Writer/director Robert Townsend stars as Bobby, a young African-American acting hopeful has a boss who thinks he's hopeless, a grandmother who wants him to work in the post office, a girlfriend who gives him blind faith, and the chance to play idiotic and insulting roles in terrible movies. He finds his budding career run aground by white producers guilty of perpetrating and perpetuating negative racial stereotypes. He has a series of comic fantasies about Hollywood's cruel history of image-making, stretching from shuffling happy slaves to clownish buffoons to gun-toting pimps. As the actor suffers through a series of often-demeaning auditions--and an even more demeaning part, once he's hired--he begins to question if he really wants to be a part of the business. A dead-on send-up of Hollywood's interminable parade of ethnic stereotypes.
A would-be actor finds his budding career run aground by white producers guilty of perpetrating and perpetuating negative racial stereotypes. He has a series of comic fantasies about Hollywood's cruel history of image-making, stretching from shuffling happy slaves to clownish buffoons to gun-toting pimps. As the actor suffers through a series of often-demeaning auditions -- and an even more demeaning part, once he's hired -- he begins to question if he really wants to be a part of the business.
Townsend wrote, produced, directed and starred in HOLLYWOOD SHUFFLE, which he financed himself on a vast assortment of credit cards.
In February 2001, Spike Lee told USA Weekend, "When I started, Michael Schultz was the only black director working. You had Richard Pryior and Eddie Murphy. That was it. It was HOLLYWOOD SHUFFLE and SGHII [SHE'S GOTTA HAVE IT] that really changed the landscape. That's when you had a lot more black films being made."
DVD Features:
Region 1
Keep Case
Letterbox - 1.85
Audio:
Dolby Digital Mono - English
Additional Release Material:
Trailers: Original Theatrical Trailer
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Review 1:
"...HOLLYWOOD SHUFFLE is boisterous, out-at-the elbows movie making....There are wonderful comic moments here..."
Source: Los Angeles Times
p.C1 04/24/1987
Review 2:
"...An exuberant satire....Townsend has taken aim at the industry's funny bone and struck a solid blow..."
Source: New York Times
p.C8 03/20/1987
Review 3:
"...Brimming with imagination and energy....[The] film is entertaining..."
Source: Variety
03/18/1987
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