OPRAH WINFREY: Tonight, on "Next Chapter"--
[UPBEAT MUSIC] - Welcome to Brooklyn.
MAN: OK. I didn't know where--
You're in the shot, man.
I didn't know where to go. [LAUGHTER]
OPRAH WINFREY: --I'm in the heart of Brooklyn, New York,
just three miles from Spike Lee's childhood home.
Home of Biggie, Jay-Z, Barbra Streisand, Woody Allen.
And you.
It's near where his children--
18-year-old Satchel and 16-year-old Jackson--
were born and where some of his most iconic films
have been made.
They told us to walk in front of--
OK, walk this way.
--our chairs.
So Brooklyn's played such a central role,
really, in your life and a starring role in your movies.
What is it about Brooklyn?
Appreciate it.
I don't know if it's just the swag or history,
but there's something in the water here.
And I was not born in Brooklyn.
A lot of people don't know that.
I was born in Atlanta, Georgia.
And we moved here--
OPRAH WINFREY: I read that, yeah.
--at a very early age.
And my family, we were the first African-American family
to move into Cobble Hill.
So when we first got there, we got called the n-word, like,
a week. But when--
OPRAH WINFREY: After a week?
A week.
But then, when they saw that there
wasn't a ton of other Black families coming in behind us--
OPRAH WINFREY: Uh-huh
--we were just-- we were good.
So you just came from NYU, where
you taught a directing class.
I've been professor at NYU for 15 years.
I'm also the artistic director of the film school.
And I graduated there in 1982.
OPRAH WINFREY: You, who called yourself--
you self-described snotty-nosed kid is now Professor Lee.
Is that what they call you, Professor Lee?
They just say Spike.
[LAUGHS]
I mean, I just let them.
I mean, they say, Professor Lee.
I don't like to be called professor.
So it's great.
My mother taught.
She was a teacher.
She taught Black literature.
My father's a jazz musician.
He also taught.
My grandmother, who lived to be 100 years old,
she taught art for 50 years.
For 50 years--
(WHISPERING) Wow.
--she never taught one white student
because of the Jim Crow laws and then the state of Georgia.
And in 50 years, a lot of--
they missed on-- them white kids missed out on a great teacher.
Really? Your grandmother.
My grandmother. She went to-- Spelman graduate.
- Ah. - My mother went to Spelman.
My father and grandfather went to Morehouse.
So I know you'll like this story.
My grandmother, 50 years, she saved
her social security checks for her grandchildren's education.
And since I was the eldest, I had first dibs.
So my grandmother put me through Morehouse,
put me through NYU film school, and gave me the seed money
for "She's Gotta Have It."
OPRAH WINFREY: Wow.
Isn't that amazing?
It's amazing because her grandma was a slave.
Her grandma was a slave.
Yet, she was a Spelman graduate.
[JAZZ MUSIC]
OPRAH WINFREY: In 1986, a 29-year-old Spike
released his debut film, the sexually provocative
"She's Gotta Have It."
[INDISTINCT CHATTER]
Just three years later, Spike would earn
his first Oscar nomination-- - Hey!
Ah!
OPRAH WINFREY: "Do the Right Thing."
[CRASH]
June 30, 2014 will be the 25th anniversary
of "Do the Right Thing."
Can you believe it?
It's a classic now.
Yeah.
I remember when you first came on "The Oprah Show"
and you were talking about do--
that was your first show, "Do the Right Thing," when the--
Right.
And thank you for having me on the show.
Does that feel like a lifetime ago, though, now?
Yes.
It doesn't feel like 25 years to me.
Well, you've been on a whirlwind, though.
[LAUGHTER] - It doesn't feel like--
You've been on a whirlwind!
A little bit. Little bit.
- A little bit. - Yeah.
Did you know that it would be as groundbreaking, as memorable?
Well, that was the intention, but you never-- you don't know
for sure until it comes out.
But the film was made to have an impact.
[FUNKY MUSIC]
OPRAH WINFREY: "Newsweek" found the in-your-face wake-up call
on racism so threatening to moviegoers they likened it to,
quote, "dynamite under every seat," unquote.
When Spike appeared on "The Oprah Show"
to talk about the reaction, he was joined by a panel,
including "New York Magazine"'s Joe Klein and legendary movie
critic Roger Ebert.
My problem with the movie is every character
in the movie is a very complicated,
interesting, funny human, person, with the exception
of the police.
The police are these cardboard cutouts who commit the atrocity
at the end of the movie.
And I think that that says--
That have been committing atrocities
like this across the nation, since Black people been here.
But wait a minute. [APPLAUSE]
But wait a minute.
And Roger, God bless his soul, he
was the number one champion of the film
because the whole brouhaha--
Yeah.
--started at the world premiere of "Do the Right
Thing," which was in Cannes.
For 15 minutes after this movie was over,
I was emotionally distraught.
I think that what this movie is about is not about the answer.
The movie is about the question.
And the question is, is there any way, in this country,
that we're gonna figure out how to love each other?
OPRAH WINFREY: Right. And what was the brouhaha then?
That Black folks can go berserk--
[LAUGHTER]
--and tear this up.
OPRAH WINFREY: Up.
That's right.
Everybody was afraid that people were gonna go to the theater,
then they would be so mad, they'd be throwing trash cans--
Yes, and I-- and blood was gonna be in my hands.
Yes. Yes.
Yes. - It was crazy.
But here's the thing that-- the biggest thing to me,
in retrospect, is that it was a total disrespect
to the intelligence of the African-American moviegoing
audience.
White folks could go see "Terminator 10"--
[LAUGHS]
--and no one's shooting up stuff.
But we wouldn't have had the intelligence
to make the distinction between what's on the screen--
Yeah.
--and what's-- and we would go out--
our intelligence was that low.
We would go out and reenact the burning
down of Sal's Famous Pizzeria.
[LAUGHTER]
In Bedford-Stuy of do or die, the country
would be up in flames.
Crazy.
That's insane.
I mean, for me, one of the most wonderful things about that
film is that ushers and managers in movie theaters
across the country would have to push people out of the lobby
to let the people come in for the next screening
because people stayed in the lobby
and talked about the film.
Yes.
And that's what we wanted to do.
We just want to have a discussion
of race in this country.
But I wanted to just read what Roger
Ebert said in May of 1989.
"I walked out of the screening with tears in my eyes.
Spike Lee had done an almost impossible thing.
He'd made a movie about race in America
that empathized with all participants."
Don't you miss him?
Yeah, I do.
I do miss him.
Great guy.
Here's the thing.
The title is "Do the Right Thing."
And I wanted to leave it up to the audience to decide
who did the right thing.
Were you angry when you did that film?
Yes, I was angry.
Mm-hmm.
Because I was angry about African-Americans--
At the people, yeah.
--who we feel murdered by--
Mm-hmm.
--the police.