Upon winning the director’s job after a public campaign arguing that Malcolm’s story could be filmed only by an African-American, Lee found himself under attack from black nationalists who questioned his ability to portray their hero correctly. Nation of Islam head Louis Farrakhan was most concerned about how the film would treat spiritual leader Elijah Muhammad, from whom Malcolm X broke after a bitter dispute. “I will wait and see what is done and how it’s done,” Farrakhan told Lee.
Meanwhile, the director clashed with his studio, over both the epic length and the budget. Lee wanted $33 million; Warner Bros. agreed to put up only $20 million. After picking up $8 million more by selling the foreign rights, Lee began shooting, hoping that Warners would make up the shortfall. When it didn’t, and the project went $5 million over budget, the bond company that insured it took financial control of production.
Typically, Lee vented the dispute in the press, upsetting Warner Bros. executives by referring to the studio as “a plantation.” It was all part of his strategy-to shame the company into ponying up more money by playing things out “in full view of the public, specifically African-Americans.” When even that didn’t work, Lee took a page out of the Malcolm manual: do for yourself. He appealed to wealthy blacks for contributions to help finish the movie, successfully tapping Bill Cosby, Oprah Winfrey, Michael Jordan, Janet Jackson, Prince and others. “They saved ‘Malcolm X’,” he says. Lee also says he plowed most of his $3 million fee back into the production. “White directors don’t have to do that,” he complains, conveniently forgetting moviemakers like Francis Ford Coppola.
Throughout, Lee constantly reworked the screenplay, originally co-written by the late black writer James Baldwin. He also did new research, interviewing Malcolm’s children and his widow, who signed on as a consultant. For the scenes of Malcolm’s pilgrimage to Mecca, Lee wanted to dispatch an Islamic camera crew to Saudi Arabia. The bond company countered with a thriftier proposal: how about the New Jersey shore? In the end, they went to Mecca, becoming the first film crew ever allowed inside the holy city during the hajj.
To link Malcolm’s message with the current struggle for racial justice, Lee wanted Nelson Mandela to appear in his epic. “Since Malcolm always talked about Pan-Africanism,” he says, “I wanted to end the film in Africa, to make the connection between Soweto and Harlem.” After Mandela read the script, his first response was no, then yes, then maybe.
Hoping that Mandela would find it harder to turn him down face to face, Lee packed up a film crew and traveled to Soweto. (When the bond company balked at paying his travel expenses without a written agreement from the ANC leader, Lee “told them to kiss my ass. We’re going anyway.”) Sure enough, Mandela agreed, and the movie concludes with his recitation of Malcolm’s most famous speech-a vow to achieve racial equality. But mindful of the volatile situation in his homeland, Mandela stopped short of speaking Malcolm’s final words: “By any means necessary.”
So Malcolm himself thunders the words in a spliced-in clip. It’s hard to imagine a more fitting tag for this film-or for its maker.
