#BackChannel: What Hollywood Gets Right & Wrong, The Contradictions Of College Sports and The Lives and Music of Two Soul Men

Mark Anthony Neal and Natalie Bullock Brown share their takes on the 2019 Oscars with The State of Things host Frank Stasio in the latest installment of #BackChannel. They also discuss new documentaries: ReMastered: The Two Killings of Sam Cooke on Netflix traces Cooke’s legacy as an activist and performer, and interrogates the factors that may have contributed to his death, while  Showtime’s Teddy Pendergrass: If You Don’t Know Me uses archival audio and video footage to pay tribute to Pendergrass’ musical legacy and comeback after he nearly died in a car crash. Later, Neal and Brown review the new BET series American Soul that tracks the career of Don Cornelius and his series Soul Train, and they share their analysis of the shoe malfunction of Duke basketball player Zion Williamson and the conversation it has opened about the contradictions in college sports.