From StyleBlazer.com

We’ve read the book, are itching to see the movie but StyleBlazers we must admit, all the hoopla surrounding Steve Harvey’s relationship comedy starring the best brown faces in Hollywood, got us to thinking… If, we repeat, if, we had the chance to score any of the following musicians, we’d lock them down in a heartbeat and have them suckers put a ring on it.

Yes, Nas, Lenny and Andre 3000 have kids and Ice Cube is happily married but the objective of this ordeal is to dream. Big.  So go on, drift away to la la land and browse through our succulent gallery of 10 hot musicians. Brace yourself ladies, these men are fine! 

For the photo gallery, visit StyleBlazer.com

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urbaninformer.com

Some people have all the talent: they’re blessed enough to have their own singing careers and they write huge hits for some of their peers. Color me jealous!  Here’s a SHORT list of some of the songs I deemed noteworthy (and trust me, I could have gone on for pages and pages). What are some of your favorite songs written by singers for other singers? Let us know…

Source: Screen Rant

I don’t have to know anything about the Hunger Games to know that it’s leaving its mark on American culture in some huge ways. This weekend, the movie made the third highest-grossing debut in North American box office history raking in $155 million. It’s also exposed something we knew was true about black men, women, and children in real-life but apparently also carries over into fictional cinema—we cannot be innocent, good, or cared about instinctively.

I know nothing about Suzanne Collins’ novel except for the fact that the book has cultivated a Twilight-Harry Potter-cultish-like following of which my little cousin is a part of. As is expected with diehard fans, there are going to be indiscrepancies between the way they visualized things in the book and how they are portrayed on film, but I don’t think anyone expected so much outrage over the character of Rue, played by Amandla Stenberg, a biracial black girl.

Call me crazy, but if I’d read page 45 of the novel and saw this sole description of Rue, Amandla is exactly who I would have expected to see on screen:

“…And most hauntingly, a twelve-year-old girl from District 11. She has dark brown skin and eyes, but other than that’s she’s very like Prim in size and demeanor…”

Apparently for “Hunger Games” readers, dark brown is like the “I’m the same color as you” comments I get from white people during the summer when they come back from an island vacation and think we’re skin twins. They thought Rue would be a dark-skinned white person, and to say they were disappointed that Rue was played by a black girl would be an understatement. The Tumblr Hunger Game Tweets, set up to expose people who talk a bunch of ish but aren’t really fans of the book, as evidenced by their lack of knowledge, caught a startling number of angry responses to Amandla’s character that weren’t just about being shocked that she was black, but more so her blackness changing their entire opinion of the character and the movie. Tweets ranged from:

“Why does Rue have to be black not gonna lie kinda ruined the movie” to

“I was pumped about the Hunger Games. Until I learned a black girl was playing Rue” to

“Kk call me racist but when I found out Rue was black her death wasn’t as sad. #Ihatemyself” to

“Sense when has rue been a n***er” I don’t even have time to go into all that is wrong with that statement.

The viewers weren’t too thrilled about Lenny Kravitz playing Cinna either, although since his dark skin wasn’t mentioned in the book, they weren’t totally blindsided into liking a black person. As for another character named Thresh, there apparently was no clue he’d be black either, despite this description: “The boy tribute from District 11, Thresh, has the same dark skin as Rue, but the resemblance stops there. He’s one of the giants, probably six and half feet tall and built like an ox.”

Another tweeter sent this reaction on the collective inclusion of black characters:

“Cinna and Rue weren’t supposed to be black. Why did the producers make all the good characters black smh”

The most ironic twist in all this discussion is when it comes to the lead character Katniss no one has said a word. That’s most likely because the producers cast a blonde-haired, blue-eyed girl by the name of Jennifer Lawrence as a character that was described in the book as having olive skin and straight black hair. To their credit, they did manage to dye her hair dark— it all sort of reminds me of Elizabeth Taylor and Angelina Jolie playing Cleopatra. The lack of outrage over that change proves this argument is not about incongruences, it’s about the inability for black people to be seen as anything but villains in real life and in cinema.

What’s worse is we talk day in and day out about how we need to change the images on the screen. We need more positive images of black people, we need to be seen in leading roles, but will it make a difference? If we’re talking about black films the people who need to see these images likely won’t even bother to watch the movies. And in this case we see that having positive images didn’t challenge any of the viewers internalized ideals about black people, it simply made them view the portrayals as unrealistic, even making them angry that they had somehow been tricked to care about a little black girl when they didn’t think she was a little black girl. If we can’t soften the youth when it comes to stereotypes and prejudices about black people through an entertainment medium of all things, what can we possibly do that will make a difference?

Since buzzfeed and other sites have run stories about these fans’ racist reactions to the film, Hunger Games Tweets has proudly reported that the number of tweets about Rue and Thresh being black has greatly reduced, but I wouldn’t count that as a victory just yet. I’m willing to bet those people have only stopped commenting because they don’t want to see their twitter accounts blasted across the Internet. No one has had a sudden change of heart about the audacity of movie producers invoking sympathy for a black character. Of course, the fans’ reactions aren’t totally startling considering all that’s going on around us in black America today, but to say they’re disturbing, yet sadly, somewhat expected, would be an understatement.

Are you familiar with The Hunger Games at all? Do you think having more positive images of black characters in films is really the answer in situations like this?

Brande Victorian is a blogger and culture writer in New York City. Follower her on Twitter at @be_vic.

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by Marissa Ellis

Culturally, black folks are known for referring to anyone they have a fondness for as their cousin. It’s a term of endearment per se. But it creates problems when it comes to an outsider determining actual blood connections. The outsider here being us, your very own nosy Madame Noire.

Case in point: many people assume that Ludacris and Monica are cousins. In actuality, they are merely connected via marriage. Luda’s uncle is married to Monica’s mom, essentially making Ludacris the nephew of Monica’s stepfather – not cousins. In any case, to the best of our abilities, we have highlighted some Black celebs who are first, second and third cousins.

Martin Lawrence and Christopher Martin 

They were in House Party together back in 1990 when Christopher Martin of Kid n Play was hot stuff and Martin Lawrence had not yet hit it big. Was cousin Chris responsible for getting Lawrence one of his breaks in movies? All we know is that these days, the roles are certainly reversed.

From StyleBlazer.com

Clutch the pearls, clutch the pearls! Interview Magazine had Grammy-award winning musician Raphael Saadiq interview the musical icon/sex god, Lenny Kravitz and lord have mercy we can’t believe this man is 48 years old! They spoke about his new big screen thriller, Hunger Games, his design firm (you read that right), Kravitz Design, his last album Black and White America as well as his upbringing and the difference between Europe and America.

Ladies, go ahead and help yourself to a little afternoon eye candy at StyleBlazer.com. 

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Some of our readers have been asking for an Eye Candy gallery on this guy, and here it is! The man, who is everything from Hawaiian to Native American, German, and Irish, is the big, beefy hottie last seen in the movie Conan the Barbarian, and on the shows Game of Thrones as well as The Game (remember that guy Roman that Kelly was having a crazy fling with when the show was on the CW?). I remember him from way back in the day during his Baywatch stint, and while his body has definitely bulked up, he’s still got his rugged good looks face-wise. The husband of Lisa Bonet has tried every look in the book and has been tasty in all of them, whether we’ve approved of them or not. Check him out and find out why some of our readers are so thirsty…(kidding!).

We know that talent runs in the family of many of our favorite celebrities – many we see on a daily basis.  But I bet there are a few you didn’t know…shoot, there are a couple I didn’t know myself!  Check out the next few pages and see how many of them rang a bell for you!

Read the rest of this entry »

I feel for Zoe Kravitz. It must be hard having a father that’s absolutely, positively hot. And Lenny Kravitz is indeed a hottie. Whether he’s rocking locks, a fro, pressed hair or a low cut, two things remain constant: his body is on point, and he’s an ageless brotha. And you know you must be fine when you can occasionally wear heels and still have the ladies on you. I’ve been a fan for years now, and I know many of our readers have expressed their desire to have a little taste of Lenny. Check through this gallery and get yourself an imaginary taste…for now.

On any given day, you can walk down the street and see a real good looking guy. You acknowledge it – either to yourself or aloud – and keep it moving. But when you see a good-looking man that’s probably “of a certain age,” you might do a double take because you are glad to see an older man taking care of himself. Well, here are a few of our favorite celebrity men over age 40 that look darn good.

Here we go…

Read the rest of this entry »

(Almost) everyone loves the Idris Elbas, Denzel Washingtons and Will Smiths of the world, but there are plenty of guys that we love that don’t have that “traditional” appeal. Check out some of our more offbeat crushes and add some of your own!