Arena — Season 1, Episode 371: Spike and Company - Do It a Cappella
Documentary • 90 min • 3 seasons, 689 episodes • ★ 7.2/10
Episode synopsis
Actor and director Spike Lee joins actress Debbie Allen on a journey in search of the perfect vocal performance. They travel through Brooklyn as different groups duel, jam and rehearse together, without the benefit of an instrument other than their own voices, culminating in an all-star a cappella concert. The film, the directorial debut of cinematographer Ernest Dickerson , features contemporary vocal groups such as the Persuasions and Ladysmith Black Mambazo.
About Arena
Arena is a British television documentary series, made and broadcast by the BBC. Voted by leading TV executives in Broadcast as one of the top 50 most influential programmes of all time, it has run since 1 October 1975 with over five hundred episodes made, directed by the likes of Martin Scorsese, Alan Yentob, Roly Keating, Frederick Baker, Volker Schlondorff and Vikram Jayanti. Arena's subjects are a roll-call of the world's best known cultural figures from the 20th and 21st centuries, from singers Bob Dylan and Amy Winehouse to academics Edward Said and Eric Hobsbawm, from writers Jean Genet and V S Naipaul to artists Francis Bacon and Louise Bourgeois. The current series editor is Anthony Wall.