Reading of a comic book, and im not really sure how to do that. Because, you know, usually what happens with a regular book is someone comes up, you know, to a podium hike this and they say, you know, hello, im amy tan, ask im going to read you my new book, what japan did to china again. [laughter] but im not really sure what to do this time because its pictures. So do we all just go like, wow, look at that. Heres another page. Wow. So i think what im going to do instead is just talk about it for a little while, talk about this project, sort of how it came to be, why im doing it, and then ill take questions from you guys. In 1917 the United States entered its first war of choice. And what i mean by war of choice is a war that we didnt have to fight and a war we werent sure we wanted to fight. Because every war up until then had had a very concrete goal which was a war of independence from britain or a war to hold the union together and free slaves, or we really liked california, and we were going to take it away from mexico. But whatever the reasons were, it was concrete whereas the First World War was the first world of an ethereal ideal, this weird idea. And this idea was hatched by president wood wilson. Woodrow wilson. This was a war to make us safe for democracy, to make the world safe for dem can accuracy. Well, that sounds democracy. Well, that sounds great. What a noble cause, were marching off to make the world safe for democracy. But what does it mean for soldiers who didnt have democracy at home . And thats what this book is about. In 1917 the United States sent over a group of its own soldiers and set them up to fail. They gave them inadequate training. Initially, they didnt even give them uniforms. In fact, they didnt even give them rifles to train with because they were too busy giving away rifles to private rifle clubs so, you know, civilians could improve their marksmanship so then they could go fight a war. So this unit actually had to write to the government to get their own guns. This unit was then sent to train in the deep south this a tiny little town called spartanburg which was not what youd call a haven of racial brotherhood. As a matter of fact, they were sent to train in spartanburg two weeks after one of the worst race riots in American History in houston where black soldiers actually rioted and shot up the town and were then shot up themselves by the white police and the white military authorities, and the whole unit was disgraced. Two weeks later, another black unit is sent to South Carolina on accident . Especially when the mayor of spartanburg actually wrote to the New York Times and said do not send them here, theres going to be trouble. So this unit was sent to spartanburg, and they were given orders, dont fight back. You guys all hear jackie robinson, you know, hes all famous for not fighting back. Well, this is a whole unit of them. And when we say not fighting back, i mean, im not dissing jackie robinson, but basically, theres a huge difference between people yelling at you from the stands and actually getting beaten up on the street which is what happened to these guys. And they were specifically ordered, do not fight back. Because if you do, the units not going to be sent overseas, and were going to be disgraced. And they held pack held back with superhuman discipline. And finally they got a chance to get overseas. And then they were sent to dig ditches. And that was infuriating. And they finally, finally lobbied to be put into combat. But heres the row. During the First World War, the United States was kind of late to the game. And by this point the british and french really wanted reinforcements and they kept saying to the americans, oh, good, youre in the war, come on, give us reenforcements, and general pershing said, no, these units will fight as an American Unit under an american flag. Except for the black guy withs, you guys can go. So they gave them to the french. So this unit which had poor training, poor equipment, had to write for their own rifles, was sent to a town where they were beaten up on the street, kicked out of its own army and loaned out to a foreign power, what happened to them . They fought so value i cantly valiantly in combat, they came home as one of the most deck crated decorated unit this is the entire United States army. [applause] thats what i think. That was the story of the Harlem Hellfighters. One of the worst things that was done to them was they werent allowed to march off in a parade. Because thats what happens with soldiers. Thats one of the good things about being a soldier is before you go off to war, because some of you may not come back, all of you get to feel special. All i dont of you get to mar dn street march down main street. Well, in new york city all the National Guard units were put together in the rainbow division, and they all got to march off to war together except these guys. And im not kidding, pause they were told because they were told black is not a color of the rainbow. Well, they got their parade when they came home. Over a Million People turned out to welcome them home. The First American of any skin color to win the french award was one of these guys, henry johnson. The entire unit won the award. They spent more time in combat than any other American Unit. They never lost a foot of ground, they never lost a man to capture. At the end of the war when the germans were massing for one big push on paris, at one point there was nothing between paris and the germans in the sector except these guys. They stopped the kaisers best. And one little side note, their regimental band introduced a previously unknown form of music to the europeans called jazz. [laughter] that is the story of the Harlem Hellfighters. And thats a story ive literally been trying to tell for 16 years. Thats their story. Heres mine. Im 11 years old, and dont worry about the math. Im getting to that. Ive been trying to do it for 16 years, but ive known it for 30 years. Im 11 years old, there was a man working for my parents who grew up in zimm zimbabwe. He was studying at ucla, and he had learned about marcus daughter i have, he was doing a research project. So he told me about the Harlem Hellfighters. He said there was a unit of black americans that went off to fight, and they were given to the french, became one of the most deck crated units in the entire u. S. Army although the American Army didnt even want them. Now, when youre a white kid growing up in the good part of l. A. , that kind of injustice is not normal. So that was pretty shocking for me. You know, im 11 years old on the good side of l. A. Did that really happen . [laughter] what . Really in oh, my goodness. So i was constantly interested in this. And i kept studying about the hellfighters as much as i could. When i was 20 years old, i did my semester abroad at college. Some of you know what happens, you go to college, you have a great time, and then you do a semester abroad, and you have a great time and get drunk and throw up over there. Just like you do over here. Except people talk differently. Ask thats pretty much your semester abroad. And you go, wow, these buildings are old. [laughter] i did not do that. I went somewhere else. I went to the university of the Virgin Islands in st. Thomas. And before you think i was just lying on the beach, no, it was the reverse. See, i had already vacationed there my whole life, and i realized, wow, im 20 years old, and i know absolutely nothing about these people. I know the beach, i know the resort, i know the happy smiles, i know nothing about the caribbean as a lace. So i figured im going to use that time, the semester abroad, to go down there and study Political Science and learn about them. And i did. And i learned what it was like to be a racial minority for the first time. And before we get all highing and mighty, lets take sure i was it was a semester, right . I got to go home afterwards. So it was like a little grain of rice in a giant buffet of racial relations. But it did make me feel for the first time what it feels like to wear a uniform that i cant take off and to be prejudged by that uniform no matter who i am, you know . Some people back home, some people liked me, some people didnt. Lots at points. But that was because of me and me opening my mouth, not because of this. When i was down there, i had a professor, an amazing man, his name was dr. Wayne edge, and he was a throwback to the 60s. You guys remember the character nat x . Chris rocks character on saturday night live . That was him. Passionate, angry. He said the great crime white people in america committed against black people was to bury their past accomplishments which blew me away. I thought, oh, my god, thats really true. When youre trying to raise a child and a child doesnt have confidence and says i cant do it, the first thing you say is you can do it because youve already done other things. I say this now because im a parent and i actually have to do this, when my 9yearold says i cant do it, yes, you can because youve done this, this and this and my son goes, oh, youre right. If my son had no accomplish bements or if i had buried them, hed have in confidence. And i was like, oh, my god, that works on a macro group as well. Thats huge to bury that kind of history. So i realized, wow, thats an incredible crime. I mean, you know, like i said, white guy, sheltered life, i had a lot to learn. When i was in the Virgin Islands, i discovered some graves from 1917, 1918, and i asked my professor, i said is this, were these the Harlem Hellfighters . And this professor who had said to me all about history said, who were they . He didnt know. Thats how obscure it was. Flash forward to the 1990s. I dont know if you guys remember this, tnt made buffalo soldiers, danny glover. And i thought it was tnt, but i think spike lee just corrected me, it was hbo that had made the original tuskegee airmen, not redtails. The original with laurence fishburne, cuba gooding jr. For me it was an eye opener because i thought, wow, there really is a moment, an opportunity for africanamerican military movies. So i decided to research and write a screenplay, the Harlem Hellfighters. And there wasnt a lot back then. You know, the first book i bought off a new web site called amazon. Com was, like, this big. But then i found this amazing book called from harlem to the rhine, and that waso1 cbz7qr anl memoir of a guy who actually fought. So i read that. I got the, a cd recording of the original music from the regimental band from james reese europe, some of the most amazing jazz lyrics identify ever heard. War ive ever heard. War lyrics, poetry. And i also got a documentary from the 1970s called men in bronze, i think one of the last two hellfighters left alive. So that was sort of my Core Research material. And i went i wrote the script, i went to tnt. No. Nobody wanted it. Nobody wanted it. Years and years. And when youre young and youre struggling, you initially blame yourself. You initially think, well, its my fault, im a bad writer, okay. And i had one meeting that changed everything with louisiana very burton. A friend of ours said, hey, ill get the script to him. He called me and said if i could make this in a heartbeat, i would. I dont have the power to direct it, but im not going to give up, and you shouldnt either. Then what he said to me was theres a few Harlem Hellfighter scripts making the rounds right now, but yours comes close to the truth. Well, let me backtrack and say that when youre a dyslexic kid and you struggle in school and you have to be tutored for hours a day just to pull off a c and to suddenly have jordy la forge tell you youve done your homework . [laughter] give up. So that sort of kept my fire lit. But finally after so many rejections from hollywood, i realized im done with hollywood because hollywood is based on economics. And finally i realized war movies are big and theyre expensive, okay. Nobody wants to make this movie, fine. I was getting into comics at this point. I had written zombie Survival Guide and i had written g. I. Joe hearts and minds, so i was like, okay, random house said what do you want to do next and and i think they were hoping for world war z ii, and i said i want to do this. They were like, yeah, okay. Lets give it to him. Maybe hell write word war z ii. They gave me this thing as, i dont know, just to keep me happy, kind of like how they gave Martin Scorsese [inaudible] hoping hed make casino. All right, give him his black world war what soldier story. So by that point id done a lot more research, and i had learned not just about them, but also about the world in which they lived in, the greater war and the greater culture, the great migration. What was at stake. And i sat down with this amazing artist, kay man white canaan white, and six years later we came out with this. You have to do your homework just to make sure you dont screw up the background, the hair styles, the clothes, all that stuff just so youre breaking even, just so youre getting it right. I was like canaans research assistant. I had to send him all this stuff. We had, im not kidding, four feet of research material, of books stacked up of which one solid foot was nothing but uniforms of world war i, weapons of world war i, pictures from harlem, all that kind of stuff just to make sure we got it right. So it was, it was quite an endeavor. And im very proud of it. So that is the Harlem Hellfighters. Im tired of hearing myself talk, as normal. I put one poor guy to sleep. [laughter] dont wake him. So im going to open no, not you, sir. No. Someone over here. How you doing . Hey. Yea. [laughter] so im going to open the floor to questions. Heres how were going to work this, apparently oh, thank you. [applause] thank you. I think how were supposed to do this is were going to be like an old 70s talk show where someone is going to raise their hand, and these two sprightly young lasses will run to you with a microphone. So questions anyone . Yes. Sir. I hope you dont mind if i also ask you about world war z. You can ask me about it. You know, a successful movie, but a lot of people who were really into the book were not happy with the movie, you know . They werent . [laughter] but it was so true to the book. And thats what i was going to ask you, did you have anything to do with the adaptation . And are you at all concerned if this eventually does become a movie that the same thing will happen . Excellent question. Let me backtrack and say, okay, for those of you dont know, wrote a book called world war z, zombie war, and a movie came out with brad pitt making pancakes, and it was the same title. [laughter] thats a about it. Was i involved in the movie . Let me put it this way, i was more involved this getting president obama elected. [laughter] literally. Because at least i phone banked for obama. I didnt phone bank for this movie. How do i feel about it . I dont feel much of anything because it was so different. You know, when youre a book writer, you live in terror of when they adapt your movie because youre going to watch your characters say things they wouldnt say, watch your story get manipulated and just completely eviscerated. I didnt watch that at all. I watched the credits roll which, by the way, what a title. And then i got to watch 28 days later on crack which had absolutely nothing to do with my book, and it was fine. I dont care what they do with jerry lane. I didnt want invent jerry lane, he wants to be there making pancakes for his wife. Oh, zombies, i have to go around the world. It was a wig summer block big summer blockbuster movie. I didnt say, hey, that character which i didnt make up would never say that. So it was so different, it allowed me to divorce myself. Am i worried or the that their going to change theyre going to change my story is Harlem Hellfighters . No, and you know why . Its not my story. Its their story. Im just telling it. And thats a big difference, see . World war z came from me. This is a true story, so ive just chosen to tell it. And because be it is a true story, limits to how much they can do. You know what i mean . Like with world war z yeah, they changed my book, and they had to deal with a lot of angry book fans. But they didnt have to deal with the families of the real people from the book which they would if they changed stuff. So theres limits. Plus, do you guys know about the movie deal . Heres the irony of my career. All those years i told you about getting rejected . Here, screenplay, no, okay, fine, im going to write it as a book, enough with hollywood. [laughter] hi, its hollywood. Two weeks before this book came out i got a call from will smiths company. He wants me to produce it, and he wants me to write the script. [applause] so this is not to say the movies going to get made. This is not to say that the eventual movie if it does get made is not going to star brad pitt. [laughter] and maybe a chinese guy because the Chinese Market is very lucrative for hollywood, so they may just stick a chinese guy in there just in case. You know, brad pitt and yao anyway. I dont know what the end results going to be. Who knows. But whats nice is at least i get the first shot. And thats more than i could ever ask for. Or so thats where we are right now. Anyone else . Yes, sir. I think you already explained it, but why the hell did you get so deeply involved in this whole experience . I mean, i dont even know any black folks who are into it like you are. [laughter] i mean, its amazing to me. Oh, thank you. And, you know, im really honoring you, im not putting you down. [applause] thank you. So i think i got into it initially because my dad was in world war ii. You know, im 41 years old, im a genxer, and most parents of people my age were baby boomers so they did, oh, the drugs we did and the unprotected sex we had, wow, and by the way with, i spent you know, that generation. I grew up with world war ii parents, so i group up with my grew up with my dad telling stories about combat in europe and about my mother having to ration. And i remember how mortified she w