Press play when you start the movie. These notes follow along, minute by minute. Questions to think about are at the end.
Public Enemy wrote the song for this movie. You'll hear it again and again from Radio Raheem's boombox.
Source · IMDb triviaLee modeled Rosie Perez's credit dance on Ann-Margret's opening in Bye Bye Birdie (1963).
Source · IMDb triviaIt's Stuyvesant Avenue between Quincy Street and Lexington Avenue in Bedford-Stuyvesant. The crew built Sal's Pizzeria and the corner store on empty lots.
Source · DNAinfo (2015), Do the Right Thing WayHe plays the DJ who narrates the day from his window. He had worked with Spike Lee on School Daze the year before.
Source · IMDb triviaHe finished the screenplay in about two weeks.
Source · IMDb triviaSpike Lee hired members of the Nation of Islam for security. They also shut down crack houses on the block during filming.
Source · Film Comment, interview with Spike Lee (1989)Joie Lee has acted in several of her brother's films.
Source · IMDb triviaThey were married for more than 50 years and were also civil rights activists together.
Source · MPR News / AP, Ruby Dee obituary (2014)Every scene with Robin Harris, Paul Benjamin and Frankie Faison under the umbrella was improvised.
Source · IMDb triviaEvery photo is of an Italian American star, in a shop where almost every customer is Black. This small fight grows all day.
Source · IMDb triviaDe Niro said no because he had played roles like it before. His photo ended up on Sal's wall anyway.
Source · IMDb triviaIn December 1986, a white mob in Howard Beach, Queens, chased three Black men who had just left a pizzeria. One of them, Michael Griffith, was hit by a car and killed, and protesters called for a boycott of white-owned pizzerias.
Source · Brooklyn Museum / Criterion (also on IMDb trivia)He plays Cee, one of the young men hanging out on the block.
Source · IMDb triviaHe saw her dancing at a party in Los Angeles and offered her the part of Tina. The two tell the story a little differently.
Source · IMDb triviaEach group insults another, one after another, in a fast montage that breaks away from the story.
Source · In Transition (academic journal), on the slur montageIn The Night of the Hunter (1955), Robert Mitchum has the same words tattooed on his knuckles. Bill Nunn plays Radio Raheem.
Source · IMDb triviaThe script ended as Smiley walked up to the window. Danny Aiello and John Turturro improvised the rest.
Source · IMDb triviaIt was one of only two Oscar nominations the film received.
Source · Academy Awards, 1990 ceremonyProduction designer Wynn Thomas chose a block with no trees, so there's no shade anywhere. He also painted a wall bright red to bring color into the picture.
Source · MoMA, Wynn Thomas on designing the filmIt reads "Tawana told the truth," about the Tawana Brawley case of 1987, which was in the news all through the time Lee was writing.
Source · IMDb triviaMichael Stewart, a young graffiti artist, died after New York transit police arrested and beat him in 1983. Listen for someone in the crowd saying his name. The film is dedicated to the families of Stewart and others killed by police.
Source · Brooklyn Museum / Criterion, Ten Details That Shaped Do the Right ThingLee pushed back, pointing out that no one said that about violent action movies with white stars. No riots happened.
Source · IMDb triviaIt was nominated for two Oscars, for the script and for Danny Aiello, and won neither. Best picture that year went to Driving Miss Daisy.
Source · Academy Awards, 1990 ceremonyKim Basinger went off script while presenting in 1990 and said the best film of the year was missing from the best picture list. Lee thanked her years later.
Source · IMDb triviaQuestions to think about on your own, or to talk through with whoever you watched with.
Spike Lee has said that only white people ask him whether Mookie did the right thing. What does it mean that people ask about the window and not about Radio Raheem?
Which of the stereotypes in the montage have you heard before? Which ones have you said?
Sal says he's fed the neighborhood for 25 years. What do businesses owe the communities they serve?
Times are matched to the film's subtitles, so they may be off by a minute on some versions. Each note links to its source. Still images will come from the studio's press materials.