Gabrielle Union: Professional Riff Raff

Gabrielle Union was minding her own f-cking business last week when she got dragged into the headlines by Matthew Lawrence running his mouth on a podcast. 

Matthew was talking about a television movie from way back in 1999 called H-E Double Hockey Sticks and his experience with Gabrielle Union. If you missed it, per Entertainment Weekly: 

"There was this one moment where — and, again, I'm oblivious, I had no idea — and [Gabrielle] wanted to rehearse," Lawrence said. "And I was like, 'No, I'm good.'" 

Union clearly wanted to practice, though, to make her performance stronger.

"And she got angry and went and reported me to the director and the studio. The only time in my entire career, because usually I'm, like, the advocate, and I'm fighting for kids and, like, you know, women's rights. This is the only time in my life when I was called into the office for something I did on set. And I had no clue."

His rationale was that it was a disruption to his process: 

"At that point, in my mind — now I can do whatever, and nothing's gonna faze me — [but] at that point in my mind, I really loved memorizing the lines, knowing all the beats," he said, "but hated running it, cause it felt like it took all the freshness out of it."

The way he made it sound, many people took it to mean that he was calling Gabrielle a narc, all these years later. Also, calling a Black woman “angry” is often code for…well… it’s not even code, it’s a reinforcing a stereotype. There was a better way he could have shared this anecdote – like… 

“She called me out and I deserved it!” In other words, a learning experience. But this is not how Matthew framed it. Which is why there are other things to consider in this situation. I’d never heard of this movie but I do know that in 1999 Matthew Lawrence was the bigger star. Just looked up the movie poster, he’s on it, he would have been either #1 or #2 on the call sheet. Gabrielle, meanwhile, is NOT on the poster. 

So here was a young Black actor taking up her concerns with the producers about the lead actor refusing to rehearse and prepare for their scenes – a much bigger risk to her than it ever would have been for him. 

I wonder, if Matthew had a chance to do-over this interview, he would tell the story differently. 

Gabrielle, though, remains professional, busy, and unbothered. She has a movie to promote. Here she is in New York, glowing, while making the rounds this morning. Riff Raff premiered at TIFF last September and it’s a stacked cast. In addition to Gabrielle, there’s Bill Murray, Pete Davidson, Ed Harris, Lewis Pullman, and Jennifer Coolidge. It opens this Friday.