The operative term here is changed. For Petey s fate is set, according to the film, by the complex circumstances that make him. Charismatic, controversial, and consistently defiant, Petey is presented here as a painfully self-aware hustler and con as well as a prophet of the streets, in the words of program director Dewey Hughes (Chiwetel Ejiofor).
Emphatically representative of his time (1960s and 70s) and place (the Chocolate City), Petey s influence appears both urgently local and, in hindsight, far-reaching. The film uses Petey and Dewey s friendship to set up and then break down what seems an easy opposition: Dewey calls Petey a miscreant and Petey calls Dewey Mr. Tibbs, or again, nothing but another white man with a tan.
And yet both come together to expand the possibilities of talk radio as a means to speak for and unite a community. The film begins when Petey is incarcerated at Virginia s Lorton Penitentiary (convicted of armed robbery), circa 1966. Dewey comes to visit his brother Milo (Mike Epps), who urges him to hire Petey, the electrifying prison DJ.
Dewey is skeptical, as he both resents and judges what he terms his brother s apparent moral failure, but eventually hires Petey on his release. As the host of Rapping with Petey Greene, Petey plays James Brown, Sly and the Family Stone, and Sam Cooke, and in between, calls out Berry Gordy as a pimp, relates his own raunchy escapades, and invites listeners to vent about the system, but also to imagine other options, to see themselves as powerful, to understand voice as a means, multiple and dynamic, to collective and individual identity. Petey says talk is the only thing I m good at that don t involve breaking the law, and invites frank conversation on air about politics, sex, race, and popular culture, calling himself a nigger in America telling it like it is, telling the truth.
The radio show is his platform on the occasion of Dr. Though he admits that, like his audience, he wants revenge, he also seeks another way. That s your city, he says of the burning streets, inviting listeners to attend a free concert by James Brown the following evening instead of destroying their neighborhood.
The concept works, but Petey shows up to emcee the event late and drunk. The crowd adores him but you (through Dewey s eyes) also see the battle that comprises Petey s soul: as he leaves the stage and the Brown facsimile (Herbert L. Rawlings, Jr.
) begins performing Say It Loud, Petey pukes and staggers. It is Dewey and Petey s relationship that shapes , which leaves Vernell, unfortunately, to play their go-between and interpreter. (Her perspective would constitute an entirely other movie.
) Plainly imperfect even as he s both selfless and ambitious, Petey reluctantly agrees to Dewey s career plan, at first enjoying the attention, the swank new apartment, the access to liquor, clothes, and women. But he also worries. His self-doubt has to do with personal misgivings but also, more deeply, in the very structural oppressions he talks about on air.
The film punctuates his story with TV images of anti-Vietnam war protests and Black Panthers, Lyndon Johnson and Shirley Chisholm. Dewey sees the chance to change the system from within, rejecting Petey s vision of genuine and only blackness: Negroes, says Dewey as he displays his own considerable skills as a pool hustler, always think that if you speak correct and wear anything other than clown suits, you re not real. Dewey s role model, he confesses, is Johnny Carson; he believes he can reach people and prosper, help shape a community and create a better world.
To this end, Dewey encourages Petey to greater and greater visibility a local TV show ( ), a live comedy routine, and even an appearance on The operative term here is changed.
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