(Akiit.com) 8/26/2007- New York, NY- Omillio Sparks is back on the movie scene with the launch of Colossal Films. Colossal Films, is a new division underneath Colossal Entertainments music umbrella that will mass market and distribute urban street movies. Sparks was once a prominent actor for his former label Rocafella Records, and starred as “Baby Boy” in the Lionsgate Films, State Property 1 & 2. Johnson will be making his own imprint in black Hollywood this fall by releasing his first movie. Omillio teamed up with Shurwil Langston of Tough Struggle Entertainment to release “Soulful” during the holiday season as a straight to DVD movie, and as a bonus DVD packaged with his album, The Payback.

The movie will be distributed through Koch Entertainment and will be sold at FYE , BEST BUY, Circuit City, and other national retail chains. The movie is a coming of age story of a young girl named Rachel nicknamed “Soulful” for her god given talent to sing despite dealing with the adversities of a hard knock life in the streets. The supporting cast deals with six degrees of separation with their own individual struggles which adds edge & suspense to the story. Jamie Knight plays the lead as Rachel aka “Soulful“, with a line-up of co-stars like Omillio Sparks, the film also stars Tray “Poot” Chaney & Felicia “Snoop” Pearson from the critically acclaimed HBO series, “The Wire”. Colossal Films second movie, Expendable is already in the production phase with an all star cast, such as Omillio Sparks, Jim Jones, Tray Chaney, Lauren London aka, New New, from the movie ATL, and more.

Omillio Sparks aka Kenneth Johnson was signed to Rocafella records in the late 90’s by Damon Dash and Shawn Carter. Sparks has starred in three movies, including State Property 1 and 2. Since leaving Rocafella records he has established a new independent label, Colossal Entertainment and now a film division called Colossal Films. Omillio Sparks, the Hip Hop artists has wrote on seven songs on the State Property 1 album and six on State Property 2- writing his verses as well as the hooks. He also wrote the hook for Jay Z’s, I Just Wanna Love You off the Dynasty album and al so had a verse on the single, As One, off of Jay Z’s, Blueprint 2: The Gift & The Curse. He’s also been featured on songs with Beanie Sigel, Freeway, and many others. He’s laid verses to tracks produced by Kanye West, Just Blaze, Johnny J, and Black Keys.

Tough Struggle Entertainment is a film and production company located in Philadelphia, PA. Shurwil Langston founded the company in early 2000 and his responsible for the production and holds the position of the lead casting director for Soulful and the upcoming movie, Expendable.

For Media Inquiries & Movie Trailer:

Brash PR
Publicist
Tiffiany Vaughn
267.233.8100
tiffianyvaughn@comcast.net

(Akiit.com) Noted Author will be hosting an Artistic Extravaganza promoting local artists, musicians, and performers as part of a Corporate Connection Event

(April 26, 2007) – On April 29, 2007, the on-line Talk shows “IN THE KNOW with Tony Reeves, Esq.” (http://www.blogtalkradio.com/intheknow) will have an on location broadcast from 7:00pm EST to 8:00pm and “IN THE GROOVE with Tony Reeves, Esq” (www.nowlive.com/reeves) will have an on location broadcast from 8:15pm to 10:00pm covering the upscale networking event in Tampa, Florida.

Noted Author / Spoken Word Artist / Entrepreneur / Attorney Alicia Phidd aka VERONICA LIONS will be conducting her upscale networking event called “THE LIONS DEN”. Ms. Lions has invited artists, musicians, spoken word poets, and performers to entertain and market their abilities to corporate executives, business owners, and entrepreneurs in a networking environment. (www.myspace.com/veronicalions).

“IN THE KNOW with Tony Reeves, Esq.” is a weekly internet talk show which provides a wide range of general legal information, social commentary, professional topics and community outreach. The talk show gives listeners the opportunity to ‘call-in’ or ‘instant message’ their questions for feedback.

“This show will be monumental in that this show gives the audience the opportunity enjoy the corporate world and cultural world in one venue,” said Reeves. “Ms. Lions is giving us a wonderful opportunity to meet the great artists and professionals.”

For more information on “IN THE KNOW with Tony Reeves, Esq.”, please e-mail reeves@anthonyreeves.com.

CONTACT:
Anthony Reeves
Anthony Reeves, Esq.
(813) 767-7147

Official Website: http://www.anthonyreeves.com

(Akiit.com) When you mention the name Tyler Perry to white people, you receive a blank stare. When you mention the name to Black people, there is a clear sign of recognition and admiration. Perry is a non-entity in the general (read: White) culture – and that includes the elite Liberal culture as well – but because of his immense success inside the Black community, he is regularly featured on the covers of magazines like Ebony and Jet which has made him a celebrity of sorts.

Why is it that Perry, who owns a movie and theater production company that is perhaps one of the largest and most successful of its type in America, is unknown to White people?

Last year I reviewed Perry’s breakthrough film “Diary of a Mad Black Woman.” Perry came to make the film after many years of hard and arduous work writing and producing plays in what continues to remain of the so-called “Chitlin’ circuit”; a chain of theaters exclusively catering to the Black community. In an America where race continues to play an important but often neglected factor in the national dialogue, Perry sought to create an independent movement based on characters and stories that resonated in the Black cultural consciousness.

Perry integrated into his stories the bedrock elements of Black life in America; elements often ignored or marginalized by the predominantly White mainstream. In “Diary of a Mad Black Housewife,” the culmination of his thematic explorations within a Black cultural framework, Perry based his writing on the centrality of the Black family and the historic Black Church. Implicit in his thematic approach was a critique not only of White ignorance of this culture, but the appropriation within the mainstream of a counterfeit culture, Hip-Hop, that has been promoted and co-opted by White media, White youth culture, and White intellectuals as the “authentic” manifestation of Black consciousness.
Read The Full Story…

(Akiit.com) Fatherhood is receiving a great deal of attention these days due to new funding initiatives by the Federal government and an increased awareness in the costs associated with children being reared in “fatherless” homes. For the sake of brevity, I won’t focus on the numbers, statistics, or studies, yet I will, however, focus on the various programs that are being, and have been, implemented to assist fathers in “re-connecting” with their children in a positive way.

First, I must give credit to all persons who are engaging in this work, and it has been my experience that there is a general consensus of urgency. I sincerely applaud your efforts. I also must add that the cross-cultural component in this work has been truly astounding – never have I seen men, women, black, white, Latino, etc. work together so well. Cheers to you. Maybe this issue will galvanize us as Americans, uniting us by truly practicing our great American principles and not merely speaking the wise truths of equality, non-discrimination, tolerance and acceptance. This is my prayer.

That said, I have also observed a common obstacle facing these programs: How do I engage, and more importantly, retain fathers? A valid question that must be answered if fatherhood programs are to be viable and effective and/or receive additional funding. A dilemma that must be rectified if our current national epidemic of “fatherlessness” is to be abated. Questions that most agencies, practitioners, human services representatives and both state and local governments have no clue of answering. And the reason why is simple: They are too far removed from the communities they serve.
Read The Full Story…

(Akiit.com) I have been convinced that many large public schools function like factory systems. You pop in one student and with the appropriate manipulations, the necessary conveyor belt rides and some pedagogical alchemy and you get the school product: a depoliticized consumer who is more prepared to select the next game system to buy then to think critically about the social context that shapes his financially struggling neighborhood. John Dewey alludes to it, and Paulo Freire explicitly discusses it.

Sure, there is something more nuanced going on here with respect to student agency and the specificity of the school site etc., but follow my logic, even if incredulously so. Maybe, these are just the cliff note ramblings of Marxist critique or the strategic staging for the theatrical introduction of radical pedagogy, but ramblings and stagings that should not be so hastily abandoned.

Humor me for a moment, if we think about this factory model of education seriously, is it possible that schools are a site of (re)production? Do schools try to make certain type of students? What are the implications of this process? A new Gender Public Advocacy Coalition (GenderPAC) report found that teachers tend to view the behavior of black girls as not “ladylike” and therefore focus disciplinary action on encouraging behaviors like passivity, deference, and bodily control at the expense of curiosity, outspokenness, and assertiveness.
Read The Full Story…