When Will Smith made a guest appearance last week on Comedy Central’s The Daily Show, there was no avoiding The Slap – his eruption of anger at comedian Chris Rock during the Oscars. But first, host Trevor Noah wanted to talk about Smith’s latest film: “You play one of the most famous unknown people … from America’s history.”
That person is today known as “whipped Peter” or by his given name as an enslaved man, Gordon. A photograph showing his scarred back after his escape from a Louisiana plantation in the 1860s became one of the first viral images, displaying the brutality of slavery to a world that could no longer look away. Peter’s story is the inspiration for Smith’s comeback movie, Emancipation, which begins streaming on Apple TV+ on Friday.
