She's Gotta Have It review: Spike Lee atones for his biggest regret in forceful, feminist new drama
As the director behind some of the most provocative and ambitious films of the past 30 years, Spike Lee isn’t a man of many regrets. But he does have one. Near the end of his 1986 debut film She’s Gotta Have It, his central character is raped by one of her male lovers. “It was just totally stupid,” Lee said in 2014. “It made light of rape. If I was able to have any do-overs, that would be it.” With his new 10-part Netflix series, Lee has been given that do-over – and he’s run with it.
Though the original was ground-breaking at the time, that ill-judged scene isn’t the only thing Lee has changed in this forceful, feminist reworking of She’s Gotta Have It. It’s kept the name, premise and central character of its feature-length predecessor, but it’s a completely different beast – updated not just in terms of style and aesthetic, but in attitude too.
The series’ blend of humour, drama and social critique would probably curdle in the hands of anyone other than Lee – not to mention its audacious set-pieces (there’s a musical number, lyrics on-screen, about the “klown” Donald Trump). But Lee manages to make the whole thing magnificent. Newcomer DeWanda Wise is stunning too, with a wit and steely warmth that defies you to judge her character’s life decisions.
She plays Nola Darling, a self-defined “sex-positive polyamorous pansexual” who’s juggling four jobs and three boyfriends. There’s wealthy, dependable, judgmental Jamie Overstreet (Lyriq Bent); beautiful, cultured, conceited Greer Childs (Cleo Anthony); and fun, adventurous, childish Mars Blackmon (Anthony Ramos). Each wants Nola to himself, but the situation isn’t up for negotiation. “I’m not a freak, I’m not a sex addict,” she says straight to camera (Lee has all his characters do this from time to time, eschewing the fourth-wall in favour of honest exposition), “and I’m damn sure nobody’s property.”
There’s a woman in the mix too – Opal Gilstrap (Ilfenesh Hadera). In the film she’s a somewhat predatory lesbian whose affections Nola rejects; here she’s the most mature and understanding of the lot. It’s a shame, considering that it’s Opal who most tempts Nola to test the waters of monogamy, that Hadera’s given comparatively little screen time.
The rest of the supporting characters are juggled more deftly, Lee injecting just enough pathos that they never become caricatures – despite their frequently ludicrous behaviour. Mars is the comic relief of the series, supremely irritating and warm-hearted in equal measure. Lee himself played Mars in the film, and the soft spot he holds for him is obvious.
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But for all its supporting characters, this is Nola’s story, and she has more pressing things to worry about than her lovers’ insecurities. Her art doesn’t pay the rent for her Fort Greene apartment, so she has to work a handful of side jobs in the increasingly gentrified Brooklyn neighbourhood in which she grew up. Gentrification is clearly at the forefront of Lee’s mind here – at one point Nola compares it to the colonisation of Native Americans. So too is society’s treatment of women – particularly black women – from subtle micro-aggressions to full-on assault. Nola experiences both, but channels these incidents into paintings and anonymous street art.
Like Spike Lee himself, Nola makes art out of life, not in an attempt to make it pretty but to expose its messiness and flaws. “They all view me differently,” says Nola of her multitudinous lovers, “but I will not allow them to paint my life, paint who I am.” That’s for her to do.