Soon it will be 25 years since Buggin' Out got his Jordans scuffed, Mookie put the trash can through Sal's window, and Spike Lee brought his unflinching look at racial conflict and gentrification to the big screen in the 1989 masterpiece Do the Right Thing.
Lee marked the occasion of the film's quarter-century anniversary with a screening and party at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art yesterday, and Barack and MichelleObama helped celebrate with a recorded video message.
It turns out the Obamas saw the movie on their "first official date" back in Chicago 25 years ago.
"So Spike, thank you for helping me impress Michelle, and thank you for telling a powerful story. Today, I've got a few more grey hairs than I did back in 1989. You don't look like Mookie anymore. But Do the Right Thing still holds up a mirror to our society, and it makes us laugh, and think and challenges all of us to see ourselves in one another," the president says in the video.
"He was trying to show me his sophisticated side by selecting an independent filmmaker and it ended up being a pretty good movie—really great!," Michelle Obama said of the future Commander-in-Chief's choice.
Well played, Mr. President.
[Via Vulture]
