“Being genius is not enough; it takes courage to change people’s hearts.”- From the movie Green Book
The above quote is from the movie Green Book. It is the story of the 1962 tour in the Deep South by a Black pianist Dr. Don Shirley and an Italian bouncer from the Bronx Frank “Tony Lip” Vallelonga. It was an eight-week tour at some of the most upscale clubs in the South where Dr. Shirley could entertain but could not eat or use the bathrooms. This tour was at the height of segregation and “Jim Crow”, but what is most important is the relationship the was built between two men who walked in different circles and built a friendship that changed their lives forever. Their relationship is a true example of the dignity journey.
I am not going to give you a 600-word overview of the movie. I encourage you to watch it. It is one of those movies that gives you hope. Two hearts were changed during a time when people were judged by how they looked or where they came from and not by the content of their character.
During the fifties and sixties, most people lived in the neighborhoods of people who were just like them. Tony Lip grew up and lived in a neighborhood with strong Italian roots. Don Shirley was born in Florida, and his parents were from Jamaica. Dr. Shirley began playing piano at age 2. He went on to college to study music and even studied in the then Soviet Union. Both men traveled in circles that normally never would have connected but they did and in a world where they should have hated each other, they formed a brotherhood.
One of the scenes that caught my attention was in the beginning of the movie there were 2 black men doing some work in Tony’s apartment. His wife, Delores, hired them. The whole family was there to keep an eye out. Delores gave them something to drink and walked them out when the job was done. Later in the scene, Tony threw the glasses away because he didn’t want to drink from those glasses. When his wife found out that Tony was going to drive for a Black man, she said to him “You won’t last a week.” But what we discovered during this movie is that Tony was more than this tough streetwise person. He was someone that could learn to look beyond those stereotypes and see a person he would later have sitting at his table on Christmas.
Dr. Shirley also had challenges as he tried to navigate where his place was in society. There was a scene when they were released from jail, and Tony made a comment that he was Blacker than him, and this is how Dr. Shirley’s responded, “Yes, I live in a castle, Tony! Alone. And rich white people pay me to play piano for them because it makes them feel culture, but when I step off the stage, I am still just another Negro to them because that is their true culture and I suffer that slight alone because I’m not accepted by my own people because I am not like them, either. So, if I’m not Black enough and if I’m not white enough, then tell me, Tony, what am I?” I believe this encounter was a turning point in their relationship. It was the fact that Dr. Shirley throughout the movie was stoic and rarely showed vulnerability and now was sharing with Tony what his true struggle was. These strong-willed men had the opportunity to be vulnerable and share with each other the part of themselves no one has seen.
I know that this is just a movie and Hollywood can take real life stories and change them to add drama, but these are real people from two different worlds who forged a friendship when the world told them it wasn’t possible. It is a lesson that in dignity all things are possible. It led to Nelson Mandela becoming the first Black President of South Africa. It ended the years of conflict between Ireland and Northern Ireland, and it led this write in learning how to be a better person, leader, parent and hopefully husband.
In the words of Dr. Don Shirley, “You only win when you maintain your dignity.”
Charles Redd RN
Dignity Freedom Fighter
Dignity Freedom Fighter 