Wesley Snipes with Gentry Thomas talks new series with Kevin Hart on Netflix

BACKSTAGE PASS

Actor and four-time NAACP winner Wesley Snipes has been making a bit of a comeback as of recent. The star appears in the new Netflix limited series True Story where he plays the role of Carlton, the burdensome and seemingly jealous older brother to the show’s lead character, the Kid, played by Kevin Hart. Snipes brings the same level of intensity and awe aspiring energy to the TV screen as he’s done in several timeless films including his seminal role in the Blade trilogy, New Jack City (1991), and Demolition Man (1993), but it felt as though Snipes had disappeared over the last decade. Well, he did disappear. Snipes spent 28-months locked away in a federal prison facility in northern Pennsylvania after being convicted of tax evasion. The star was intertwined in a lengthy legal battle over unpaid taxes for years following the court’s decision to fine him up to $5 million for the outstanding fees. True Story Netflix Series Now the 59 year-old actor is back with a 7 part series on Netflix Now Streaming. On this episode of The Backstage Pass, Snipes talks about his famous role as Sidney Deane in the (1992) classic White Men Can’t Jump and tells Gentry what is was like working with guys like Sly Stallone, Denzel Washington and Eddie Murphy. Snipes has been quoted as saying that “Hollywood is still run by white people for white people. I don’t expect a white guy to go out and write the experience of a black guy growing up in the Bronx the way I grew up. How is he going to know that?” And that’s why he says black artists should follow the example of film-makers in, for example, South Korea or Nigeria. “The South Koreans are not sitting there complaining about not being included in Hollywood. They went and built their own.” He did tell us that we have come along way since he first got to Hollywood in the late 80s. Listen to this and previous episodes of The Backstage Pass on The Podcast Playground. email the host @ Gentry@GentryThomas.com See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.