The Emperor Jones (1933)

January’s theme of PORTRAITS OF THE ARTISTS has us examining some of the works of two major black leading men in film and our Monday classic selections revolve around a man that would be ahead of his time at any time, Paul Robeson. We’ve seen him silent and now it’s time for the talkies as Paul Robeson plays the lead character of Brutus Jones in Dudley Murphy’s 1933 adaptation of the Eugene O’Neil play “THE EMPEROR JONES”. Jones hits some ups and downs and finds himself a crafty little despot on a small Caribbean island but getting power and keeping it are two different things. Featuring, for the first time this month, is Paul Robeson doing what he was very famous for doing. Singing. It’s pretty nice. We watched an excellent remaster from the Robeson Criterion collection (the title of that is what we named this month’s theme after) but there are other free versions online that you can find such as right here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?app=desktop&v=suYeWvhFxwQ 

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