Nov.-Dec. 2011 - Maryland Institute College of Art

18 GLOBAL
Trustee Produces Special on First Lady
Michelle Obama
miCa trustee James F. Blue III is no stranger to high-stakes broadcast reporting and film production. He has reported from
Afghanistan, Kosovo, Russia, China, Pakistan, South Africa, Iran, the Persian Gulf, Latin America, and Europe. He worked with
Bryant Gumbel in Zimbabwe, Ted Koppel in London, and led a news team into southern Iraq as US forces advanced. Over
his 14 years as a producer for ABC News, NBC News, and the Discovery Channel, he has won eight Emmy Awards, two George
Foster Peabody Awards, and numerous other accolades. However, even he was surprised when he was approached to produce a
Black Entertainment Television (BET) special on First Lady Michelle Obama’s recent trip to Africa and to help transform the cable
station’s programming brand.
Blue is founder and executive producer of Public Affairs Media Group, Inc.
and was asked by BET to also produce a documentary on the Martin Luther
King, Jr. memorial unveiling. He sat down with Juxtapositions in his home
to reflect on his filmmaking, his unique access to Mrs. Obama, and the
possibilities for BET.
Juxtapositions:
Tell us about your opportunity to highlight the first lady’s trip to Africa.
James Blue:
BET has recognized that there is an under-served market, particularly in
the black community, that really wants quality original programming. This
summer they called me up and said they had the opportunity to do a project
with a celebrity in South Africa. They wouldn’t tell me who it was. A few
days later, they called me up and said it would be Michelle Obama. I said,
“Great. Let’s do it.” We went in late June and spent a week with the first
lady and her family and went on this mission to Africa, as Mrs. Obama called
it, and it was amazing.
JP:
What was she doing in Africa?
Blue:
It really was a working trip. She was highlighting the things that were
important to her and her agenda—youth empowerment, women’s
empowerment, and healthy living. So she did visits to child care centers,
universities, and AIDS clinics, where she could shine a light and inspire
people to do better. She thinks that—and I think it’s accurate—people can
identify with her in a way that perhaps they haven’t been able to identify
with former first ladies. So there is an authenticity to what she is saying:
“You can do it. You can do anything.”
JP:
What was the reaction to her visit?
Blue:
It was pretty overwhelming. People were inspired, and as they say in the
story, they’ve never seen an American first lady who looked like them. I’m
pretty jaded. I’m a journalist; I’ve been doing this for over 20 years. But it
is pretty amazing that we have a first family in the White House who could
easily be my contemporaries. We know people in common. So it is amazing
that we have gotten to the point where we have a black first family.
JP:
You’ve seen other interviews with the first lady before so what kind of
special insight did you want to bring out?
Blue:
This is my first time working for a majority black network. I worked at ABC;
I worked at NBC; and I worked at the Discovery Channel. It’s a much more
general audience. So I think one of the reasons the Obamas asked BET to
go is because they really wanted to show the BET audience, mostly urban
and black, the possibilities of life. Mrs. Obama makes a point in the segment
that middle-class black people when she was growing up didn’t just go get
a passport and go overseas. But she wants people to recognize that those
are the things that are possible for all of us, black, white, red, or whatever—
and how connected we all are. She gave a speech in one of the old Soweto
churches, and she really spoke quite movingly about how were it not for the
struggles of all the people that have come before us—King, Mandela, and
others—she would not be standing there as first lady of the United States.
And that was pretty powerful.
JP:
You had behind-the-scenes access. What did you learn from her that you
wanted to incorporate in your storytelling?
Blue:
I was really taken with her personal warmth. I think she is probably the
engine of that family. The president seems to have an even keel, and I think
she’s the one that provides the spark. I came away impressed. It’s really
rare when I come away really impressed. She’s trying to do something with
her platform. During our visit, she told a young woman she believed in her.
And for this woman in Botswana, that was the first time anyone had ever
said that to her.
Hear the full interview with Blue and view clips from the
documentary special at fyi.mica.edu.