James Baldwin said of actress Sylvia Sidney: "Sylvia Sidney was the only film actress who reminded me of a colored girl, or woman - which is to say that she was the only American film actress who reminded me of reality. ... I always believed in her." Baldwin was an aficionado of classic film, and director Peck uses vintage footage to reflect this. Peck stated that he had a "great team of archivists" locating footage that would underscore Baldwin's commentary on film and film players. So, where is Sylvia Sidney? Her omission is an unfortunate oversight. Most appalling is the use of Doris Day's image juxtaposed against the lynching of a black woman. As if Day were responsible for such atrocities. While Baldwin claimed that Day and Gary Cooper were "two of the most grotesque appeals to innocence the word has ever seen" -- was he aware that Day's father had married a black woman? Was he aware that Day had an affair with African-American baseball player Maury Wills? Was he aware that Day had starred in one of the first anti-KKK films (Storm Warning) in 1951? For Peck to insert the image of Doris Day in such an undeserving spot, in an otherwise absorbing film, does great injustice to her. It would have better suited the purpose of I Am Not Your Negro, to include Baldwin's commentary on Ms. Sidney, and feature a clip of her in Street Scene, or Dead End .... where she reigned as cinema's Depression Heroine.
Review of I Am Not Your Negro
