In 'Rustin,' a 'deputy' civil rights leader finally gets his due

If 200,000 Jews who turned up at the March for Israel in Washington on Nov. 14 feel more empowered since that gathering, they have Bayard Rustin to thank.

Then again, so does everyone else in the country, whether they ever participated in a mass protest or not.

Rustin’s role as the chief organizer of the nation-changing 1963 March on Washington — a direct inspiration for dozens of mass protests since, including the Israel march — is chronicled in the biopic Rustin, now streaming on Netflix. It’s directed by George C. Wolfe (Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom) and stars a very likely Oscar-bound Colman Domingo in the title role. Executive producers are Barack and Michelle Obama, themselves historical figures and fittingly so because the film is as much a history lesson as it is entertainment.

That history centers around Rustin’s role organizing what was then the largest mass gathering at the nation’s capital, most famous as the setting of the “I Have a Dream” speech of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. (Aml Ameen). Officially, Rustin was only the march’s deputy director, relegated to the role because Harlem’s Black Congressman Adam Clayton Powell (Jeffrey Wright) and NAACP head Roy Wilkins (Chris Rock) adamantly refused to bestow the director title to a gay Black Quaker pacifist who once belonged to the Young Communist League.

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