The city of Baltimore features prominently in an extraordinary number
of films, television shows, novels, plays, poems, and songs. Whether
it's the small-town eccentricity of Charm City (think duckpin bowling
and marble-stooped row houses) or the gang violence of Bodymore,
Murdaland, Baltimore has figured prominently in popular culture about
cities since the 1950s.
In Come and Be
Shocked, Mary Rizzo examines the cultural history and racial
politics of these contrasting images of the city. From the 1950s, a
period of urban crisis and urban renewal, to the early twenty-first
century, Rizzo looks at how artists created powerful images of
Baltimore. How, Rizzo asks, do the imaginary cities created by
artists affect the real cities that we live in? How does public
policy (intentionally or not) shape the kinds of cultural
representations that artists create? And why has the relationship
between artists and Baltimore city officials been so fraught,
resulting in public battles over film permits and censorship?
To answer these
questions, Rizzo explores the rise of tourism, urban branding, and
citizen activism. She considers artists working in the margins, from
the East Baltimore poets writing in Chicory, a community magazine
funded by the Office of Economic Opportunity, to a young John Waters,
who shot his early low-budget movies on the streets, guerrilla-style.
She also investigates more mainstream art, from the teen dance
sensation The Buddy Deane Show to the comedy-drama Roc
to the crime show The Wire, from Anne Tyler's award-winning
book The Accidental Tourist to Barry Levinson's movie classic
Diner.