'Shirley' Underscores The Problem With The Great Black Historical Figure Trope

There’s a moment in writer-director John Ridley’s new film, “Shirley,” based on the life and career of Shirley Chisholm, the first Black U.S. congresswoman, when you think it’s going to finally buckle under its own austere weight and let us see some humanity.

Shirley (Regina King) is studiously seated — back straight, shoulders perfectly squared — at her kitchen table telling her husband, Conrad (Michael Cherrie), that her campaign for Democratic party presidential nomination needs more funds. It hasn’t gone great. Her run has absorbed tons of money and resources and it’s in danger of reaching an anticlimactic end.

Conrad tries in vain to reason with his wife about spending money they don’t have. They go back and forth about it for a bit until Shirley lashes out with “Mymoney!” to indicate, presumably (since the movie never really confirms this), that it’s her campaign moneyand she can do whatever she wants with it.

At this point at the Brooklyn Academy of Music screening of the film earlier this month, someone in the audience let out an audible gasp. Because it’s the only time in the film when Shirley is uncomposed and in the wrong. Conrad, clearly just as astonished, stares at her before stomping off to get her checkbook, bringing it to her and leaving the room in silence.

Shirley quickly regains herself — and the moment is never referred to again. It doesn’t lead to the couple having a big fight, we learn nothing more about their obviously strained relationship, or each of them as individuals, or the matter of their finances.

It’s like if a single block fell out of a Jenga tower, then leapt right back inside the fortress so neatly and nimbly that you wonder if it even happened at all.

That’s much of the