Octavia Spencer in Fruitvale Station: More Than a Performance

By Emma Smith

With racial inequalities becoming an increasingly relevant political topic today in  America, there is a growing exigency to portray stories of racial relations and the resulting inequalities accurately in entertainment. The film Fruitvale Station (2013), directed by Ryan Coogler, presents true story of the murder of Oscar Grant, which is then elevated by the compelling performances by its main cast. Octavia Spencer’s portrayal of Wanda, the mother of Oscar Grant, gives voice to the immensely harrowing pain and inequalities that thousands of parents of color in America face. Spencer’s physicality provides a strong foundation to deliver the black parental perspective of incidents of police brutality and the distinct struggles that may come with it. More specifically, of those that frequently face injustices caused by foundationally racist institutions such as the justice system. Her performance in two key scenes – a prison flashback scene and hospital scene – reveals to the audience the visceral pain and specific trauma parents of incarcerated people of color in America may face. 

Fruitvale Station depicts a true story of police brutality, an issue that is heavily informed by intersectional identities like race, gender, and class. Oscar (Micahel B. Jordan) is depicted as a complex, struggling individual trying to redirect his life post-incarceration. He is burdened by racial injustices purposefully designed within the criminal justice system, making it more difficult for him to reinvent himself and start anew. Spencer’s performance embodies the nuanced emotions and real life reactions that come with being a parent of an incarcerated individual and victim of police brutality. On the surface, her performance conveys the struggles of parents of incarcerated children, but understanding the film’s subject matter of police brutality and its connection to race adds a more nuanced commentary to her performance about racial inequalities and the parental perspective of police brutality. The commentary on race and its impacts on parenting is more subtle in the prison flashback scene, mostly manifesting itself within the container (the prison) that Oscar finds himself in. However, it becomes more prevalent in a later hospital scene where Oscar’s race adds obvious context to his unjust death, leaving Spencer’s character with repercussions that directly stem from racial injustices.    

Spencer’s mythology as an actress, or previous roles and their public reception, would suggest that her performance in this film would not carry much of the emotional weight and racial commentary. Prior to her role in Fruitvale Station, Spencer often played side characters who had little impact on the narrative and were one-dimensional. Perhaps the most powerful and impressive aspect of Spencer’s performance is that she portrays a real-life mother without being a mother herself (Alexander). Spencer even mentions the potential difficulties of playing a real person in an interview stating that the filmmakers “had to make sure there weren’t any ‘Octaviaisms’ in” her performance (“Octavia Spencer relates”). These factors would suggest a disconnect between her performance and the true story she was given to work with, limiting her ability to effectively convince the audience that she is a mother of a victim of police brutality. However, Spencer’s performance is not undermined by outside factors, allowing it to serve as a vehicle to successfully deliver Fruitvale Station’s social commentary. 

In a flashback scene, set in a prison, Spencer’s physicality is used as a tool to communicate the struggles and difficult decisions that come with parenting incarcerated children. The most prevalent and impactful aspects of Spencer’s performance are her face and eyes, which are accentuated by the use of close-up shots throughout the scene. Her expressions reveal the progressing contrast between the relatively warm and welcoming atmosphere at the beginning of the scene and the cold and tense one at its conclusion. Spencer closes her eyes intermittently while her character, Wanda, begins retelling a story about Tatiana (Ariana Neal), her character’s granddaughter, removing what has previously been a key indicator of her character’s thoughts and motivations (22:12-26:42). This perhaps creates a sense of avoidance and uneasiness, especially within the unfamiliar prison setting. Despite its subtlety, understanding the impact of race and the racial injustices that occur within the criminal justice system creates a layered reading of the setting, adding to the tension and uneasiness Wanda, a black mother, may feel in this setting. Spencer’s face indicates a sharp mood change after Oscar joins in on a verbal altercation with another inmate. Her eyes become more consistently visible and her expression more taut. Spencer’s engagement in eye contact with her co-star, in contrast to the lack of it at the beginning of the scene, indicates the increased severity of the situation and a growing internal struggle concerning how to best advise her imprisoned son. Spencer’s eyes are most convincing of said struggle when they appear glossy and tearful during her character’s final look at her son in prison. Spencer’s final close-up shot is a longer take, allowing the audience to follow her character’s progression of thoughts via her series of expressions, from anger towards the person the prison system has turned her son into, to surprise, and then finally to pity as she realizes her helplessness as a black parent of an incarcerated child. As the scene concludes, her last expression conveys a complex myriad of emotions revealing the burdens that parenting an incarcerated child in a racially unjust system may present.

Similar to her face and eyes, Spencer’s voice, in combination with her delivery of specific lines in the scene, introduces the audience auditorily to the film’s same commentary on the parental perspective of having a child in prison. Within the prison scene, the same question, “What happened to your face?” is delivered twice, once before Spencer witnesses her son’s fight with another inmate, and once after. The differences in Spencer’s intonation of the same line is stark, suggesting contrasting emotions. Initially, she speaks softly, in a  conversational manner, full of motherly love; the second time, those same words sound harsh and accusatory. This contrast perhaps suggests a difficult realization that resulted from the aforementioned internal struggle of how best to parent a troubled child. Just as the words spoken within the scene convey the emotional thought process of Spencer’s character, her silence within their dialogue is just as powerful. The silence after Oscar’s violent interaction with another inmate is met by Spencer’s own silence, marking the moment in which her character decides to stop visiting her son in prison. The silence after Oscar’s hostile response to this decision solidifies Wanda’s decision. Both Spencer’s nuanced delivery of lines and her deliberate silence in this scene provide non-visual signals for the audience to better understand the parental perspective of hopelessly attempting to navigate the criminal justice system as a black parent. Race makes any negotiation within all facets of the racist criminal justice system a near impossible task, arguably resulting in Wanda’s ultimate tough decision.  Understanding the larger context of the film’s commentary on police brutality, and its relationship with race, emphasizes the unspoken implications race plays within the prison, an inherently unjust and anti-black setting.  

In addition to speech and facial expressions, Spencer’s body language is just as telling in showing her conflicting attitudes about how to properly approach her parental responsibilities. When her character is telling her son a lighthearted story about her granddaughter, Spencer’s head and shoulder movements are more frequent and smoother in appearance. This suggests Wanda’s attempt to maintain an air of ease  despite the rigid and unfamiliar setting of the prison – her movements come off as involuntarily reactive to both her surroundings and her co-star’s expressions. However, the verbal argument stiffens her body language; she only nods her head downwards when she walks away from her character’s son, hurriedly exiting the prison. These subtle actions suggest Wanda’s shift in mindset concerning her approach to parenting. For example, when Oscar accuses her character of “leaving [him] again,” Spencer moves her body away from her co-star, creating both a physical and metaphorical distance between the characters. The metaphorical distance allows her character to take the appropriate ‘tough love’ approach to parenting. A single gesture, a visible swallow, allows the audience to sense the unbearable, internal choice to distance oneself from one’s child child. Finally, Spencer leaves determinately, without a single glance back at Oscar. Her posture when walking away is stiff and her gaze remains forward even though her character hears her son’s physical struggle with the guards behind her. Jordan’s character even invites Spencer’s character for a goodbye hug, which she denies, physically emphasizing her choice to leave. Her posture and lack of movement here suggests that even the smallest glance or irregular motion would prompt her character to re-evaluate her ultimate decision. Spencer’s physicality provides subtle visual cues that demonstrate an insight to her instinctual motherly tendencies and emotions and the challenges parents of incarcerated children may have. 

In one of the concluding scenes of the film, Wanda learns of her son’s death, which resulted from an accidental gunshot wound during an incident of police brutality. In this concluding hospital scene, Spencer’s physicality once again plays a critical role in connecting the film’s overall commentary of racial injustices and police brutality and the parental perspective of this tragic situation, more so than the flashback prison scene. Spencer’s voice, and lack thereof, stands out the most in her physicality during the film’s final sequence (1:15:01-1:17:01). Her first words after learning that her character’s son did not survive are “I need to see him,” and she repeats the phrase three more times, getting progressively quieter in each instance. Repeating this phrase gives Spencer’s character time for reality to sink in, comforting and grounding her character before she attempts to process the truth. As soon as Oscar’s body is visible to Spencer’s character, the dialogue spoken in reaction gives insight into her character’s growing guilt and grief. Spencer delivers the lines, “I should’ve just let him drive,” repeatedly in between sobs.  Guilt and remorse flood Wanda’s face as she comes to the realization that her son may have avoided the tragic fate if she hadn't directed him to take the BART to prevent him from drinking and driving. The cries laced between each word demonstrate Spencer’s character's attempt to grapple with the reality of Oscar’s death and inevitable growing grief. Spencer’s intonation within this scene invites the audience to connect with the possibility of losing a child and the pain that comes with it. With the film being a true story of an instance of police brutality in America, there are added layers of meaning to Spencer’s auditory performance, as it is a tragic yet true to life situation that parents of incarcerated people of color may unequally find themselves in.  

Spencer’s movements and expressions work in tandem with her voice throughout the hospital scene, emphasizing the physical toll of her character’s son’s death. Spencer’s character’s initial reaction to the news of her son’s death is considerably more still and relaxed than that of Sophina (Melonie Diaz), Oscar’s girlfriend, who emphatically cries and throws her hands down in disbelief. Spencer’s movements during the scene with all of Oscar’s friends and family are subtle: she only displays a slight glance downwards and widens her eyes rather than having a full body reaction to the news of her son’s death. This suggests that her reaction may set the tone for the rest of the room; she is the parental figure and thus role model for everyone else. It is only when Spencer’s character is alone, viewing her son’s dead body, that she becomes more visibly upset and physically distraught. When the sheet is taken off Oscar’s body, Spencer physically convulses, curving inward and gasping. Similarly, in contrast to the waiting room scene where Spencer’s face was rather stoic, when viewing the body, her face contorts from her constant crying. Her posture specifically conveys a sense of helplessness as Wanda cannot physically stand up straight and instead leans against the nurse for support. Spencer’s facial and bodily movements elicit strong empathetic responses in audiences in sharing the understanding the physical and emotional impacts of a harrowing reality parents may face. Through these physical reactions in Octavia Spencer’s performance, the film aims to resonate with its audience. Spencer’s distraught physical reaction is a direct effect from an incident of police brutality, a topic the film comments on as a whole. Here, it is more overtly evident that the racial difference between Oscar and the police had a costly impact on the outcome of their altercation. Acknowledging the intense subject matter of Fruitvale Station adds to the depth of Spencer’s performance, which alludes the racial connections to police brutality and its effects on the parents of victims. 

Spencer uses her physicality  to help promote  social messages about parenting incarcerated children and the unequal reality black parents may encounter in America, specifically with instances of police brutality. Behind her emotionally charged performance is the true and tragic killing of Oscar Grant. Ultimately, her telling performance allows viewers a glimpse into a less publicly discussed reality of America, helping to increase awareness and understanding of parental sacrifice in the face of such racially motivated violence that unfortunately is still experienced by a disproportionate number of black parents in America.

Works Cited 

Alexander, Bryan. “Octavia Spencer: The help behind ‘Fruitvale Station.’” USA Today,  10 July 2013, https://www.usatoday.com/story/life/movies/2013/07/10/octavia spencer-fruitvale-station-help-oscar/2447089/. 

Fruitvale Station. Directed by Ryan Coogler, performance by Octavia Spencer, The  Weinstein Company, 2013. 

“Octavia Spencer relates to the mom of Oscar Grant | Fruitvale Station.” YouTube,  Uploaded by BlackTree TV, 10 July 2013, https://youtu.be/A6-ZKpkKcxM.