The Cooley High cast reunited at the 13th annual TCM Classic Film Festival and received a tribute at Hollywood’s legendary TCL (Grauman’s) Chinese Theatre complex.
Director Michael Schultz and cast members Glynn Turman, Lawrence Hilton-Jacobs, Garrett Morris, Cynthia Davis, and Steven Williams appeared for a pre-screening talk alongside TMC host Jacqueline Stewart at the Hollywood Legion Theater on Friday night, the Chicago Times reported.
Cooley High (1975) was a classic Chicago-based favorite and coming-of-age-comedy and considered one of the most significant projects in Black-produced cinema history.
Stewart, the chief artistic and programming officer of the new Academy Museum of Motion Pictures in Los Angeles, recalled growing up in Chicago and becoming very familiar with the film.
“I grew up in Chicago, where ‘Cooley High’ was considered Black national cinema,” said Stewart. “If you were from Chicago, you knew this film.”
The film has paved the way for many Black filmmakers in Hollywood, such as John Singleton, Spike Lee, and Robert Townsend, who had minor roles in the Chicagoan classic.
“This film is so influential,” Schultz said. “Without ‘Cooley High,’ there would be no ‘Boyz N the Hood’.”
The movie was set in 1964 in Chicago, following the lives of high school seniors Preach (Turman), an aspiring writer, and Cochise (Hilton-Jacobs), a basketball star, while navigating through life as young adults. Cooley High highlights their teenage escapades, delinquent misadventures (a joy ride on Navy Pier), dating mishaps, and a sudden, life-altering event.
During the pre-screening, Schultz explained that the original script was written by Eric Monte, a one-time resident at Cabrini-Green, the Northern side of Chicago. Though his work had potential, Schultz said it wasn’t enough to transition into a movie.
“Eric Monte was funny, but his draft was not yet a movie,” he said. “It didn’t have a strong throughline. He was a great storyteller, but Eric didn’t have the discipline” to produce a screenplay. However, Schultz and his team had written a final script a month later.
The 83-year-old continued his directing career with credits in several films and television shows such as All-American, Black Lightning, and Black-ish. Meanwhile, Morris (now 85), Turman (75), Williams (73), and Hilton-Jacobs (69) all remain working actors.
“I didn’t realize the significance of what I was doing,” Williams said, referring to the then-actors roles in the movie. “It was just a gig. Then, it became what it is now.”
Last year, Cooley High was added to the Library of Congress’s National Film Registry “for being culturally, historically or aesthetically significant.”
