fort Greene, “the jazz-driven soundtrack underscoring the rhythms of neighborhood life.”
Jeffrey Wright is not an “actor’s actor”—he’s a writer’s actor. In 1996, Wright took on the role of tragic artist Jean-Michel Basquiat in what proved a breakthrough performance. John Bowe, who co-wrote the screenplay directed by Julian Schnabel, said of Wright: “I’ve always felt he’s why Basquiat worked. Schnabel’s style is very much that of an artist and not a wannabe commercial Hollywood guy. The script wasn’t intended to explain every psychological and motivational detail, like Hollywood scripts tend to do… In the hands of a first-time director with a low-budget script, this could have been disastrous. But Jeffrey’s internal compass was unerring, and he held the fort impeccably. His interview with Christopher Walken is, for my money, one of the best-performed scenes about the business and transaction of fame that I’ve ever seen.”
Wright does not transact in fame. But he has become an unlikely businessman, in an even unlikelier business. He is the Chairman of Taia, LLC, which identifies and acquires mineral deposits in Sierra Leone. As most any corporation with African mineral interests is eager to point out, the “blood diamond” (and its accompanying imagery) is foremost associated with the Revolutionary United Front—the rebel army in Sierra Leone that committed atrocities during the war—and its unlawful occupation of areas rich in “alluvial diamonds,” or diamonds that are close to the surface of the earth and can be mined manually (and, according to many accounts, represent a small minority of the diamonds imported to the United States). While the accessibility of diamonds was at the center of the Sierra Leone Civil War, Wright maintains that “African mineral wealth is not predestined to be a curse.”
Still—and this is where it may get confusing—Wright’s self-admitted “obsession” with the diamond-fueled conflict in Sierra Leone was catalyzed by thoughtless consumerism at home. “Urban youth began increasingly to fetishize diamonds as hip-hop’s bling fascination grew,” he said. “All this happened at the same time as the war escalated, but there was an absence of curiosity here about what was happening there, even though there was a direct correlation. There was no consumer interest in the war.”
There was plenty of consumer interest in the 2006 film Blood Diamond, which Wright said “did some good about raising consumer awareness, but did Sierra Leone a greater disservice in painting a picture of contemporary violence when the story in the counry was one of reconciliation, revitalization, and progress towards peace. And the message that folks should simply not buy diamonds is not necessarily a productive one. It’s easier to mine the tragedy than invest in the upside. I think what we’re doing there will be more impactful.” Referring to the movie’s production budget, Wright pointed out that “$100 million dollars invested in Sierra Leone could have changed the situation entirely.”