Van Peebles has also composed music for various film soundtracks, as well as two Broadway musicals. Years later, Van Peebles directed the video of Houdini’s influential rap song “White Lines.” More recently, Van Peebles co-produced the mid ‘90s film Panther, which he adapted from his novel on the Black Panther Party. When Melvin learned afterwards I shared a birthday with Godfrey Cambridge, and met the actor on the set of The Monkees, he smiled and said, “Hope they let you one day into the cinema picnic.” Van Peebles appears on screen in the Mel Stuart-directed music documentary Wattstax lensed in Los Angeles during 1972. Van Peeples used some of his Watermelon Man salary to help finance Sweetback. He subsequently directed Watermelon Man starring Godfrey Cambridge, and Identity Crisis. Melvin Van Peebles debuted with a bang when his first film, the French language La Permission” (The Story Of A Three-Day Pass) earned the critic’s choice award at the San Francisco Film Festival. Some scenes took place in the Crenshaw Village area where my family and I lived in the late 1950s.

Van Peebles’ 1971 feature film, Sweet, Sweetback’s Baadassss Song, which he wrote, acted in, directed, scored and produced, was shot in the Los Angeles community of Watts, featured a Black stud as its protagonist in the face of white adversity. Our dialogue subsequently appeared in my 2004 book Hollywood Shack Job: Rock Music in Film and On Your Screen. Melvin and I connected at son Mario’s house in Studio City, California, after we had a delightful meal on Ventura Blvd in a Studio City restaurant. He penned all the lyrics and music on Ghetto Gothic, producing the recording with associate producers William “Spaceman” Patterson and Dunn Pearson.

“His work continues to be essential and is being celebrated at the New York Film Festival this weekend with a 50th anniversary screening of his landmark film Sweet Sweetback’s Baadassss Song: a Criterion Collection box set, Melvin Van Peebles: Essential Films, next week and a revival of his play Ain’t Supposed to Die a Natural Death, slated for a return to Broadway next year.” In 1998 I interviewed Renaissance man Melvin Van Peebles, who has often been called “the Godfather of black film.” I interviewed Van Peebles in the late nineties when he was in Hollywood promoting his most recent album on Capitol Records. “In an unparalleled career distinguished by relentless innovation, boundless curiosity and spiritual empathy, Melvin Van Peebles made an indelible mark on the international cultural landscape through his films, novels, plays and music,” the statement read. Copyright 1998, 2021 Film director, producer, writer, recording artist, novelist, author and former NPR host Melvin Van Peebles has died at his residence in Manhattan at age of 89. His family, The Criterion Collection and Janus Films announced his passing.

Panther melvin van peebles