Talk to Me
The film Talk to Me does a decent job in showing varying degrees, but equally jarring, racial divisions in the 1960’s – 1970’s working world. The people in positions of power in the film are portrayed as the controlling, white, corporate America types, and although Dewey has worked alongside many of these men for some time, he is still considered lower down on the hierarchy and that truly there is “only one boss,� – in this case, the white man. Dewey has had to adapt to their mold to achieve his success. He, unlike Petey, would not have “made it� in “their� world without conforming. Whereas Petey’s marketability was his “blackness,� Dewey’s was his ability to blend in with the world around him. And although they achieved their success through different strategies, one by defying the norm (Petey) and the other playing into it (Dewey), at the end of the day, both men are agents of profitability for the higher-level white men in positions of power. In a sense, Petey’s freedom is still an illusion; he is still a cash cow for those whom he opposes.