You ever feel like you have too much shit going on in your life? Bills breathing down your neck, you gotta work 15 hustles to stay afloat, your love life isn't considered "normal" and every five minutes gentrification is rearing its ugly face in your community? None of these things seem to slow down Spike Lee's debatably controversial character Nola Darling in the 2017 re-make of She's Gotta Have It. The story follows Brooklyn native Nola Darling who is dating three men at once (eventually a woman as well). She's trying to become a successful artist while battling her inner demons dealing with her sexual freedom. Most of the story remains the same from the 1986 version, which was Lee's directorial debut.
The greatest theme Lee tackles in this story is the issue of gentrification that many urban communities face today. The formal definitions of gentrification are the process of renovating and improving a house or district so that it conforms to middle-class taste. Or, the process of making a person or activity more refined or polite. The problem with both of these definitions is that it implies something was wrong with the neighborhood in the first place. It sounds like colonizers talking about the people they have conquered. As if the original people or place weren't what created the name recognition of the neighborhood they're conquering. The grass root people would describe gentrification as glorified eviction. Some people have the luxury of being bought out of their property so at least they have money to move some where else. But other's like Nola Darling and her neighborhood friend Papo were being forced out by all the changes culturally and economically.
The introduction of each episode starts off eloquently with nice piano music followed by various pictures of Brooklyn throughout the 1980s-2000s. Lee is showing the roots of what made Brooklyn's reputation of being tough, edgy and one of the most interesting places you could ever visit. But as each episode continues, he shows how that reputation is being torn down by the new people moving in the Fort Greene neighborhood, which can be reflective of all urban neighborhoods going through this process. A particular incident happened between Papo, referred to as the mayor of Fort Greene, and a new resident, a middle class white woman, who can be identified as a part of the gentrifying movement. The woman was sick of Papo sitting on her stoop, playing his music and trying to sell his art to those who passed by him. Her last straw came when a green spray painted "G" was put on her door and stoop because it stood for "gentrifier". She decided to call the police on him but at the last minute Darling decided to take the blame for Papo. All three people had to go to the station in the end.
This scene represents the problem with gentrification as a whole. It's understandable to not want your property defaced or have someone sit on your stoop constantly playing their loud music at all hours of the night. But if you do not like that culture, DON'T MOVE TO BROOKLYN! Don't move to Brooklyn if you don't like music being played at all hours of the night. Don't move to Brooklyn if you can't handle people always sitting on your stoop. Lastly, don't move to Brooklyn if you have no intentions of understanding the people who have lived their for generations. Papo wasn't a menace to society or some old crazy homeless dude. He was an army vet that suffered from mental issues because of the things he saw while at war protecting her rights to own property and remain within her affluent lifestyle. If she had taken the time out to understand and know him she wouldn't have gotten a "G' written on her stoop. She would've been welcomed into the community and given the tools to understand how to peacefully live among one another.
This is all to say that just because someone has something doesn't mean you need to have it as well. Just because she's gotta have it doesn't mean you do too. A lot of people are moving to very famous New York areas and changing the format of what made them famous in order to profit off them but still meet the needs of their middle to upper class life styles. For example, some people are trying to change the name Harlem to NOHA (in reference to SOHO in Manhattan) so they can make the area more profitable but keep the attraction of Harlem itself. That is not how this works! Nobody has the right to invade a neighborhood, especially a neighborhood people have labeled "ghetto" or sub-par to a suburban area and then try to make a profit off of it because tourist want the "real" New York experience and exclude all the people that make it real.
If you want to move to Brooklyn and gain a new experience in life that's completely fine, but you do not have the right to push others out socially and economically then profit off the things they have build from the ground up. You are a guest in someone else's home, be respectful and take your shoes off.
