vox--2020-09-02--Why the no-tipping movement failed (and why it still has a chance)

One year after we first spoke in July 2019 , Andrew Hoffman tells me I need a “ disclaimer ” for this piece .
“ This article was started pre-pandemic .
Back in the Great Before , ” jokes Hoffman , co-owner of Berkeley ’ s Comal and Comal Next Door , who eliminated tipping at his table-service restaurant around six years ago .
I like that , I reply , repeating “ the Great Before ” with sardonic gusto .
Hoffman laughs .
“ Take that playbook from the Great Before and throw it away , ” says Hoffman @ @ @ @ @ @ @ it anymore.
” Since COVID-19 spread through the United States , millions of food service workers have been laid off or furloughed , and those who are still employed are risking their health each day by returning to work .
And despite all the pivoting — to delivery and takeout , to corner stores or bottle shops , to outdoor dining — between a third and half of all independent restaurants will shutter as a result of the pandemic .
This economic reckoning comes commensurately with a social one , as calls amplify @ @ @ @ @ @ @ following George Floyd ’ s death in Minneapolis police custody , and , more recently , the police shooting of Jacob Blake in Kenosha , Wisconsin .
Depending on who you ask , these crises make right now either the worst time to talk about tipping , or render it a conversation that has never been more urgent .
The case against tipping is compelling : It facilitates racism , sexism , and widespread wage theft ; perpetuates a growing income gap between front- and back-of-house staff , particularly in cities like New @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to a stigma that service work is transitory .
“ No matter how you do it , tipping hits BIPOC workers in the pocketbook , it exposes more female workers to sexual harassment , and it keeps all workers from making a steady , solid salary , ” says Amanda Cohen of New York City ’ s Dirt Candy , a longtime anti-tipping advocate .
Around the U.S. , independent restaurateurs are newly experimenting with no tipping : from Hunky Dory in Crown Heights , Brooklyn , which re-opened in July with menu @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ s Kitchen in Austin and Last Resort in Athens , Georgia , which have in recent months instituted service charges that , they say , will help provide fair and stable wages for all staff .
“ Before the pandemic , tipping was baked into the industry and we all inherited it , ” Cohen says .
“ Right now , no one wants to go back and consciously , purposefully inflict its inequities on their staff.
” The end of tipping has been heralded before , and not all that long @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Danny Meyer announced that he would eliminate gratuities throughout his sprawling Union Square Hospitality Group , hoping to narrow the stark income disparity between servers , who received tips , and cooks , who did not .
“ I hate those Saturday nights where the whole dining room is high-fiving because they just set a record , and they ’ re counting their shekels , and the kitchen just says , ‘ Well , boy , did we sweat tonight , ’ ” Meyer said at the time .
Meyer ’ s move @ @ @ @ @ @ @ eliminate tipping by several Bay Area restaurateurs who , for similar reasons , did away with gratuity over the prior year : Berkeley ’ s Comal ; Oakland ’ s Camino ( now closed ) and Homestead ; and San Francisco ’ s Trou Normand , Bar Agricole , and Zazie .
While other New York chef-owners , like Cohen , had banished tipping earlier , Meyer ’ s decision marked a tectonic shift : As the founder of Shake Shack and the CEO of a dozen-plus New York restaurants , if anyone @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , the thinking went , it was Meyer .
Other influential New York players , including David Chang and Tom Colicchio , acted around the time that Meyer did , resulting in a full-fledged “ no-tipping movement.
” Within months , Andrew Tarlow announced that he would go gratuity-free throughout the Marlow Collective , his restaurant group that helped define dining in a gentrified Brooklyn ; Tarlow even designed an open-source logo for demarcating no-tipping venues , of which Gabriel Stulman made use after banning tips at Fedora , one of his then-six @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , USHG alums Jonah Miller and Nate Adler likewise pledged to eliminate tips at their restaurant , Huertas .
By May 2016 , data bore out the beginnings of a cultural shift .
An American Express survey released that month found that of 503 randomly sampled restaurateurs , 18 percent said they had already adopted no-tipping policies , 29 percent said they planned to do the same , and 17 percent said they would consider implementing no-tipping if others did .
The EndTipping subreddit , one of the more complete records of no-tipping @ @ @ @ @ @ @ than 200 restaurants that were , at one point or another , without gratuity .
Although these comprised a sliver of the roughly 650,000 restaurants across the country , momentum appeared to be building .
Until , it seemed , the wheels came off .
Most of the restaurants that participated in the Meyer-catalyzed no-tipping movement had , by 2018 , returned to gratuity .
Meyer , whose organization never fully recovered from the shift to what he called “ Hospitality Included , ” capitulated earlier this summer , announcing that he would @ @ @ @ @ @ @ tipping won , and decisively .
Now , facing a potential reset of the entire restaurant industry , no-tipping could once again be on the proverbial table .
“ The big reason why people didn ’ t switch to getting rid of tips was because they were scared that they were going to lose their staff .
And then they were scared that they were going to lose their guests .
And now they ’ ve lost both , ” Hoffman explains .
But if the post-pandemic restaurant industry stands any chance of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ equitable compensation methods , it is worth asking : What exactly went wrong before ?
What went right ?
And how , if at all , can sustainable change be made ?
When the Brooklyn restaurateurs David Stockwell and his wife , Carla Swickerath , opened their modern Italian-American bistro Faun in August 2016 , they debuted as a tip-free establishment in part because , Stockwell said , “ it seemed like we were going to get in front of a rising tide.
” The anti-tipping cohort of the mid-2010s largely consisted of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ casually upscale table-service spots that promised a mix of hospitality and affordability .
By contrast , fine-dining establishments already had a history of no-tipping , as their guests expected to pay top dollar and were therefore less likely to resist prices that included the cost of gratuity or an automatic service charge — although this willingness was not entirely without exception .
Still , these restaurants were largely not considered part of the tip-free trend , and neither were the fast-food and counter-service venues that traded primarily on price and often forewent tips @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and my ideals are one thing , but what ’ s the priority here ?
” And in the case of Faun , Stockwell found himself explaining to guests why menu prices were higher than those at comparable restaurants .
“ Once you get people to understand that you ’ re gratuity-inclusive , there ’ s still the next level of this visceral connection with numbers on a menu , ” he told me last summer .
“ When entrees are all up in the 30s versus in the 20s , it doesn @ @ @ @ @ @ @ know that you are gratuity-inclusive.
” Stockwell and Swickerath waited for other restaurateurs to follow suit .
But several early adopters had already reversed course , including Craft , Fedora , and Momofuku Nishi ( which has since closed entirely ) .
“ It was a miscalculation that this tide was growing , ” Stockwell confided .
Despite positive reviews , by winter 2017 , Faun was struggling .
Stockwell was unsure if the restaurant could survive the coming January , with its crowd-killing short days and frigid temperatures .
He didn ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ but he felt his hands were tied .
“ So many times that you are operating as a business , you realize , ‘ Okay , my politics and my ideals are one thing , but what ’ s the priority here ?
’ ” Faun reintroduced tipping the first week of January 2018 .
According to Stockwell , the effect was striking .
“ Immediately , it made this whole thing possible , ” he recalled .
Although he and Swickerath would have preferred to remain tip-free for ethical reasons , he @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ t let the ship keep sinking.
” Elsewhere in Brooklyn , Mike Fadem was confronting a similar challenge : determining the “ right ” price of pizza — one that factored in gratuity but also didn ’ t cause guests to mutiny .
In October 2016 , Fadem and his partners Marie Tribouilloy and Gavin Compton opened their Bushwick pizzeria , Ops , as a service-inclusive establishment .
Before this , Fadem spent seven years climbing the ranks at Tarlow ’ s Marlow Collective , where , as a manager , he @ @ @ @ @ @ @ transition to tip-free .
Based on that experience , he knew that Ops couldn ’ t simply raise menu prices by 20 percent across the board .
Instead , he calibrated his opening prices to those at comparable pizzerias , and played primarily with the cost of wine .
For its first two years , Fadem says , Ops did not turn a profit .
Despite the financial challenges , and watching Roman ’ s and the rest of the Marlow Collective revert to tipping in December 2018 , Fadem and Tribouilloy were @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Still , Fadem remained a realist about tipping ’ s prevalence when we spoke last July .
“ I think a lot of people don ’ t see the system as being broken , or anything .
And a lot of people love tipping , ” he observed .
“ They feel some kind of power.
” Time would prove him right .
In September 2019 , still unprofitable , Ops abandoned gratuity-free .
“ It just wasn ’ t working , ” Fadem said later that month .
Ops ’ s labor @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and Tribouilloy were unable to reward longtime staff members with higher pay .
Introducing tips , Fadem said recently , allowed them to give “ every staff member a substantial raise.
” Ultimately , the issue was guests ’ perception of value .
“ In Brooklyn especially , I don ’ t believe it ’ s possible to charge the correct price to make tip-free work , ” he says .
“ People are happy to pay $ 25 for a pizza if it ’ s $ 20 plus tip , but if @ @ @ @ @ @ @ pizza you ’ re looked at as ripping people off , even if it ’ s the right price for the cost of getting the food to the table.
” “ In Brooklyn especially , I don ’ t believe it ’ s possible to charge the correct price to make tip-free work.
” But diners alone didn ’ t doom the mid-2010s anti-tipping movement ; workers who saw lower earnings were also reluctant to embrace the shift .
At Faun , for example , Stockwell started servers at $ 25 per hour @ @ @ @ @ @ @ then , he says , it was “ virtually impossible ” to compete with what servers could make at a “ similarly ambitious local restaurant with tips.
” If a tipped server could make $ 40 to $ 50 an hour , or up to $ 350 over the course of a seven-hour shift , why do the same work for half the money ?
At Huertas , USHG alums Jonah Miller and Nate Adler struggled to increase back-of-house wages as much as expected after going tip-free in December 2015 — they sought @ @ @ @ @ @ @ by raising cooks ’ wages by $ 2.50 an hour .
“ We did pay cooks more than we had before , but in many cases not a full $ 2.50 per hour more , ” Miller said last summer .
Even Meyer grappled with staff departures at USHG , in addition to reports of a corresponding decline in service quality and an inability to close the wage gap .
In 2018 , Meyer stated publicly that 30 to 40 percent of USHG ’ s long-term staffers quit following the phased introduction of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ restaurants .
In the aftermath , the company continued to confront staffing issues caused by HI , according to a USHG front-of-house employee , who spoke on the condition of anonymity in both July 2019 and this past March .
“ There hasn ’ t been a fix in the morale , ” said the USHG employee , in part because of decreased front-of-house compensation as compared to pre-HI rates .
The employee shared an internal USHG memorandum , which showed a comparison of 2018 average hourly pay from multiple USHG restaurants with @ @ @ @ @ @ @ two USHG locations without the policy .
Servers ’ average hourly pay was $ 26.13 with HI and $ 32.88 without , a difference of $ 6.75 ; bartenders ’ average hourly pay was $ 29.88 with HI and $ 35.23 without , a difference of $ 5.35 .
As a result of reduced earnings , it was harder to hold onto staff at restaurants like Blue Smoke , one of the last Meyer restaurants to move to HI .
Employee trainers left , and managers leveled up inexperienced hires even if they @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to get “ bodies on the floor.
” Another part of the problem was a perceived take-it-or-leave-it mentality that ran contrary to USHG ’ s ethos , and that made some staff feel replaceable .
“ It just sort of felt like , if [ HI ] doesn ’ t seem right for you , it ’ s totally okay if you leave , ” said the employee .
USHG was not especially effective in closing the pay gap between the front and back of house — a primary rationale for going tip-free @ @ @ @ @ @ @ for USHG prep cooks was $ 14.45 with HI and $ 15.06 without , a difference of 61 cents , according to the internal memo .
The average hourly pay for line cooks was $ 15.88 with HI , 29 cents higher than the non-HI average of $ 15.59 , but a rate that was still $ 10.25 less than the average hourly pay for servers under HI .
( USHG declined multiple requests for comment . )
According to the employee , management wasn ’ t willing to raise prices enough to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ maintain front-of-house salaries : “ They didn ’ t want to raise the prices so high that people have sticker shock.
” These results , in combination with the financial pressures caused by the pandemic , may have contributed to Meyer ’ s decision to bring back tipping in July .
“ I think the timing and rationale is totally understandable , ” Miller said of Meyer ’ s return to tipping .
Miller notes that the reversal may be an example of “ ‘ COVID exposing a fragile system ’ in the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ barely surviving pre-pandemic are likely to choose this moment to move on.
” “ Danny Meyer has abdicated his right to be a leader in this industry , ” Cohen says of the move , arguing that if there was any time for Meyer to hold firm , it is this very moment .
“ What happens when his customers don ’ t feel so generous three months from now ?
” she asks .
“ I did no tipping before Danny Meyer , and I ’ ll keep doing it long after @ @ @ @ @ @ @ think women and BIPOCs are used to white guys not being there for us when the chips are down.
” It remains to be seen how the pandemic will intersect with wages for servers , at a time when so many are out of work .
This July , Marketplace reported that restaurant traffic has declined by 60 percent in some parts of the country , but according to the BBC , those who are ordering out seem to be tipping generously , with tips up by nearly 15 percent for Grubhub and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ for Instacart shoppers since the pandemic began .
Though a sense of altruism may be responsible for this increase in gratuity , larger tips can also widen the earnings disparity between the few servers who remain and kitchen staff , so that a handful of tipped employees are making as much or more than they did previously , “ whereas their cooks and managers are being asked to be more dexterous and take on more responsibility than ever before , ” Miller says .
Even as sticker shock and worker turnover shredded the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ sizable percentage of Bay Area restaurateurs who began experimenting with tip-free in the mid-2010s managed to make it work .
The difference may owe , in part , to regulatory flexibility and a greater number of policy alternatives available in California .
Most notable , it seems , is the ability to append a mandatory service charge to checks at the end of the meal , a practice that is currently illegal in New York City .
“ People are so much less likely to spend an extra dollar on a menu item @ @ @ @ @ @ @ dollar at a tip.
” “ I am fully convinced that even at our very popular , busy restaurant , if we raised the prices by 20 percent starting tomorrow , we ’ d do significantly less business , ” Hoffman said last July .
Comal ’ s mandatory service charge allowed Hoffman and co-owner John Paluska to increase revenue while avoiding the sort of business loss attributable to sticker shock .
“ People are so much less likely to spend an extra dollar on a menu item than they are to throw @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ” Hoffman observed , which accords with studies that show consumers ’ preferences for prices that are partitioned , rather than bundled .
Corey Lee , the chef behind the San Francisco restaurants Benu , Monsieur Benjamin , and In Situ , agrees that a service charge is a necessary bridge for diners in the U.S. “ The idea of a ‘ tip ’ is so ingrained in American dining culture that most diners aren ’ t ready for service-inclusive pricing , ” Lee said in July 2019 .
“ Therefore , we @ @ @ @ @ @ @ separate charge so they can see what ’ s happening.
” Lee , who has imposed this charge at both the three-Michelin-starred Benu and the more casual Monsieur Benjamin , says that it avoids sticker shock while stabilizing wages for all staff and raising earnings for those individuals on the “ lower end of the pay scale.
” But for some restaurateurs , the service charge is not a silver bullet .
When Fred and Elizabeth Sassen decided to eliminate tipping at their Oakland restaurant , Homestead , in March 2015 , they @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a tacked-on fee might confuse and frustrate guests and staff alike .
Instead , they opted for service-inclusive pricing and , to incentivize employee performance , implemented a compensation model that factors in skill , experience , and hours to arrive at a base salary ; from there , total salaries are set based on individual effort .
Though the process was not without its difficulties — “ what we realized quickly was that we would eventually have to cycle through the whole [ front-of-house ] staff ” who expected the higher wages @ @ @ @ @ @ @ said that the new system has been , overall , more equitable in terms of compensation and advancement opportunities .
“ I ’ ve had a dishwasher that ’ s been with me for four years , he makes more than some of my servers , ” he said , an industry rarity .
Jennifer Bennett , part-owner of San Francisco bistro Zazie , said that replacing gratuity with service-inclusive pricing in June 2015 allowed her to implement a pay-for-performance system that not only equalized wages , but improved service .
It is @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , that “ is very different ” than the static hourly no-tipping models used by many other proprietors , which divorce work quality from earnings and thus fail to effectively incentivize employees .
In her model , on top of the minimum wage , servers make 12 percent of their individual sales , while kitchen staff earn 12 percent of shift sales .
Because the entire restaurant is engaged in a sell-more , earn-more mentality , servers are quick to refill mimosas , while the kitchen profits too .
Before , Bennett noticed @ @ @ @ @ @ @ eight-top walked in the door right before closing .
“ But now , what do they see ?
Another $ 15 in my pocket.
” Bennett , who split ownership of Zazie with three longtime employees in January , believes that the benefits go beyond economics .
“ Everyone thinks they are judging their waiter , ” she said , “ but really , from the moment you walk in the door , your waiters are judging you also.
” With gratuity , Bennett noticed that some staff would make tipping stereotypes based @ @ @ @ @ @ @ over “ good ” tables and avoided “ bad ” ones “ like the plague.
” Despite the tip-free movement ’ s waning trajectory , Bennett is confident that tipping will inevitably fall out of favor in the United States .
“ The inequality between the front and the back of the house has got to change , ” she said .
“ We can ’ t keep having these people working in hot miserable conditions for 10 hours a day , making a third of the money of the cute bartender.
” @ @ @ @ @ @ @ for reformation , new Zazie co-owner Megan Cornelius said in July .
“ These workers have been deemed essential and are putting themselves at risk .
To walk out with a living wage that is secure and accurately coincides with how much they sell in a night , and isn ’ t reliant on the whim of guests who have been [ sheltering in place ] for months , is actually extremely important , now , more than ever.
” “ My heart breaks every time another restaurant gets rid of its no-tipping @ @ @ @ @ @ @ March of the setbacks faced by her New York peers .
One of New York ’ s most notable tip-free successes — she opened her second restaurant , Lekka Burger , last November , after nearly five years of gratuity-free at Dirt Candy — Cohen has a specific aim beyond solidarity for its own sake : creating a critical mass of tip-free restaurants .
Eliminating tipping can be considered a collective action problem : a situation where short-term self-interest conflicts with the achievement of longer-term collective benefits .
If a few restaurants charge @ @ @ @ @ @ @ free-model , a nearby restaurant that charges $ 22 and collects tips can gain by acquiring price-sensitive customers and servers who are attracted to tipping , even if all restaurants would be better off with a fairer and more sustainable payment structure .
“ If you ’ re a no-tipping restaurant , you just look so much more expensive than the restaurant next door to you , ” Cohen explained .
Some restaurateurs believe that the government could generate sustainable buy-in by offering a tax break or some kind of subsidy to tip-free @ @ @ @ @ @ @ be tipless , I think it would take some economic incentive , ” Lee said when we spoke last year .
Bennett , for instance , said that she would “ love to see ” a tip-free tax break , or even a tax incentive that simply rewards restaurateurs for paying staff higher wages .
It is the kind of relief that , in the wake of COVID-19 , Congress has already enacted for the airline industry , and could be added to a broader aid package for restaurants .
To a similar @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Wage president Saru Jayaraman recently penned a Time op-ed that , among other proposals , advocated paying a full minimum wage to all workers plus a cut to restaurant payroll taxes — a form of tax relief that could , perhaps , be increased for tip-free establishments .
State labor laws can cut several ways , including by reducing an employer ’ s incentives to rely on tipping .
Forty-three states maintain different minimum wages for tipped and non-tipped employees .
In states like New York with a “ tipped minimum wage , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ lower minimum than their non-tipped colleagues ( called a sub-minimum wage ) , as long as the employer can prove that tips make up the difference between what the employer pays and the non-tipped minimum .
Seven states , including California , currently impose one minimum wage for all workers , regardless of whether or not they ’ re tipped , which also means that restaurant owners do not have the option of off-loading labor costs onto customers .
But other policies may work to “ save tipping ” by reducing some of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ albeit while leaving in place tipping ’ s problematic and often punitive dynamics .
A 2018 amendment to the federal Fair Labor Standards Act legalized unlocked tip pooling — allowing gratuities to be split between front- and back-of-house workers — in most states , as long as the entire staff is paid the full minimum wage .
This means restaurateurs can equalize earnings between the front and back of house without eliminating tipping or building the entire cost of labor into menu prices .
( Unlocked pooling remains illegal under New York state @ @ @ @ @ @ @ . )
The idea is popular : In the Time op-ed , Jayaraman and Meyer voiced support for “ a full minimum wage with shareable tips on top.
” After the FLSA change , chef-owners at several prominent , moderately priced Bay Area restaurants announced that they would adopt unlocked pooling , a group that included Tanya Holland of Oakland ’ s Brown Sugar Kitchen .
Even some of no-tipping ’ s earliest adopters have considered reintroducing gratuity and pooling it .
“ We ’ re looking at all of it , ” @ @ @ @ @ @ @ told me last year during ongoing discussions to modify or replace the restaurant ’ s 30-year-old service charge .
More recently , current GM Varun Mehra , who succeeded Sherman , said that the compensation question remains undecided as the restaurant and more affordable upstairs cafe remain closed for dining during the pandemic .
Despite tip pooling ’ s appeal as a relatively straightforward solution to industry-wide wage disparities , it leaves unresolved the dynamic that remains central to tipping : placing worker compensation directly in the hands of diners , a power @ @ @ @ @ @ @ harassment , discrimination , and inequitable treatment of employees .
“ Shared tips are still the fruit of a poisonous tree , ” says Cohen .
“ We have a history in our country of not paying the real cost of food.
” Lacking a more persuasive financial case , the no-tipping movement seemed unlikely to win over more supporters in the Great Before .
But now , as the pandemic ’ s social and economic crises unfold and larger swaths of the public pay greater attention to racial and financial equity , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ anew .
“ You could argue that restaurants have a cover and ready explanation for raising menu prices , ” hypothesizes Michael Lynn , a professor of consumer behavior at Cornell University and an expert on tipping .
“ Under the circumstances , we ’ ve got extra cost .
We ’ ve had to implement whatever safety protocols and we have less seating capacity .
And so , the cost of business has gone up , we have to charge more .
And I would think that customers would understand that.
” @ @ @ @ @ @ @ alter what has previously comprised a longstanding undervaluation of the costs involved in eating at restaurants , and align them more closely with compensatory practices in other parts of the world .
“ We have a history in our country of not paying the real cost of food , ” said Karen Bornarth , head of workforce development at the East Harlem nonprofit bakery and business incubator Hot Bread Kitchen , when we spoke last July .
“ And I think that those of us who love to eat out and enjoy our @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , and realize that maybe we have to pay a little bit more for that dinner out so that we can create a more equitable system that works better for everyone , business included.
” That there will be fewer places to leave gratuity may circuitously aid the cause for tip-free .
In the New York Times , Besha Rodell wrote that the pandemic could “ end the age of midpriced dining , ” as the trends in Melbourne — away from “ casual gastronomy found in its cafes , pubs and wine @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to-go options — could be a “ bellwether for other cities around the world.
” As more U.S. proprietors stick with menus designed for pickup and delivery , there may be an even stronger lurch toward limited-service , which , as the name suggests , calls into question the need for any related charges or gratuity .
As Eater reported in mid-August , 150 restaurants have closed in New York alone since the onset of COVID-19 .
It ’ s a shift that ’ s already happening .
Both Chez Panisse and Comal @ @ @ @ @ @ @ pricing as the pandemic has forced them into takeout- and delivery-only .
“ All three of our menus are just the prices plus tax and that ’ s it , ” Hoffman says .
“ There ’ s not the traditional tipping environment anymore ...
There is no restaurant server , bringing you food , bringing your bill , and then receiving the tip at the end of it , that whole dynamic is gone.
” Besides , customers report greater irritation when asked to tip at counter-service restaurants , according to research @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
In the midst of widespread suffering , Hoffman isn ’ t quite ready for optimism about a renewed push for no-tipping .
But he continues to believe in its potential .
“ This is incrementalism .
It ’ s gon na be slow evolution and change , based on the [ restaurants ] that survive , ” he says .
“ It ’ s going to be the savvy ones that make it , and let ’ s hope they have their heads on straight with respect to the biggest issue in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ pay and work .
”

One year after we first spoke in July 2019, Andrew Hoffman tells me I need a “disclaimer” for this piece. “This article was started pre-pandemic. Back in the Great Before,” jokes Hoffman, co-owner of Berkeley’s Comal and Comal Next Door, who eliminated tipping at his table-service restaurant around six years ago. I like that, I reply, repeating “the Great Before” with sardonic gusto. Hoffman laughs. “Take that playbook from the Great Before and throw it away,” says Hoffman. “You don’t need it anymore.”
Since COVID-19 spread through the United States, millions of food service workers have been laid off or furloughed, and those who are still employed are risking their health each day by returning to work. And despite all the pivoting — to delivery and takeout, to corner stores or bottle shops, to outdoor dining — between a third and half of all independent restaurants will shutter as a result of the pandemic. This economic reckoning comes commensurately with a social one, as calls amplify to address systemic racism and anti-Black violence following George Floyd’s death in Minneapolis police custody, and, more recently, the police shooting of Jacob Blake in Kenosha, Wisconsin. Depending on who you ask, these crises make right now either the worst time to talk about tipping, or render it a conversation that has never been more urgent.
The case against tipping is compelling: It facilitates racism, sexism, and widespread wage theft; perpetuates a growing income gap between front- and back-of-house staff, particularly in cities like New York and San Francisco; and contributes to a stigma that service work is transitory. “No matter how you do it, tipping hits BIPOC workers in the pocketbook, it exposes more female workers to sexual harassment, and it keeps all workers from making a steady, solid salary,” says Amanda Cohen of New York City’s Dirt Candy, a longtime anti-tipping advocate.
Around the U.S., independent restaurateurs are newly experimenting with no tipping: from Hunky Dory in Crown Heights, Brooklyn, which re-opened in July with menu prices that include gratuity, to Colleen’s Kitchen in Austin and Last Resort in Athens, Georgia, which have in recent months instituted service charges that, they say, will help provide fair and stable wages for all staff. “Before the pandemic, tipping was baked into the industry and we all inherited it,” Cohen says. “Right now, no one wants to go back and consciously, purposefully inflict its inequities on their staff.”
The end of tipping has been heralded before, and not all that long ago. In 2015, acclaimed restaurateur Danny Meyer announced that he would eliminate gratuities throughout his sprawling Union Square Hospitality Group, hoping to narrow the stark income disparity between servers, who received tips, and cooks, who did not. “I hate those Saturday nights where the whole dining room is high-fiving because they just set a record, and they’re counting their shekels, and the kitchen just says, ‘Well, boy, did we sweat tonight,’” Meyer said at the time.
Meyer’s move came on the heels of decisions to eliminate tipping by several Bay Area restaurateurs who, for similar reasons, did away with gratuity over the prior year: Berkeley’s Comal; Oakland’s Camino (now closed) and Homestead; and San Francisco’s Trou Normand, Bar Agricole, and Zazie. While other New York chef-owners, like Cohen, had banished tipping earlier, Meyer’s decision marked a tectonic shift: As the founder of Shake Shack and the CEO of a dozen-plus New York restaurants, if anyone could lead in putting tipping to rest, the thinking went, it was Meyer.
Other influential New York players, including David Chang and Tom Colicchio, acted around the time that Meyer did, resulting in a full-fledged “no-tipping movement.” Within months, Andrew Tarlow announced that he would go gratuity-free throughout the Marlow Collective, his restaurant group that helped define dining in a gentrified Brooklyn; Tarlow even designed an open-source logo for demarcating no-tipping venues, of which Gabriel Stulman made use after banning tips at Fedora, one of his then-six downtown restaurants. In the East Village, USHG alums Jonah Miller and Nate Adler likewise pledged to eliminate tips at their restaurant, Huertas.
By May 2016, data bore out the beginnings of a cultural shift. An American Express survey released that month found that of 503 randomly sampled restaurateurs, 18 percent said they had already adopted no-tipping policies, 29 percent said they planned to do the same, and 17 percent said they would consider implementing no-tipping if others did. The EndTipping subreddit, one of the more complete records of no-tipping establishments from the time, listed more than 200 restaurants that were, at one point or another, without gratuity. Although these comprised a sliver of the roughly 650,000 restaurants across the country, momentum appeared to be building.
Until, it seemed, the wheels came off. Most of the restaurants that participated in the Meyer-catalyzed no-tipping movement had, by 2018, returned to gratuity. Meyer, whose organization never fully recovered from the shift to what he called “Hospitality Included,” capitulated earlier this summer, announcing that he would bring back tipping to USHG. Thus tipping won, and decisively.
Now, facing a potential reset of the entire restaurant industry, no-tipping could once again be on the proverbial table. “The big reason why people didn’t switch to getting rid of tips was because they were scared that they were going to lose their staff. And then they were scared that they were going to lose their guests. And now they’ve lost both,” Hoffman explains.
But if the post-pandemic restaurant industry stands any chance of successfully moving beyond gratuity and toward more equitable compensation methods, it is worth asking: What exactly went wrong before? What went right? And how, if at all, can sustainable change be made?
When the Brooklyn restaurateurs David Stockwell and his wife, Carla Swickerath, opened their modern Italian-American bistro Faun in August 2016, they debuted as a tip-free establishment in part because, Stockwell said, “it seemed like we were going to get in front of a rising tide.”
The anti-tipping cohort of the mid-2010s largely consisted of restaurants like Faun: moderately priced, casually upscale table-service spots that promised a mix of hospitality and affordability. By contrast, fine-dining establishments already had a history of no-tipping, as their guests expected to pay top dollar and were therefore less likely to resist prices that included the cost of gratuity or an automatic service charge — although this willingness was not entirely without exception. Still, these restaurants were largely not considered part of the tip-free trend, and neither were the fast-food and counter-service venues that traded primarily on price and often forewent tips anyway.
“Okay, my politics and my ideals are one thing, but what’s the priority here?”
And in the case of Faun, Stockwell found himself explaining to guests why menu prices were higher than those at comparable restaurants. “Once you get people to understand that you’re gratuity-inclusive, there’s still the next level of this visceral connection with numbers on a menu,” he told me last summer. “When entrees are all up in the 30s versus in the 20s, it doesn’t matter if [customers] know that you are gratuity-inclusive.”
Stockwell and Swickerath waited for other restaurateurs to follow suit. But several early adopters had already reversed course, including Craft, Fedora, and Momofuku Nishi (which has since closed entirely). “It was a miscalculation that this tide was growing,” Stockwell confided. Despite positive reviews, by winter 2017, Faun was struggling. Stockwell was unsure if the restaurant could survive the coming January, with its crowd-killing short days and frigid temperatures. He didn’t want to revert to tipping, but he felt his hands were tied. “So many times that you are operating as a business, you realize, ‘Okay, my politics and my ideals are one thing, but what’s the priority here?’”
Faun reintroduced tipping the first week of January 2018. According to Stockwell, the effect was striking. “Immediately, it made this whole thing possible,” he recalled. Although he and Swickerath would have preferred to remain tip-free for ethical reasons, he said that ultimately, “we couldn’t let the ship keep sinking.”
Elsewhere in Brooklyn, Mike Fadem was confronting a similar challenge: determining the “right” price of pizza — one that factored in gratuity but also didn’t cause guests to mutiny. In October 2016, Fadem and his partners Marie Tribouilloy and Gavin Compton opened their Bushwick pizzeria, Ops, as a service-inclusive establishment. Before this, Fadem spent seven years climbing the ranks at Tarlow’s Marlow Collective, where, as a manager, he had helped oversee Roman’s 2015 transition to tip-free. Based on that experience, he knew that Ops couldn’t simply raise menu prices by 20 percent across the board. Instead, he calibrated his opening prices to those at comparable pizzerias, and played primarily with the cost of wine. For its first two years, Fadem says, Ops did not turn a profit.
Despite the financial challenges, and watching Roman’s and the rest of the Marlow Collective revert to tipping in December 2018, Fadem and Tribouilloy were hopeful they could make tip-free work. Still, Fadem remained a realist about tipping’s prevalence when we spoke last July. “I think a lot of people don’t see the system as being broken, or anything. And a lot of people love tipping,” he observed. “They feel some kind of power.”
Time would prove him right. In September 2019, still unprofitable, Ops abandoned gratuity-free. “It just wasn’t working,” Fadem said later that month. Ops’s labor costs were too high, and Fadem and Tribouilloy were unable to reward longtime staff members with higher pay. Introducing tips, Fadem said recently, allowed them to give “every staff member a substantial raise.”
Ultimately, the issue was guests’ perception of value. “In Brooklyn especially, I don’t believe it’s possible to charge the correct price to make tip-free work,” he says. “People are happy to pay $25 for a pizza if it’s $20 plus tip, but if the menu reads $25 for a pizza you’re looked at as ripping people off, even if it’s the right price for the cost of getting the food to the table.”
“In Brooklyn especially, I don’t believe it’s possible to charge the correct price to make tip-free work.”
But diners alone didn’t doom the mid-2010s anti-tipping movement; workers who saw lower earnings were also reluctant to embrace the shift. At Faun, for example, Stockwell started servers at $25 per hour when the restaurant was tip-free. Even then, he says, it was “virtually impossible” to compete with what servers could make at a “similarly ambitious local restaurant with tips.” If a tipped server could make $40 to $50 an hour, or up to $350 over the course of a seven-hour shift, why do the same work for half the money?
At Huertas, USHG alums Jonah Miller and Nate Adler struggled to increase back-of-house wages as much as expected after going tip-free in December 2015 — they sought to reduce the kitchen-dining room wage disparity by raising cooks’ wages by $2.50 an hour. “We did pay cooks more than we had before, but in many cases not a full $2.50 per hour more,” Miller said last summer.
Even Meyer grappled with staff departures at USHG, in addition to reports of a corresponding decline in service quality and an inability to close the wage gap. In 2018, Meyer stated publicly that 30 to 40 percent of USHG’s long-term staffers quit following the phased introduction of Hospitality Included across the group’s restaurants. In the aftermath, the company continued to confront staffing issues caused by HI, according to a USHG front-of-house employee, who spoke on the condition of anonymity in both July 2019 and this past March.
“There hasn’t been a fix in the morale,” said the USHG employee, in part because of decreased front-of-house compensation as compared to pre-HI rates. The employee shared an internal USHG memorandum, which showed a comparison of 2018 average hourly pay from multiple USHG restaurants with HI against the average hourly pay from two USHG locations without the policy. Servers’ average hourly pay was $26.13 with HI and $32.88 without, a difference of $6.75; bartenders’ average hourly pay was $29.88 with HI and $35.23 without, a difference of $5.35.
As a result of reduced earnings, it was harder to hold onto staff at restaurants like Blue Smoke, one of the last Meyer restaurants to move to HI. Employee trainers left, and managers leveled up inexperienced hires even if they were not ready for additional responsibility just to get “bodies on the floor.” Another part of the problem was a perceived take-it-or-leave-it mentality that ran contrary to USHG’s ethos, and that made some staff feel replaceable. “It just sort of felt like, if [HI] doesn’t seem right for you, it’s totally okay if you leave,” said the employee.
USHG was not especially effective in closing the pay gap between the front and back of house — a primary rationale for going tip-free. In 2018, average hourly pay for USHG prep cooks was $14.45 with HI and $15.06 without, a difference of 61 cents, according to the internal memo. The average hourly pay for line cooks was $15.88 with HI, 29 cents higher than the non-HI average of $15.59, but a rate that was still $10.25 less than the average hourly pay for servers under HI. (USHG declined multiple requests for comment.) According to the employee, management wasn’t willing to raise prices enough to meaningfully increase back-of-house wages, or to maintain front-of-house salaries: “They didn’t want to raise the prices so high that people have sticker shock.”
These results, in combination with the financial pressures caused by the pandemic, may have contributed to Meyer’s decision to bring back tipping in July. “I think the timing and rationale is totally understandable,” Miller said of Meyer’s return to tipping. Miller notes that the reversal may be an example of “‘COVID exposing a fragile system’ in the same way that restaurants that were just barely surviving pre-pandemic are likely to choose this moment to move on.”
“Danny Meyer has abdicated his right to be a leader in this industry,” Cohen says of the move, arguing that if there was any time for Meyer to hold firm, it is this very moment. “What happens when his customers don’t feel so generous three months from now?” she asks. “I did no tipping before Danny Meyer, and I’ll keep doing it long after he’s given up. I think women and BIPOCs are used to white guys not being there for us when the chips are down.”
It remains to be seen how the pandemic will intersect with wages for servers, at a time when so many are out of work. This July, Marketplace reported that restaurant traffic has declined by 60 percent in some parts of the country, but according to the BBC, those who are ordering out seem to be tipping generously, with tips up by nearly 15 percent for Grubhub and Seamless drivers, and up 99 percent for Instacart shoppers since the pandemic began.
Though a sense of altruism may be responsible for this increase in gratuity, larger tips can also widen the earnings disparity between the few servers who remain and kitchen staff, so that a handful of tipped employees are making as much or more than they did previously, “whereas their cooks and managers are being asked to be more dexterous and take on more responsibility than ever before,” Miller says.
Even as sticker shock and worker turnover shredded the no-tipping cohort in New York, a sizable percentage of Bay Area restaurateurs who began experimenting with tip-free in the mid-2010s managed to make it work. The difference may owe, in part, to regulatory flexibility and a greater number of policy alternatives available in California. Most notable, it seems, is the ability to append a mandatory service charge to checks at the end of the meal, a practice that is currently illegal in New York City.
“People are so much less likely to spend an extra dollar on a menu item than they are to throw an extra dollar at a tip.”
“I am fully convinced that even at our very popular, busy restaurant, if we raised the prices by 20 percent starting tomorrow, we’d do significantly less business,” Hoffman said last July. Comal’s mandatory service charge allowed Hoffman and co-owner John Paluska to increase revenue while avoiding the sort of business loss attributable to sticker shock. “People are so much less likely to spend an extra dollar on a menu item than they are to throw an extra dollar at a tip,” Hoffman observed, which accords with studies that show consumers’ preferences for prices that are partitioned, rather than bundled.
Corey Lee, the chef behind the San Francisco restaurants Benu, Monsieur Benjamin, and In Situ, agrees that a service charge is a necessary bridge for diners in the U.S. “The idea of a ‘tip’ is so ingrained in American dining culture that most diners aren’t ready for service-inclusive pricing,” Lee said in July 2019. “Therefore, we break it out for them as a separate charge so they can see what’s happening.” Lee, who has imposed this charge at both the three-Michelin-starred Benu and the more casual Monsieur Benjamin, says that it avoids sticker shock while stabilizing wages for all staff and raising earnings for those individuals on the “lower end of the pay scale.”
But for some restaurateurs, the service charge is not a silver bullet. When Fred and Elizabeth Sassen decided to eliminate tipping at their Oakland restaurant, Homestead, in March 2015, they eschewed an automatic charge, believing that a tacked-on fee might confuse and frustrate guests and staff alike. Instead, they opted for service-inclusive pricing and, to incentivize employee performance, implemented a compensation model that factors in skill, experience, and hours to arrive at a base salary; from there, total salaries are set based on individual effort. Though the process was not without its difficulties — “what we realized quickly was that we would eventually have to cycle through the whole [front-of-house] staff” who expected the higher wages of a tipping model — Fred Sassen said that the new system has been, overall, more equitable in terms of compensation and advancement opportunities. “I’ve had a dishwasher that’s been with me for four years, he makes more than some of my servers,” he said, an industry rarity.
Jennifer Bennett, part-owner of San Francisco bistro Zazie, said that replacing gratuity with service-inclusive pricing in June 2015 allowed her to implement a pay-for-performance system that not only equalized wages, but improved service. It is a system, Bennett said last summer, that “is very different” than the static hourly no-tipping models used by many other proprietors, which divorce work quality from earnings and thus fail to effectively incentivize employees. In her model, on top of the minimum wage, servers make 12 percent of their individual sales, while kitchen staff earn 12 percent of shift sales. Because the entire restaurant is engaged in a sell-more, earn-more mentality, servers are quick to refill mimosas, while the kitchen profits too. Before, Bennett noticed that cooks would be furious if an eight-top walked in the door right before closing. “But now, what do they see? Another $15 in my pocket.”
Bennett, who split ownership of Zazie with three longtime employees in January, believes that the benefits go beyond economics. “Everyone thinks they are judging their waiter,” she said, “but really, from the moment you walk in the door, your waiters are judging you also.” With gratuity, Bennett noticed that some staff would make tipping stereotypes based on race and gender; servers fought over “good” tables and avoided “bad” ones “like the plague.”
Despite the tip-free movement’s waning trajectory, Bennett is confident that tipping will inevitably fall out of favor in the United States. “The inequality between the front and the back of the house has got to change,” she said. “We can’t keep having these people working in hot miserable conditions for 10 hours a day, making a third of the money of the cute bartender.”
Now is the “perfect” moment for reformation, new Zazie co-owner Megan Cornelius said in July. “These workers have been deemed essential and are putting themselves at risk. To walk out with a living wage that is secure and accurately coincides with how much they sell in a night, and isn’t reliant on the whim of guests who have been [sheltering in place] for months, is actually extremely important, now, more than ever.”
“My heart breaks every time another restaurant gets rid of its no-tipping policies,” Cohen said in pre-pandemic March of the setbacks faced by her New York peers. One of New York’s most notable tip-free successes — she opened her second restaurant, Lekka Burger, last November, after nearly five years of gratuity-free at Dirt Candy — Cohen has a specific aim beyond solidarity for its own sake: creating a critical mass of tip-free restaurants.
Eliminating tipping can be considered a collective action problem: a situation where short-term self-interest conflicts with the achievement of longer-term collective benefits. If a few restaurants charge $27 for lasagna under a gratuity free-model, a nearby restaurant that charges $22 and collects tips can gain by acquiring price-sensitive customers and servers who are attracted to tipping, even if all restaurants would be better off with a fairer and more sustainable payment structure. “If you’re a no-tipping restaurant, you just look so much more expensive than the restaurant next door to you,” Cohen explained.
Some restaurateurs believe that the government could generate sustainable buy-in by offering a tax break or some kind of subsidy to tip-free establishments. “For more restaurants to be tipless, I think it would take some economic incentive,” Lee said when we spoke last year.
Bennett, for instance, said that she would “love to see” a tip-free tax break, or even a tax incentive that simply rewards restaurateurs for paying staff higher wages. It is the kind of relief that, in the wake of COVID-19, Congress has already enacted for the airline industry, and could be added to a broader aid package for restaurants. To a similar end, Danny Meyer and One Fair Wage president Saru Jayaraman recently penned a Time op-ed that, among other proposals, advocated paying a full minimum wage to all workers plus a cut to restaurant payroll taxes — a form of tax relief that could, perhaps, be increased for tip-free establishments.
State labor laws can cut several ways, including by reducing an employer’s incentives to rely on tipping. Forty-three states maintain different minimum wages for tipped and non-tipped employees. In states like New York with a “tipped minimum wage,” employers can pay tipped workers a lower minimum than their non-tipped colleagues (called a sub-minimum wage), as long as the employer can prove that tips make up the difference between what the employer pays and the non-tipped minimum. Seven states, including California, currently impose one minimum wage for all workers, regardless of whether or not they’re tipped, which also means that restaurant owners do not have the option of off-loading labor costs onto customers.
But other policies may work to “save tipping” by reducing some of the system’s socio-economic discordances, albeit while leaving in place tipping’s problematic and often punitive dynamics. A 2018 amendment to the federal Fair Labor Standards Act legalized unlocked tip pooling — allowing gratuities to be split between front- and back-of-house workers — in most states, as long as the entire staff is paid the full minimum wage. This means restaurateurs can equalize earnings between the front and back of house without eliminating tipping or building the entire cost of labor into menu prices. (Unlocked pooling remains illegal under New York state law even after the national statutory change.)
The idea is popular: In the Time op-ed, Jayaraman and Meyer voiced support for “a full minimum wage with shareable tips on top.” After the FLSA change, chef-owners at several prominent, moderately priced Bay Area restaurants announced that they would adopt unlocked pooling, a group that included Tanya Holland of Oakland’s Brown Sugar Kitchen. Even some of no-tipping’s earliest adopters have considered reintroducing gratuity and pooling it. “We’re looking at all of it,” former Chez Panisse general manager Jennifer Sherman told me last year during ongoing discussions to modify or replace the restaurant’s 30-year-old service charge. More recently, current GM Varun Mehra, who succeeded Sherman, said that the compensation question remains undecided as the restaurant and more affordable upstairs cafe remain closed for dining during the pandemic.
Despite tip pooling’s appeal as a relatively straightforward solution to industry-wide wage disparities, it leaves unresolved the dynamic that remains central to tipping: placing worker compensation directly in the hands of diners, a power that can be at the root of harassment, discrimination, and inequitable treatment of employees. “Shared tips are still the fruit of a poisonous tree,” says Cohen.
“We have a history in our country of not paying the real cost of food.”
Lacking a more persuasive financial case, the no-tipping movement seemed unlikely to win over more supporters in the Great Before. But now, as the pandemic’s social and economic crises unfold and larger swaths of the public pay greater attention to racial and financial equity, the case for tipping may be challenged anew.
“You could argue that restaurants have a cover and ready explanation for raising menu prices,” hypothesizes Michael Lynn, a professor of consumer behavior at Cornell University and an expert on tipping. “Under the circumstances, we’ve got extra cost. We’ve had to implement whatever safety protocols and we have less seating capacity. And so, the cost of business has gone up, we have to charge more. And I would think that customers would understand that.” That type of empathy and comprehension could alter what has previously comprised a longstanding undervaluation of the costs involved in eating at restaurants, and align them more closely with compensatory practices in other parts of the world.
“We have a history in our country of not paying the real cost of food,” said Karen Bornarth, head of workforce development at the East Harlem nonprofit bakery and business incubator Hot Bread Kitchen, when we spoke last July. “And I think that those of us who love to eat out and enjoy our food need to wake up to that, and realize that maybe we have to pay a little bit more for that dinner out so that we can create a more equitable system that works better for everyone, business included.”
That there will be fewer places to leave gratuity may circuitously aid the cause for tip-free. In the New York Times, Besha Rodell wrote that the pandemic could “end the age of midpriced dining,” as the trends in Melbourne — away from “casual gastronomy found in its cafes, pubs and wine bars” and toward higher-end concepts with to-go options — could be a “bellwether for other cities around the world.” As more U.S. proprietors stick with menus designed for pickup and delivery, there may be an even stronger lurch toward limited-service, which, as the name suggests, calls into question the need for any related charges or gratuity. As Eater reported in mid-August, 150 restaurants have closed in New York alone since the onset of COVID-19.
It’s a shift that’s already happening. Both Chez Panisse and Comal have swapped separate service charges for service-inclusive pricing as the pandemic has forced them into takeout- and delivery-only. “All three of our menus are just the prices plus tax and that’s it,” Hoffman says. “There’s not the traditional tipping environment anymore... There is no restaurant server, bringing you food, bringing your bill, and then receiving the tip at the end of it, that whole dynamic is gone.” Besides, customers report greater irritation when asked to tip at counter-service restaurants, according to research conducted pre-pandemic but published in May 2020.
In the midst of widespread suffering, Hoffman isn’t quite ready for optimism about a renewed push for no-tipping. But he continues to believe in its potential. “This is incrementalism. It’s gonna be slow evolution and change, based on the [restaurants] that survive,” he says. “It’s going to be the savvy ones that make it, and let’s hope they have their heads on straight with respect to the biggest issue in restaurants, which is the relationship between pay and work.”


vox--2020-09-02--The power of the Black athlete

The power of the Black athlete

The extraordinary sight of NBA players protesting racial injustice by refusing to participate in playoff games last week made me ( and others ) think about a movie I saw last year .
High Flying Bird tells the story of an NBA rookie whose first season is thwarted by the 2011 NBA lockout , and his agent ( played by André Holland ) who is trying to keep his job , find a way to retain his clients , and also , maybe , break an unjust system .
The story was Holland ’ s idea ; he passed it @ @ @ @ @ @ @ McCraney , best known in the movie world for co-writing the Oscar-winning screenplay for Moonlight .
( McCraney is also the chair of playwriting at the Yale School of Drama . )
Holland also gave McCraney a book that turns up prominently in the film : The Revolt of the Black Athlete , published in 1968 by sociologist Dr. Harry Edwards .
A game-changing work of both scholarship and activism , the book is a study of and call for Black athletes to participate in collective action aimed at social change .
Among @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the famous Black Power salute that Tommie Smith and John Carlos raised at the 1968 Olympics .
High Flying Bird raises important questions about what Holland ’ s character calls the “ game on top of the game ” — the business of pro basketball , in which players , owners , media , and others all play different roles and have different access to resources and power .
Directed by Steven Soderbergh , it ’ s a crackling film that suggests that second-order game could be illusory , if athletes start to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ by the lockout , which was a mini-apocalypse back in 2011 , prompted by disputes over the division of revenue between owners and players .
The situation the league found itself in 2020 was much stranger , with shortened seasons and reduced revenue thanks to the pandemic , and Black Lives Matter uprisings across the country in reaction to police shootings .
So I wanted to ask McCraney what he was thinking about as the events of last week ’ s walkouts unfolded .
I spoke with him over Zoom about the film @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the power that Black professional and college athletes hold and the power that ’ s still outside their grasp , how social media changes the game , and whether artists have something to learn from the collective action of athletes .
This conversation has been edited and condensed for clarity .
What were you thinking about last week , as you watched the NBA walkouts unfold ?
I wondered what it must be like for Dr. [ Harry ] Edwards , who chronicled this phenomenon amongst Black athletes throughout the history of the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , “ I wonder what ’ s going through his mind.
” I know he has a very deep interest in telling stories and points of view , like we did in High Flying Bird , about the collective power of those athletes , and about the social change they can bring , and want to bring .
Then I started wondering what those players are going through .
To be in a bubble , in Orlando , not able to move , and then have your hometown going up in flames , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ able to be there .
Even if it ’ s not your hometown — even if it ’ s a town that has become your home base because of the team — there ’ s social unrest happening around people who look like you .
As we know , these players experience it all the time , even if they may not report it .
So I was thinking more about what sparked High Flying Bird .
These moments , these stories , these collisions with capitalism , racism , the industry .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ about much until this year is something André Holland ’ s character says in the first scene of High Flying Bird : that NBA players have a certain amount of power because the league relies on their image to be able to sell sneakers and merch for the “ sexiest sport.
” I watched The Last Dance in the spring , and showing how much power Michael Jordan had was a big part of the documentary .
It was clear that his celebrity and power were very individual .
But right now , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the individual at all ; they ’ re about the collective .
I am not a basketball scholar .
But one of the reasons the research [ for High Flying Bird ] came to me easily was that there are a lot of comparable markets [ to pro sports ] .
Freelance writers .
The WGA and agency dispute — that was happening at the same time .
We were literally looking at looming actor strikes .
Michael Jordan has a great deal to do with this , but the rise of the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , has created a kind of tiered power system in which you need a star player .
You can look at ballet companies the same way : There has to be a prima .
There has to be somebody who ’ s the star that ’ s going to draw the audience .
But you still need the corps , you need the ensemble .
The interesting thing about how that power works is that it ’ s endemic to the way we run our society .
We mete out freedom to a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ is scrambling for the scraps .
But there ’ s a point where people are like , “ Wait a minute , together we all need freedom .
Yes , we can talk about different tiers of payment .
But we all need human dignity , respect , the freedom to be our full person.
” There are moments like now , where everybody ’ s vying to figure out , “ Okay , well what ’ s the collective gon na do ?
” There are folks who are going , “ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ And there are people saying , “ No , I ’ ve got to pay my bills.
” That ’ s where the tensions lie .
That ’ s where the system wants you to be .
It wants to keep us in a constant state of saying , “ Hey , don ’ t rock the boat here ; some of us don ’ t have the privileges you have.
” It ’ s always important to remember the way capitalism works in these industries : It wants you to think it @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s not true .
It can ’ t .
It ’ s not possible .
That ’ s why we call the one percent “ the one percent.
” If we keep everybody vying to be the one percent , keep everybody pulling to be there , they ’ re so distracted that nobody ’ s paying attention to the fact that the 99 percent is being treated like less-than-human beings .
How great would those players be if they were just able to focus on being their best player selves ?
But @ @ @ @ @ @ @ should be doing what they ’ re doing , which is making the people they work for , and work with , pay attention to the pain and suffering of the communities that they came from and that they are a part of .
One thing that struck me watching everything that ’ s going on , and then rewatching High Flying Bird , is that our imaginations have been wired so that we often can ’ t even conceive of what would happen if a group of people who were calling for @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Or if a large group of people suddenly decided they weren ’ t going to participate in an unjust system anymore .
Or if athletes or artists decided to sidestep an unequal industry rather than work inside it .
It ’ s hard to imagine that as even a possibility .
In the movie , that realization comes because the NBA is literally in the midst of a lockout due to contract disputes , so the system is effectively not even there .
The similarities [ between the movie and now ] are @ @ @ @ @ @ @ what is normal .
In our world today , many things could interrupt the cash flow of many industries .
We ’ re all going through them , including the NBA .
But they ’ re trying to continue to march forward in the middle of a pandemic .
In the middle of 180,000 deaths , and rising , there is this feeling that we have to keep the tap on .
But that is its weakness .
The industry isn ’ t able to change and move .
It doesn ’ t @ @ @ @ @ @ @ forward momentum .
These are moments when we ’ re trying to tell nature , “ Oh , we ’ ll find a way to do what we need to do , ” but things around us really should tell us to stop , to reconfigure .
This is a moment to look at how we can make things better , more equitable .
It ’ s a time that we can just stop .
But many industries are like , “ That ’ s the opposite of what we can do.
” @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , we ’ re going to extend ourselves even more , and take away more freedom , and broadcast from people ’ s homes now if we have to , because we ’ re not going to stop the flow .
We can ’ t .
What will we do ?
If you know that the system is vulnerable in that way , then you can really interrupt it , if you go , “ Well , you want this to keep going , but what if I said no ?
” And @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to you not being employed anymore .
But do you really want to be employed by a system that vulnerable ?
A system that can ’ t stop and say , “ Hey , we ’ re running wrong , we need to stop for a second and figure things out.
” Capitalism is like , “ Well , it ’ s too big to fail.
” But every time we get into a “ too big to fail ” situation , and it does fail , nobody sees the writing on the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ advance that something was too big , that some small cog would really mess it up , and it would send a lot of people reeling .
That we need to do something now .
But nobody ever does .
In these moments of collective action , when players in all kinds of sports , even in the MLB , decided to walk off , it looked like solidarity across sports .
But I guarantee you there are a lot of people in the background screaming , “ We can ’ t let @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ s too much money at stake.
” I wonder , though — none of the major leagues can be making much money right now , right ?
How much must they be making in contrast to what they normally make in order to tell themselves that playing games is the right thing to continue doing ?
Is it worth it ?
Those are the questions that keep going through my mind .
They ’ re not operating an ordinary system , so what ’ s the margin here ?
What ’ s @ @ @ @ @ @ @ out players just to say you ’ re doing it ?
The situation has made me think a lot about the powers that college athletes wield , both in these times and others , since they ’ re not even getting paid .
Oh , for sure .
They definitely do .
There are whole schools that are terrified right now that they won ’ t be able to operate in general , because their sports teams can ’ t operate .
There was this highly recruited student who just went to visit @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Top 10 schools , or the Big Three , that people thought he should have been looking at .
People were going crazy : “ What ?
He can ’ t go to that school .
If he goes there , then… ” You get this nauseous feeling in your stomach , thinking , “ Wow , that person is just dollar signs to your institution.
” If schools aren ’ t about higher learning and deepening education , are they really just investment funds , hedge funds masked as universities ?
I @ @ @ @ @ @ @ I work for , Yale , all the time .
Like , what ’ s happening here ?
Where are our values ?
I think Dr. Edwards speaks so eloquently about the way in which these young players , especially in college , have more collective freedom than they think .
But the game is to make sure that they don ’ t know that .
Also , there ’ s a burden on them .
There are many players who know they ’ re bringing home championships , or making sure their @ @ @ @ @ @ @ that they ’ re bringing the stadium money , the money that the teams get from endorsements .
The revenue that schools get from athletics — those numbers are terrifying .
I don ’ t know what those schools ’ values are , I don ’ t know what their ethos is .
But there ’ s something really powerful in what ’ s happening there , in the ways in which these young folks are beginning to think about both their collective action and their actions as individuals .
I know Dr. @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
One big element of High Flying Bird — and also an element of the power that athletes can yield these days — came with the advent of social media , which gave people a new way to own their images .
They weren ’ t as easy to control as they might have been in the past .
The age of information , like all periods in history , has its pluses and minuses , or gifts and curses .
The internet , the amount of information that we get , the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ it back and forth — there ’ s never been another time like it .
Our brains are so stimulated by that passing of information .
And to think that artists , athletes , or anyone creative isn ’ t going to engage that , with some sort of individualist mindset , is wrong .
As people who are in the entertainment industry , we have been asked to be quieter about our interior feelings about specific issues — understandably so .
But right or wrong , [ through social media ] we @ @ @ @ @ @ @ thoughts .
It ’ s kind of interesting that colleges used to be the place where people go and find their voice , whereas a lot of college athletes find that ’ s where people are asking them to be the most quiet .
For Black people — for Black artists and Black athletes in particular — there is a kind of urge to engage in that way .
And they have every right to , and should be able to .
You also get to see people on the same team arguing @ @ @ @ @ @ @ As we saw in The Last Dance , those arguments used to stay in the locker room or behind the scenes .
People would guess about them , and then every now and then , a journalist would find the story and run it in the Chicago Tribune or something .
But now , we can see arguments play out over tweets flying back and forth .
And I think because we are being allowed into that , it ’ s giving us more space and time to remember that athletes are people @ @ @ @ @ @ @ under any [ political post from an athlete ] and see people from every side of the issue who just want everybody to go back and shut up and dribble .
You ’ ll see a Black athlete saying , “ Yo , these riots aren ’ t good , ” and then people who call themselves liberals will write , “ Oh , just shut up and play basketball.
” Then there ’ ll be someone who wants to kneel with Kaepernick , who thinks that the NBA or the NFL need @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ ll see all these comments from the right saying , “ You need to shut up and do what you do .
Keep to your sports.
” That ’ s interesting to me , because it means that there ’ s a mechanism on both sides that shuts off that person ’ s humanity and just wants them to be a player , just wants them to be a musician , and not a fully human person in the world .
That , again , is that veil of capitalism .
You @ @ @ @ @ @ @ my grocer .
I don ’ t want to hear about your personal , political struggles as I ’ m getting my oatmeal .
It ’ s wild to me that we live in a society where , on the one hand , we want to struggle for those freedoms , and at the same time , we don ’ t want everybody else to have them .
That seems relevant far beyond sports .
You work in the arts and the entertainment industry , and I write about it , and often @ @ @ @ @ @ @ “ We pay you to entertain us .
Just entertain me .
Don ’ t make me feel uncomfortable .
Which of course is ludicrous when you ’ re talking about theater and film— —whose purpose is literally to make you feel uncomfortable .
If I don ’ t make you feel uncomfortable in some way , making you laugh won ’ t be easy .
If I don ’ t make you feel uncomfortable , making you cry won ’ t be easy .
The whole point of me doing this work @ @ @ @ @ @ @ I ’ ve got to make you feel like you ’ re not sitting in a place that you sit every day and think about the things you think about every day .
I ’ ve got to take you out of your comfort zone in order to get you to move , think , feel slightly different .
Sorry , I interrupted your question .
No , you ’ re totally right !
So given that , do you think there are lessons that Black artists can take from athletes , or @ @ @ @ @ @ @ white-dominated worlds of theater and film ?
I hate to be that short , but it ’ s really the truth .
Look , the thing that Dr. Edwards talks about the most is that he ’ s an advocate for Black participation in management .
And even I will look around sometimes , and be like , “ Where are all the Black people ?
” I ’ ll look at my executive producers and be like , “ What ’ s happening ?
” Sometimes it ’ s a hard thing @ @ @ @ @ @ @ relationships with your white colleagues all the time .
But at the same time , at some moments , I ’ m just like , we ’ ve got to start building these collectives .
You ’ ve got to start talking to other people .
You start building those collectives .
You start talking to the other people who are at the same level of you in the job and say , “ Hey , who are your people ?
Who are your managers , your agents , your lawyers ?
” @ @ @ @ @ @ @ how to build more infrastructure .
Because , to be honest , what ends up happening [ in the industry ] is less about a kind of overt racism .
That happens , for sure .
Don ’ t ever think that it doesn ’ t .
Overt racism happens at every level in all industries .
It ’ s just less frequent .
People have gotten better about it .
When it does happen , even if it isn ’ t “ overt , ” it ’ s still violent .
The @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ s hard to explain that an action is harmful when people have decided it ’ s benign .
Even when you ’ re negotiating contracts or deals , folks will tell you , “ Oh , you ’ re going to go into the room and they ’ re going to ask for a discount [ ed rate ] .
” And you think to yourself , “ Wait a minute , why am I being asked for a discount ?
Why am I being discounted already ?
I just came in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ even know what I ’ m selling.
” But you know .
It ’ s because I ’ m Black .
Then you start thinking to yourself , “ Well , I need to start selling to more Black people because then I don ’ t need to discount anything.
” As an artist who wants to be paid , I enter a negotiation saying , “ Hey , this is how much this thing is going to cost ; this is how much time it ’ s going to take me.
” @ @ @ @ @ @ @ going in there and being like , “ I got this really dumb thing that I ’ m gon na go in and pitch , and I just want billions of dollars for it.
” It happens , and good luck to those people .
But rarely is that the case , right ?
If I ’ m coming into a project , and [ I ’ m upfront about ] what it will cost to make , then why I ’ m being discounted for it just because I ’ m Black @ @ @ @ @ @ @ hearing that , and knowing that that ’ s happening , you start thinking to yourself , “ I got to go in the room with people who aren ’ t going to discount me .
I have to have people who are going to fight for me and remind those people why they shouldn ’ t discount me.
” Speaking very personally , once André [ Holland ] thrust this idea into my heart , and I started reading The Revolt of the Black Athlete , I just started thinking , yeah @ @ @ @ @ @ @ sense .
We fought for 400 hundred years to undo systemic racism , yet it ’ s not going anywhere .
We can keep running up against that , which becomes exhausting .
And then I ’ m not writing , I ’ m not playing basketball , I ’ m not doing the thing that I ’ m actually called to do .
I ’ m just running up against the system .
Or , I can just surround myself with people who don ’ t want to engage the system in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ subtle for me , but I understand those people who are just like , “ All Black Everything.
” I get it .
I totally get it .
We can pretend those lessons don ’ t translate from athletics to art , but I think that ’ s to our own detriment .
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The extraordinary sight of NBA players protesting racial injustice by refusing to participate in playoff games last week made me (and others) think about a movie I saw last year. High Flying Bird tells the story of an NBA rookie whose first season is thwarted by the 2011 NBA lockout, and his agent (played by André Holland) who is trying to keep his job, find a way to retain his clients, and also, maybe, break an unjust system.
The story was Holland’s idea; he passed it along to playwright and screenwriter Tarell Alvin McCraney, best known in the movie world for co-writing the Oscar-winning screenplay for Moonlight. (McCraney is also the chair of playwriting at the Yale School of Drama.) Holland also gave McCraney a book that turns up prominently in the film: The Revolt of the Black Athlete, published in 1968 by sociologist Dr. Harry Edwards. A game-changing work of both scholarship and activism, the book is a study of and call for Black athletes to participate in collective action aimed at social change. Among many other accomplishments, Edwards helped engineer the famous Black Power salute that Tommie Smith and John Carlos raised at the 1968 Olympics.
High Flying Bird raises important questions about what Holland’s character calls the “game on top of the game” — the business of pro basketball, in which players, owners, media, and others all play different roles and have different access to resources and power. Directed by Steven Soderbergh, it’s a crackling film that suggests that second-order game could be illusory, if athletes start to work together.
That realization is prompted by the lockout, which was a mini-apocalypse back in 2011, prompted by disputes over the division of revenue between owners and players. The situation the league found itself in 2020 was much stranger, with shortened seasons and reduced revenue thanks to the pandemic, and Black Lives Matter uprisings across the country in reaction to police shootings. So I wanted to ask McCraney what he was thinking about as the events of last week’s walkouts unfolded.
I spoke with him over Zoom about the film’s relationship to our reality, the power that Black professional and college athletes hold and the power that’s still outside their grasp, how social media changes the game, and whether artists have something to learn from the collective action of athletes. This conversation has been edited and condensed for clarity.
What were you thinking about last week, as you watched the NBA walkouts unfold?
I wondered what it must be like for Dr. [Harry] Edwards, who chronicled this phenomenon amongst Black athletes throughout the history of the United States — I just kept thinking, “I wonder what’s going through his mind.” I know he has a very deep interest in telling stories and points of view, like we did in High Flying Bird, about the collective power of those athletes, and about the social change they can bring, and want to bring.
Then I started wondering what those players are going through. To be in a bubble, in Orlando, not able to move, and then have your hometown going up in flames, or protests happening and you not being able to be there. Even if it’s not your hometown — even if it’s a town that has become your home base because of the team — there’s social unrest happening around people who look like you. As we know, these players experience it all the time, even if they may not report it.
So I was thinking more about what sparked High Flying Bird. These moments, these stories, these collisions with capitalism, racism, the industry.
One thing I hadn’t thought about much until this year is something André Holland’s character says in the first scene of High Flying Bird: that NBA players have a certain amount of power because the league relies on their image to be able to sell sneakers and merch for the “sexiest sport.” I watched The Last Dance in the spring, and showing how much power Michael Jordan had was a big part of the documentary. It was clear that his celebrity and power were very individual. But right now, the collective actions aren’t about the individual at all; they’re about the collective.
I am not a basketball scholar. But one of the reasons the research [for High Flying Bird] came to me easily was that there are a lot of comparable markets [to pro sports]. Freelance writers. The WGA and agency dispute — that was happening at the same time. We were literally looking at looming actor strikes.
Michael Jordan has a great deal to do with this, but the rise of the superstar athlete, especially in the NBA, has created a kind of tiered power system in which you need a star player. You can look at ballet companies the same way: There has to be a prima. There has to be somebody who’s the star that’s going to draw the audience. But you still need the corps, you need the ensemble.
The interesting thing about how that power works is that it’s endemic to the way we run our society. We mete out freedom to a few people, and then everybody else is scrambling for the scraps. But there’s a point where people are like, “Wait a minute, together we all need freedom. Yes, we can talk about different tiers of payment. But we all need human dignity, respect, the freedom to be our full person.”
There are moments like now, where everybody’s vying to figure out, “Okay, well what’s the collective gonna do?” There are folks who are going, “We should all just walk away.” And there are people saying, “No, I’ve got to pay my bills.” That’s where the tensions lie. That’s where the system wants you to be. It wants to keep us in a constant state of saying, “Hey, don’t rock the boat here; some of us don’t have the privileges you have.”
It’s always important to remember the way capitalism works in these industries: It wants you to think it supports the individual, but that’s not true. It can’t. It’s not possible. That’s why we call the one percent “the one percent.” If we keep everybody vying to be the one percent, keep everybody pulling to be there, they’re so distracted that nobody’s paying attention to the fact that the 99 percent is being treated like less-than-human beings.
How great would those players be if they were just able to focus on being their best player selves? But they can’t. They absolutely should be doing what they’re doing, which is making the people they work for, and work with, pay attention to the pain and suffering of the communities that they came from and that they are a part of.
One thing that struck me watching everything that’s going on, and then rewatching High Flying Bird, is that our imaginations have been wired so that we often can’t even conceive of what would happen if a group of people who were calling for justice just walked off the job. Or if a large group of people suddenly decided they weren’t going to participate in an unjust system anymore. Or if athletes or artists decided to sidestep an unequal industry rather than work inside it. It’s hard to imagine that as even a possibility.
In the movie, that realization comes because the NBA is literally in the midst of a lockout due to contract disputes, so the system is effectively not even there.
The similarities [between the movie and now] are terrifying, because something larger has stopped what is normal. In our world today, many things could interrupt the cash flow of many industries. We’re all going through them, including the NBA. But they’re trying to continue to march forward in the middle of a pandemic. In the middle of 180,000 deaths, and rising, there is this feeling that we have to keep the tap on.
But that is its weakness. The industry isn’t able to change and move. It doesn’t have flexibility. It has to keep forward momentum. These are moments when we’re trying to tell nature, “Oh, we’ll find a way to do what we need to do,” but things around us really should tell us to stop, to reconfigure. This is a moment to look at how we can make things better, more equitable. It’s a time that we can just stop. But many industries are like, “That’s the opposite of what we can do.” We’re going to hurt ourselves, we’re going to extend ourselves even more, and take away more freedom, and broadcast from people’s homes now if we have to, because we’re not going to stop the flow. We can’t. What will we do?
If you know that the system is vulnerable in that way, then you can really interrupt it, if you go, “Well, you want this to keep going, but what if I said no?” And yes, the collective action could lead to you not being employed anymore. But do you really want to be employed by a system that vulnerable? A system that can’t stop and say, “Hey, we’re running wrong, we need to stop for a second and figure things out.”
Capitalism is like, “Well, it’s too big to fail.” But every time we get into a “too big to fail” situation, and it does fail, nobody sees the writing on the wall. We could have seen in advance that something was too big, that some small cog would really mess it up, and it would send a lot of people reeling. That we need to do something now. But nobody ever does.
In these moments of collective action, when players in all kinds of sports, even in the MLB, decided to walk off, it looked like solidarity across sports. But I guarantee you there are a lot of people in the background screaming, “We can’t let this go on too long. There’s too much money at stake.” I wonder, though — none of the major leagues can be making much money right now, right? How much must they be making in contrast to what they normally make in order to tell themselves that playing games is the right thing to continue doing? Is it worth it? Those are the questions that keep going through my mind. They’re not operating an ordinary system, so what’s the margin here? What’s making this beneficial? Are you wearing out players just to say you’re doing it?
The situation has made me think a lot about the powers that college athletes wield, both in these times and others, since they’re not even getting paid.
Oh, for sure. They definitely do. There are whole schools that are terrified right now that they won’t be able to operate in general, because their sports teams can’t operate.
There was this highly recruited student who just went to visit a historically Black college instead of the Top 10 schools, or the Big Three, that people thought he should have been looking at. People were going crazy: “What? He can’t go to that school. If he goes there, then…” You get this nauseous feeling in your stomach, thinking, “Wow, that person is just dollar signs to your institution.” If schools aren’t about higher learning and deepening education, are they really just investment funds, hedge funds masked as universities? I argue about this even with the institution I work for, Yale, all the time. Like, what’s happening here? Where are our values?
I think Dr. Edwards speaks so eloquently about the way in which these young players, especially in college, have more collective freedom than they think. But the game is to make sure that they don’t know that.
Also, there’s a burden on them. There are many players who know they’re bringing home championships, or making sure their team is in the playoffs, and that they’re bringing the stadium money, the money that the teams get from endorsements. The revenue that schools get from athletics — those numbers are terrifying. I don’t know what those schools’ values are, I don’t know what their ethos is. But there’s something really powerful in what’s happening there, in the ways in which these young folks are beginning to think about both their collective action and their actions as individuals. I know Dr. Edwards has lots to say about that.
One big element of High Flying Bird — and also an element of the power that athletes can yield these days — came with the advent of social media, which gave people a new way to own their images. They weren’t as easy to control as they might have been in the past.
The age of information, like all periods in history, has its pluses and minuses, or gifts and curses. The internet, the amount of information that we get, the ability to shift that information and pass it back and forth — there’s never been another time like it. Our brains are so stimulated by that passing of information. And to think that artists, athletes, or anyone creative isn’t going to engage that, with some sort of individualist mindset, is wrong.
As people who are in the entertainment industry, we have been asked to be quieter about our interior feelings about specific issues — understandably so. But right or wrong, [through social media] we get to see people’s innermost thoughts.
It’s kind of interesting that colleges used to be the place where people go and find their voice, whereas a lot of college athletes find that’s where people are asking them to be the most quiet.
For Black people — for Black artists and Black athletes in particular — there is a kind of urge to engage in that way. And they have every right to, and should be able to.
You also get to see people on the same team arguing an issue from polar opposite directions. As we saw in The Last Dance, those arguments used to stay in the locker room or behind the scenes. People would guess about them, and then every now and then, a journalist would find the story and run it in the Chicago Tribune or something. But now, we can see arguments play out over tweets flying back and forth. And I think because we are being allowed into that, it’s giving us more space and time to remember that athletes are people.
You can look at the comments under any [political post from an athlete] and see people from every side of the issue who just want everybody to go back and shut up and dribble. You’ll see a Black athlete saying, “Yo, these riots aren’t good,” and then people who call themselves liberals will write, “Oh, just shut up and play basketball.” Then there’ll be someone who wants to kneel with Kaepernick, who thinks that the NBA or the NFL need to do better, and then you’ll see all these comments from the right saying, “You need to shut up and do what you do. Keep to your sports.”
That’s interesting to me, because it means that there’s a mechanism on both sides that shuts off that person’s humanity and just wants them to be a player, just wants them to be a musician, and not a fully human person in the world. That, again, is that veil of capitalism. You provide me a service. You are my grocer. I don’t want to hear about your personal, political struggles as I’m getting my oatmeal.
It’s wild to me that we live in a society where, on the one hand, we want to struggle for those freedoms, and at the same time, we don’t want everybody else to have them.
That seems relevant far beyond sports. You work in the arts and the entertainment industry, and I write about it, and often I see people saying things like, “We pay you to entertain us. Just entertain me. Don’t make me feel uncomfortable. Which of course is ludicrous when you’re talking about theater and film—
—whose purpose is literally to make you feel uncomfortable. If I don’t make you feel uncomfortable in some way, making you laugh won’t be easy. If I don’t make you feel uncomfortable, making you cry won’t be easy. The whole point of me doing this work is that, at some point, I’ve got to make you feel like you’re not sitting in a place that you sit every day and think about the things you think about every day. I’ve got to take you out of your comfort zone in order to get you to move, think, feel slightly different. Sorry, I interrupted your question.
No, you’re totally right! So given that, do you think there are lessons that Black artists can take from athletes, or from Dr. Edwards, in the very white-dominated worlds of theater and film?
Yes.
I hate to be that short, but it’s really the truth. Look, the thing that Dr. Edwards talks about the most is that he’s an advocate for Black participation in management. And even I will look around sometimes, and be like, “Where are all the Black people?” I’ll look at my executive producers and be like, “What’s happening?”
Sometimes it’s a hard thing to say, because you build good relationships with your white colleagues all the time. But at the same time, at some moments, I’m just like, we’ve got to start building these collectives. You’ve got to start talking to other people. You start building those collectives. You start talking to the other people who are at the same level of you in the job and say, “Hey, who are your people? Who are your managers, your agents, your lawyers?” You start slowly trying to figure out how to build more infrastructure.
Because, to be honest, what ends up happening [in the industry] is less about a kind of overt racism. That happens, for sure. Don’t ever think that it doesn’t. Overt racism happens at every level in all industries. It’s just less frequent. People have gotten better about it. When it does happen, even if it isn’t “overt,” it’s still violent. The harm is still done. And it’s hard to explain that an action is harmful when people have decided it’s benign. Even when you’re negotiating contracts or deals, folks will tell you, “Oh, you’re going to go into the room and they’re going to ask for a discount[ed rate].” And you think to yourself, “Wait a minute, why am I being asked for a discount? Why am I being discounted already? I just came in the room. You don’t even know what I’m selling.”
But you know. It’s because I’m Black.
Then you start thinking to yourself, “Well, I need to start selling to more Black people because then I don’t need to discount anything.” As an artist who wants to be paid, I enter a negotiation saying, “Hey, this is how much this thing is going to cost; this is how much time it’s going to take me.” I know very few artists who are going in there and being like, “I got this really dumb thing that I’m gonna go in and pitch, and I just want billions of dollars for it.” It happens, and good luck to those people. But rarely is that the case, right? If I’m coming into a project, and [I’m upfront about] what it will cost to make, then why I’m being discounted for it just because I’m Black?
Anyway, the moment you start hearing that, and knowing that that’s happening, you start thinking to yourself, “I got to go in the room with people who aren’t going to discount me. I have to have people who are going to fight for me and remind those people why they shouldn’t discount me.”
Speaking very personally, once André [Holland] thrust this idea into my heart, and I started reading The Revolt of the Black Athlete, I just started thinking, yeah, this makes a whole bunch of sense. We fought for 400 hundred years to undo systemic racism, yet it’s not going anywhere. We can keep running up against that, which becomes exhausting. And then I’m not writing, I’m not playing basketball, I’m not doing the thing that I’m actually called to do. I’m just running up against the system.
Or, I can just surround myself with people who don’t want to engage the system in that. That shift has been more subtle for me, but I understand those people who are just like, “All Black Everything.” I get it. I totally get it.
We can pretend those lessons don’t translate from athletics to art, but I think that’s to our own detriment.
High Flying Bird is streaming on Netflix.