On my way to work today I passed a boarded up storefront that had a huge poster advertising the Ken Burns Jack Johnson documentary that will be shown on PBS on January 17th (Ali's birthday btw). The poster showed a picture of Johnson standing with his arms outstretched to the sides so that his body is forming a cross. Well, someone wrote in magic marker across the top of the poster "Jesus was a Jew. Not Black. This is plain Wrong!" Below that someone else responded with "This is about a boxer not Jesus YOU IDIOT"
I've seen that photo in print ads for the documentary (which will air 1/17/05 on PBS). Great image, and surprising we've never seen it before. I hope there's lots of other new material Ken Burns digs out of the archive. His documentaries always find those unknown images, not just the cliche shots of his subject. Maybe he's dug up new film footage?
The Johnson photo is rather Christ-like. I hope it doesn't mean Burns is going to portray Jack as a martyr. He was much more complex than that. Well, he was like Christ in the company he kept - prostitutes and outcasts!