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40 Acres and a Mule Filmworks

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40 Acres and a Mule Filmworks
TypeProduction company
IndustryFilm and television
Founded1979; 44 years ago (1979)
FoundersSpike Lee, Monty Ross
HeadquartersSouth Elliott Place, Brooklyn, New York, U.S.
Area served
Worldwide
ProductsMotion pictures, television programs, commercials
ServicesFilm production, television production
Website40acres.com

40 Acres and a Mule Filmworks is the production company of Spike Lee,[1][2] founded in 1979.[3] The company name is a reference to the phrase most often used to refer to the early Reconstruction period policy and episode of events, in which certain recently emancipated black families on the Georgia coast were given lots of land no larger than 40 acres (160,000 m2) and in some cases surplus army mules. The order, issued in 1865 by General Sherman as "Special Field Order 15", was later revoked by Andrew Johnson, and the land was taken away from the freed slaves and returned to previous owners.[4]

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Production company

Production company

A production company, production house, production studio, or a production team is a studio that creates works in the fields of performing arts, new media art, film, television, radio, comics, interactive arts, video games, websites, music, and video. These groups consist of technical staff to produce the media, and are often incorporated as a commercial publisher. Generally the term refers to all individuals responsible for the technical aspects of creating a particular product, regardless of where in the process their expertise is required, or how long they are involved in the project. For example, in a theatrical performance, the production team has not only the running crew, but also the theatrical producer, designers and theatrical direction.

Spike Lee

Spike Lee

Shelton Jackson "Spike" Lee is an American filmmaker and actor. Lee's work has continually explored race relations, issues within the black community, the role of media in contemporary life, urban crime and poverty, and other political issues. He has won numerous accolades for his work, including an Academy Award, a Student Academy Award, two Primetime Emmy Awards, a BAFTA Award, and two Peabody Awards. He has also been honored with an Honorary BAFTA Award in 2002, an Honorary César in 2003, the Academy Honorary Award in 2019, and a Gala Tribute from the Film Society of Lincoln Center as well as the Dorothy and Lillian Gish Prize.

Forty acres and a mule

Forty acres and a mule

Forty acres and a mule was part of Special Field Orders No. 15, a wartime order proclaimed by Union General William Tecumseh Sherman on January 16, 1865, during the American Civil War, to allot land to some freed families, in plots of land no larger than 40 acres (16 ha). Sherman later ordered the army to lend mules for the agrarian reform effort. The field orders followed a series of conversations between Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton and Radical Republican abolitionists Charles Sumner and Thaddeus Stevens following disruptions to the institution of slavery provoked by the American Civil War. Many freed people believed, after being told by various political figures, that they had a right to own the land they had been forced to work as slaves and were eager to control their own property. Freed people widely expected to legally claim 40 acres of land. However, Abraham Lincoln's successor as president, Andrew Johnson, tried to reverse the intent of Sherman's wartime Order No. 15 and similar provisions included in the second Freedmen's Bureau bills.

Emancipation Proclamation

Emancipation Proclamation

The Emancipation Proclamation, officially Proclamation 95, was a presidential proclamation and executive order issued by United States President Abraham Lincoln on January 1, 1863, during the Civil War. The Proclamation changed the legal status of more than 3.5 million enslaved African Americans in the secessionist Confederate states from enslaved to free. As soon as slaves escaped the control of their enslavers, either by fleeing to Union lines or through the advance of federal troops, they were permanently free. In addition, the Proclamation allowed for former slaves to "be received into the armed service of the United States".

Georgia (U.S. state)

Georgia (U.S. state)

Georgia is a state in the Southeastern region of the United States, bordered to the north by Tennessee and North Carolina; to the northeast by South Carolina; to the southeast by the Atlantic Ocean; to the south by Florida; and to the west by Alabama. Georgia is the 24th-largest state in area and 8th most populous of the 50 United States. Its 2020 population was 10,711,908, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. Atlanta, a "beta(+)" global city, is both the state's capital and its largest city. The Atlanta metropolitan area, with a population of more than 6 million people in 2021, is the 8th most populous metropolitan area in the United States and contains about 57% of Georgia's entire population.

Mule

Mule

The mule is a domestic equine hybrid between a donkey and a horse. It is the offspring of a male donkey and a female horse. The horse and the donkey are different species, with different numbers of chromosomes; of the two possible first-generation hybrids between them, the mule is easier to obtain and more common than the hinny, which is the offspring of a female donkey and a male horse.

William Tecumseh Sherman

William Tecumseh Sherman

William Tecumseh Sherman was an American soldier, businessman, educator, and author. He served as a general in the Union Army during the American Civil War (1861–1865), achieving recognition for his command of military strategy as well as criticism for the harshness of the scorched-earth policies that he implemented against the Confederate States. British military theorist and historian B. H. Liddell Hart declared that Sherman was "the most original genius of the American Civil War" and "the first modern general".

Andrew Johnson

Andrew Johnson

Andrew Johnson was the 17th president of the United States, serving from 1865 to 1869. He assumed the presidency following the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, as he was vice president at that time. Johnson was a Democrat who ran with Lincoln on the National Union Party ticket, coming to office as the Civil War concluded. He favored quick restoration of the seceded states to the Union without protection for the newly freed people who were formerly enslaved. This led to conflict with the Republican-dominated Congress, culminating in his impeachment by the House of Representatives in 1868. He was acquitted in the Senate by one vote.

Slavery in the United States

Slavery in the United States

The legal institution of human chattel slavery, comprising the enslavement primarily of Africans and African Americans, was prevalent in the United States of America from its founding in 1776 until 1865, predominantly in the South. Slavery was established throughout European colonization in the Americas. From 1526, during early colonial days, it was practiced in what became Britain's colonies, including the Thirteen Colonies that formed the United States. Under the law, an enslaved person was treated as property that could be bought, sold, or given away. Slavery lasted in about half of U.S. states until abolition. In the decades after the end of Reconstruction, many of slavery's economic and social functions were continued through segregation, sharecropping, and convict leasing.

History

The company has produced all of Lee's films, starting in 1986 with She's Gotta Have It.[3] After the success of films Do the Right Thing and Malcolm X, Lee expanded the 40 Acres and a Mule Filmworks brand by opening clothing stores with merchandise that bore the company's emblem. Lee has also done several collaborations with Nike, Eckō Unltd. and Brooklyn Denim.

40 Acres and a Mule Filmworks also has an advertising division with DDB called Spike DDB located in New York City. They have done Super Bowl, Nike and Lay's commercial spots. They have produced commercials and music videos in addition to Lee's films. The company established a music branch, used to designate records, 40 Acres and a Mule Musicworks in 1993.[5]

In the late 1980s, the company sought a partnership with Universal Pictures, which was reupped in September 1992, and stayed on for five years,[6] which lasted until March 2, 1997, when it was moved to Columbia Pictures.[7] Sam Kitt was named president of production at the Sony-based studio on June 18, 1997.[8]

In 2004, the company moved all of its operations to New York City with headquarters on South Elliott Place in the Fort Greene neighborhood of Brooklyn.

In December 2021, the company had signed a multi-year creative partnership with Netflix to develop their film and television projects.[9]

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She's Gotta Have It

She's Gotta Have It

She's Gotta Have It is a 1986 American black-and-white comedy-drama film written, produced, edited and directed by Spike Lee. Filmed on a small budget and Lee's first feature-length film to be released, it earned positive reviews and launched Lee's career.

Do the Right Thing

Do the Right Thing

Do the Right Thing is a 1989 American comedy-drama film produced, written, and directed by Spike Lee. It stars Lee, Danny Aiello, Ossie Davis, Ruby Dee, Richard Edson, Giancarlo Esposito, Bill Nunn, John Turturro, and Samuel L. Jackson, and is the feature film debut of Martin Lawrence and Rosie Perez. The story explores a Brooklyn neighborhood's simmering racial tension between its African-American residents and the Italian-American owners of a local pizzeria, culminating in tragedy and violence on a hot summer day.

Malcolm X (1992 film)

Malcolm X (1992 film)

Malcolm X is a 1992 American epic biographical drama film about the African-American activist Malcolm X. Directed and co-written by Spike Lee, the film stars Denzel Washington in the title role, as well as Angela Bassett, Albert Hall, Al Freeman Jr., and Delroy Lindo. Lee has a supporting role, while Black Panther Party co-founder Bobby Seale, the Rev. Al Sharpton, and future South African president Nelson Mandela makes a cameo appearance. It is the second of four film collaborations between Washington and Lee.

Nike, Inc.

Nike, Inc.

Nike, Inc. is an American multinational corporation that is engaged in the design, development, manufacturing, and worldwide marketing and sales of footwear, apparel, equipment, accessories, and services. The company is headquartered near Beaverton, Oregon, in the Portland metropolitan area. It is the world's largest supplier of athletic shoes and apparel and a major manufacturer of sports equipment, with revenue in excess of US$46 billion in its fiscal year 2022.

Super Bowl

Super Bowl

The Super Bowl is the annual final playoff game of the National Football League (NFL) to determine the league champion. It has served as the final game of every NFL season since 1966, replacing the NFL Championship Game. Since 2022, the game is played on the second Sunday in February. Prior Super Bowls were played on Sundays in early to mid-January from 1967 to 1978, late January from 1979 to 2003, except 2002, and the first Sunday of February from 2004 to 2021. Winning teams are awarded the Vince Lombardi Trophy, named for the coach of the Green Bay Packers who won the first two Super Bowls. Due to the NFL restricting use of its "Super Bowl" trademark, it is frequently referred to as the "big game" or other generic terms by non-sponsoring corporations. The day the game is played is often referred to as "Super Bowl Sunday" or simply "Super Sunday".

Lay's

Lay's

Lay's is a brand of potato chips with different flavors, as well as the name of the company that founded the chip brand in the United States. The brand is also referred to as Frito-Lay because both Lay's and Fritos are brands sold by the Frito-Lay company, which has been a wholly owned subsidiary of PepsiCo since 1965.

Universal Pictures

Universal Pictures

Universal Pictures is an American film production and distribution company owned by Comcast through the NBCUniversal Film and Entertainment division of NBCUniversal.

Columbia Pictures

Columbia Pictures

Columbia Pictures Industries, Inc. is an American film production studio that is a member of the Sony Pictures Motion Picture Group, a division of Sony Pictures Entertainment, which is one of the Big Five studios and a subsidiary of the multinational conglomerate Sony.

New York City

New York City

New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over 300.46 square miles (778.2 km2), New York City is the most densely populated major city in the United States and more than twice as populous as Los Angeles, the nation's second-largest city. New York City is located at the southern tip of New York State. It constitutes the geographical and demographic center of both the Northeast megalopolis and the New York metropolitan area, the largest metropolitan area in the U.S. by both population and urban area. With over 20.1 million people in its metropolitan statistical area and 23.5 million in its combined statistical area as of 2020, New York is one of the world's most populous megacities, and over 58 million people live within 250 mi (400 km) of the city. New York City is a global cultural, financial, entertainment, and media center with a significant influence on commerce, health care and life sciences, research, technology, education, politics, tourism, dining, art, fashion, and sports. Home to the headquarters of the United Nations, New York is an important center for international diplomacy, and is sometimes described as the capital of the world.

Brooklyn

Brooklyn

Brooklyn is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Kings County, in the U.S. state of New York. Kings County is the most populous county in the State of New York, and the second-most densely populated county in the United States, behind New York County (Manhattan). Brooklyn is also New York City's most populous borough, with 2,736,074 residents in 2020.

Netflix

Netflix

Netflix, Inc. is an American media company based in Los Gatos, California. Founded in 1997 by Reed Hastings and Marc Randolph in Scotts Valley, California, it operates the over-the-top subscription video on-demand service Netflix brand, which includes original films and television series commissioned or acquired by the company, and third-party content licensed from other distributors. Netflix is a member of the Motion Picture Association—having become the first streaming company to become a member.

Filmography

Release Date Title Directors Production partners Distributors
August 8, 1986 She's Gotta Have It Spike Lee Island Pictures
February 12, 1988 School Daze Columbia Pictures
July 21, 1989 Do the Right Thing Universal Pictures
August 3, 1990 Mo' Better Blues
June 7, 1991 Jungle Fever
November 18, 1992 Malcolm X Warner Bros.
(United States)
Largo International
(International)
May 13, 1994 Crooklyn Universal Pictures
April 19, 1995 New Jersey Drive Nick Gomez Gramercy Pictures
May 24, 1995 Tales from the Hood Rusty Cundieff Savoy Pictures
September 13, 1995 Clockers Spike Lee Universal Pictures
March 22, 1996 Girl 6 Fox Searchlight Pictures Fox Searchlight Pictures
October 16, 1996 Get on the Bus Columbia Pictures Sony Pictures Releasing
May 1, 1998 He Got Game Touchstone Pictures Buena Vista Pictures
July 2, 1999 Summer of Sam
October 22, 1999 The Best Man Malcolm D. Lee Universal Pictures
April 21, 2000 Love & Basketball Gina Prince-Bythewood New Line Cinema
August 18, 2000 The Original Kings of Comedy Spike Lee MTV Productions
Latham Entertainment
Paramount Pictures
October 6, 2000 Bamboozled New Line Cinema
July 1, 2001 3 A.M. Lee Davis Prism Leisure Corporation
December 19, 2002 25th Hour Spike Lee Touchstone Pictures
25th Hour Productions
Gamut Films
Industry Entertainment
Buena Vista Pictures
July 30, 2004 She Hate Me Sony Pictures Classics
March 24, 2006 Inside Man Universal Pictures
Imagine Entertainment
Universal Pictures
September 26, 2008 Miracle at St. Anna Touchstone Pictures
RAI Cinema
On My Own Produzioni Cinematografiche
Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures
August 10, 2012 Red Hook Summer Variance Films
November 27, 2013 Oldboy Good Universe
Vertigo Entertainment
FilmDistrict
January 25, 2015 Cronies Michael Larnell Circa 1978 Productions
February 14, 2015 Da Sweet Blood of Jesus Spike Lee Gravitas Ventures
December 4, 2015 Chi-Raq Amazon Studios Roadside Attractions
April 20, 2018 Pass Over Amazon Prime
August 10, 2018 BlacKkKlansman Blumhouse Productions
Monkeypaw Productions
QC Entertainment
Legendary Entertainment
Perfect World Pictures
Focus Features
October 2, 2018 Tales from the Hood 2 Rusty Cundieff
Darin Scott
Universal 1440 Entertainment
Hood Productions, Inc.
Universal Pictures Home Entertainment
May 17, 2019 See You Yesterday Stefon Bristol Netflix
June 12, 2020 Da 5 Bloods Spike Lee Rahway Road
Lloyd Levin/Beatriz Levin Production
October 17, 2020 American Utopia HBO Films
Participant
River Road Entertainment
Warner Music Entertainment
RadicalMedia
Todomundo
HBO
(United States/Canada)
Universal Pictures
(International)

Television

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Island Records

Island Records

Island Records is a multinational record label owned by Universal Music Group. It was founded in 1959 by Chris Blackwell, Graeme Goodall, and Leslie Kong in Jamaica, and was eventually sold to PolyGram in 1989. Island and A&M Records, another label recently acquired by PolyGram, were both at the time the largest independent record labels in history, with Island having exerted a major influence on the progressive music scene in the United Kingdom in the early 1970s. Island Records operates four international divisions: Island US, Island UK, Island Australia, and Island France. Current key people include Island US president Darcus Beese, OBE and MD Jon Turner. Partially due to its significant legacy, Island remains one of UMG's pre-eminent record labels.

Columbia Pictures

Columbia Pictures

Columbia Pictures Industries, Inc. is an American film production studio that is a member of the Sony Pictures Motion Picture Group, a division of Sony Pictures Entertainment, which is one of the Big Five studios and a subsidiary of the multinational conglomerate Sony.

Do the Right Thing

Do the Right Thing

Do the Right Thing is a 1989 American comedy-drama film produced, written, and directed by Spike Lee. It stars Lee, Danny Aiello, Ossie Davis, Ruby Dee, Richard Edson, Giancarlo Esposito, Bill Nunn, John Turturro, and Samuel L. Jackson, and is the feature film debut of Martin Lawrence and Rosie Perez. The story explores a Brooklyn neighborhood's simmering racial tension between its African-American residents and the Italian-American owners of a local pizzeria, culminating in tragedy and violence on a hot summer day.

Mo' Better Blues

Mo' Better Blues

Mo' Better Blues is a 1990 American musical comedy-drama film starring Denzel Washington, Wesley Snipes, and Spike Lee, who also wrote, produced, and directed. It follows a period in the life of fictional jazz trumpeter Bleek Gilliam as a series of bad decisions result in his jeopardizing both his relationships and his playing career. The film focuses on themes of friendship, loyalty, honesty, cause-and-effect, and ultimately salvation. It features the music of the Branford Marsalis quartet and Terence Blanchard on trumpet. The film was released five months after the death of Robin Harris and is dedicated to his memory, being his penultimate acting role.

Jungle Fever

Jungle Fever

Jungle Fever is a 1991 American romantic drama film written, produced and directed by Spike Lee. The film stars Lee, Wesley Snipes, Annabella Sciorra, Ossie Davis, Ruby Dee, Samuel L. Jackson, Lonette McKee, John Turturro, Frank Vincent, Halle Berry, Tim Robbins, Brad Dourif, Queen Latifah, Michael Imperioli, and Anthony Quinn, and is Lee's fifth feature-length film. Jungle Fever explores the beginning and end of an extramarital interracial relationship against the urban backdrop of the streets of New York City in the early 1990s. The film received positive reviews, with particular praise for Samuel L. Jackson's performance.

Malcolm X (1992 film)

Malcolm X (1992 film)

Malcolm X is a 1992 American epic biographical drama film about the African-American activist Malcolm X. Directed and co-written by Spike Lee, the film stars Denzel Washington in the title role, as well as Angela Bassett, Albert Hall, Al Freeman Jr., and Delroy Lindo. Lee has a supporting role, while Black Panther Party co-founder Bobby Seale, the Rev. Al Sharpton, and future South African president Nelson Mandela makes a cameo appearance. It is the second of four film collaborations between Washington and Lee.

Largo Entertainment

Largo Entertainment

Largo Entertainment was a production company founded in 1989. It was run by film producer Lawrence Gordon and was backed by electronics firm Victor Company of Japan, Ltd. (JVC) in an investment that cost more than $100 million. The production company released their first film, Point Break in 1991 and their last film was Grey Owl in 1999.

Crooklyn

Crooklyn

Crooklyn is a 1994 American semi-autobiographical film produced and directed by Spike Lee and co-written with his sister Joie and brother Cinqué. Occurring in the Bedford–Stuyvesant neighborhood of Brooklyn, New York, during the summer of 1973, the film primarily focuses on a young girl named Troy Carmichael, and her family. Throughout the film, Troy learns life lessons through her rowdy brothers Clinton, Wendell, Nate, and Joseph; her loving but strict mother Carolyn, and her naive, struggling father Woody.

New Jersey Drive

New Jersey Drive

New Jersey Drive is a 1995 crime drama film written and directed by Nick Gomez and executive produced by Spike Lee. The film is about joyriding teenagers in 1990s Newark, New Jersey, then known as the "car theft capital of the world". The film was an official selection at the 1995 Sundance Film Festival.

Nick Gomez

Nick Gomez

Nick Gomez is an American film director and writer. He has directed for a number of television and film. His first feature-length film was the 1992 movie Laws of Gravity, which won awards at both the Berlin International Film Festival and the Valencia International Film Festival. Gomez's next film was the 1995 crime drama New Jersey Drive, which was screened and competed for a Grand Jury Prize during that year's Sundance Film Festival.

Gramercy Pictures

Gramercy Pictures

Gramercy Pictures was an American film production label. It was founded on May 20, 1992 as a joint venture between PolyGram Filmed Entertainment and Universal Pictures. Gramercy was the distributor of PolyGram films in the United States and Canada and also served as Universal's art-house division. After Seagram's buyout of PolyGram, Gramercy along with October Films were merged by Barry Diller to form USA Films in 1999. On May 20, 2015, Focus Features revived the name as a label for action, horror and sci-fi genre films; the label was shut down after the release of Ratchet & Clank on April 29, 2016.

Rusty Cundieff

Rusty Cundieff

George Arthur "Rusty" Cundieff is an American film and television director, actor, and writer known for his work on Fear of a Black Hat (1993), Tales from the Hood (1995), and Chappelle's Show (2003–2006).

Source: "40 Acres and a Mule Filmworks", Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, (2023, February 15th), https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/40_Acres_and_a_Mule_Filmworks.

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References
  1. ^ Schartoff, Adam (August 10, 2012). "Get Out: Red Hook Summer Opens Today". The New York Times. Archived from the original on 2014-03-06. Retrieved 2014-03-01.
  2. ^ Williams, Zelena (February 28, 2014). "Spike Lee Rants About Gentrification In Brooklyn". Uptown Magazine. Archived from the original on 2014-03-01. Retrieved 2014-03-01.
  3. ^ a b Greif, Coby (3 February 2021). "10 Actors Who Own Their Own Production Company & Its Best Project". Screenrant. Retrieved 1 September 2021.
  4. ^ Staples, Brent (July 21, 1997). "Forty Acres and a Mule". The New York Times.
  5. ^ Eller, Claudia (1993-01-08). "ICM inks to represent Spike Lee". Variety. Retrieved 2021-12-21.
  6. ^ Marx, Andy (1993-03-04). "Lee gets a go for 'Crooklyn'". Variety. Retrieved 2021-12-21.
  7. ^ Cox, Dan (1997-03-03). "40 ACRES & A MULE TO COL". Variety. Retrieved 2021-12-21.
  8. ^ Cox, Dan (1997-06-18). "Kitt tills Lee's 40 Acres". Variety. Retrieved 2021-12-21.
  9. ^ Laws, Khalid (2021-12-17). "Spike Lee signs multi-year creative partnership deal with Netflix". KOMO. Retrieved 2021-12-21.
  10. ^ 70th Annual Peabody Awards, May 2011.
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