Speaker 1: Of Course Love Supreme is a production of I Heart Radio.
Speaker 1: This classic episode was produced by the team at Pandora.
Speaker 1: Ladies and gentlemen. Welcome to QLs Classic Episode forty seven
Speaker 1: with the Great Spike Lee August two thousand seventeen. UH
Speaker 1: side note, our guest today deserves credit at least for
Speaker 1: inspiring the Suprema roll call theme song on our beloved show.
Speaker 1: Besides that, Spike Lee is a provocateur, a visionary of storytelling,
Speaker 1: great hustling, eccentric soul. This episode came slightly before his
Speaker 1: Oscar victory for Black Klansmen in two thousand nineteen. But
Speaker 1: don't worry. We get it all out, all of his journeys,
Speaker 1: all of our favorite movies. We get to ask him
Speaker 1: everything right here on QLs Classic with the Great Spike Lee.
Speaker 1: It's gonna be really awkward. Oh my god, supremo role
Speaker 1: called subprimams laughing, Suprema su prima roll call, Suprema southing
Speaker 1: suremo role. So I'm just gonna sit here, yeah and
Speaker 1: have the call. Yeah, I'm prea spike don't suit me. Yeah,
Speaker 1: we're stealing his song roll call, sub Frema roll call,
Speaker 1: sub Fremau some sub Frema roll call. My name is Fante, Yeah,
Speaker 1: dropping these flows, yeah, because I smacking my heart Frema
Speaker 1: road Camma some Suprema rock. My name is Sugar, yeah,
Speaker 1: the inside man. Yeah, I've been with the roots. Yeah
Speaker 1: since the bamboozl Fan Sma roll call, just some sub
Speaker 1: Frema roll call. My three once was yeah boss Bill's
Speaker 1: teen hero. Yeah, but directing skills, yeah, I had almost
Speaker 1: heero roremaremo role. I want to let you know I'm
Speaker 1: not just for show. Yeah, will you let me go?
Speaker 1: Oh God, give explain that after the reason roll call.
Speaker 1: My name is Spike, yeah, with a nickname. My mother said, yeah,
Speaker 1: I was out of this world roll so Frema Frema
Speaker 1: roll fremo role um. Yeah. One person. I'm not just
Speaker 1: sure what days because her timing because she's you know, okay,
Speaker 1: now I hear the song. Everybody out there. I recognized
Speaker 1: the song either did you recognize before I even introduce you,
Speaker 1: Spike Lee? Uh, he just did. What is the history
Speaker 1: behind uh your road call? Like that? Heard that at
Speaker 1: more House? Oh so that's how didn't make that up?
Speaker 1: Isn't it like a three day? So we just righting,
Speaker 1: just going to school. More House they had a rod
Speaker 1: call and we just incorporate into a school days and
Speaker 1: do it again. Did it again when he got game?
Speaker 1: So that was in school days. It wasn't because I
Speaker 1: first heard and get on the bus on school days too. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I gotta watch it the gam mites really when I
Speaker 1: first get in and when the first come on and
Speaker 1: they walked down up. Yeah, the ga Mites. Oh, I
Speaker 1: gotta watch it again. Ok wow, well three times. Okay,
Speaker 1: ladies and gentlemen, this is another episode of quest Lip Supreme.
Speaker 1: Uh introducing the fam This is uh damn I really
Speaker 1: wish uh Fontigelo. Uh who who was the the the
Speaker 1: bus driver of get on the bus? And Uh to
Speaker 1: my right, we have a sugar Steve who was one
Speaker 1: of the thugs um in in Summer of sam that's
Speaker 1: what's up y? Yeah? Yeah, what's your last what's your
Speaker 1: last name? No, at the end of the vowel, I
Speaker 1: was around back then, but there I didn't do it.
Speaker 1: I actually actually I have a similar last name to
Speaker 1: the guy who did do it. Okay, damn uh yeah,
Speaker 1: and uh boss builds in my left eagle sandwich. Oh,
Speaker 1: he was one of the cornermen and do the right thing.
Speaker 1: I was going to ask to be Bob Regular from
Speaker 1: Girls six Bob Regular. No, okay anyway. Uh, and we
Speaker 1: have Fresh from Crookland. Ok yeah, she was a girl
Speaker 1: making out with Frante was also in Crookland. Y'all were
Speaker 1: making out with each other in the in the until
Speaker 1: the beginning. I keep no Taki Joe Cuba. Yes, finally, Uh,
Speaker 1: It's it's taken some time, but I will say that,
Speaker 1: at least for me personally, and maybe I speak for
Speaker 1: most of the inhabitants of this room, that we we
Speaker 1: have the director of our particular generation with us right now.
Speaker 1: Thank you very much, Mr Spike Sheldon Lee New Yorker
Speaker 1: kilm Our tour, political activists and and and great human being.
Speaker 1: How how are you so? I'm good, I'm glad to
Speaker 1: be here. And we're an Electric Lady studio, so this
Speaker 1: is very historical. Yes we I'm sorry I've not been
Speaker 1: given Electric Lady their props. We're live in studio a
Speaker 1: where many a classic has been born. A lot of
Speaker 1: great spirits in here were all right now. You can
Speaker 1: feel it walking the door. You could feel the spirits. Well, Spike,
Speaker 1: I know when when Spike agreed to do this He
Speaker 1: was like, so it's like like forty five minutes. I
Speaker 1: was like no. He was like, all right, so now right.
Speaker 1: I was like no, Spike ninety I tried to hint.
Speaker 1: I was like, well, in the Jimmy jamm episode it
Speaker 1: was seven hours. Was like, namuck, So I'm good. We
Speaker 1: have to let me go. Oh ship, you don't mean that.
Speaker 1: You don't mean that. Let me lean back. So I'm
Speaker 1: gonna because we're we we have so much questions about
Speaker 1: your work body of work. Yes for thirty years. Yeah, um,
Speaker 1: you were born where in Atlanta, Georgia? In Atlanta, Georgia, right, really?
Speaker 1: I thought you were born in New York. No, uh,
Speaker 1: I was born in Atlanta, Georgia, and my parents moved
Speaker 1: to Brooklyn. We moved to Krown Heights when I was
Speaker 1: like two years old. Moved from Crown Heights during the
Speaker 1: First Black Family. Cobble Hill. Wow, that's where all my
Speaker 1: time American thing comes back back then the cobble Hills
Speaker 1: of Stone Italian American. And then my mother says, time
Speaker 1: of paint and rents. We bought a brown Stone and
Speaker 1: four green for forty five thou dollars. How is that possible?
Speaker 1: What was that like pre gentification. In fact, the realtors
Speaker 1: wouldn't even list for Green, it would say downtown Vicinity.
Speaker 1: So it's really been a trip that you grow up
Speaker 1: in four Green, predominant black and Puerto Rican school's no
Speaker 1: good garbage, never picked up, cops on around, and those
Speaker 1: things aren't like that anymore with the change, and they're
Speaker 1: not just cleaned up. Public schools are great on the
Speaker 1: cops or around. I was trying to explain to my
Speaker 1: New York daddy what Dumble was today. He was like,
Speaker 1: what I don't know, do under Manhattan Bridge that son
Speaker 1: for For the films that you've shot in Brooklyn neighborhoods,
Speaker 1: how different are they now? Like they Do the Right
Speaker 1: Thing block? Like what is that now? Is that like attainable?
Speaker 1: It was gentified? So no more black families, no more brown,
Speaker 1: but gentified. I mean Do the Right Thing, which was
Speaker 1: shot in Bedstide dood Died Bethistuveson. But the great thing
Speaker 1: about that New York City that block we shot on,
Speaker 1: we shot do on Thing at one block. The summer,
Speaker 1: that block has been renamed do the Right Thing Way
Speaker 1: as the first time a movie, a song we've ever
Speaker 1: been just named the name after that, so we take queer.
Speaker 1: And that's also where we have our Michael Jackson block
Speaker 1: parties too, on the same block. So is that the
Speaker 1: black wherever is it the office? And it's the office
Speaker 1: is further down downtown. You know my office in Fort Green? Okay?
Speaker 1: So okay, that's not yet. And the place where you
Speaker 1: when I visited your first store, like back in, is
Speaker 1: that still up. That's called Chez paul Lett. Okay, But
Speaker 1: that's the new name of the block or the new name.
Speaker 1: It's a restaurant. But my office is on South Ox
Speaker 1: South Elliott. Where the restaurant is is where the original
Speaker 1: Spice Joint was, Okay, and I own that building too.
Speaker 1: And so when we did Jungle Fever, that's where Halle Berry.
Speaker 1: We're gonna put a plaque there where she stayed. Wow. Wait,
Speaker 1: that's the scene where there's no scene, And that's that's
Speaker 1: just where she while she while she was shooting the film.
Speaker 1: Oh damn, Okay, that's not what scene was up. Let's
Speaker 1: Caliberry's first film too, Jungle Fever, And did she really
Speaker 1: not shower for all those days? And the story wait
Speaker 1: wait wait wait, let's get to that. We could do
Speaker 1: it now? She Uh, Robbie Reid cast that film, and
Speaker 1: so she brought it. Halle Berry came in five times
Speaker 1: m hm, and the role is viving the two lot
Speaker 1: crack hope. And the first four times she was us
Speaker 1: to fun. Finally something must have told her, you can't
Speaker 1: kind of look like this. So she I think she
Speaker 1: didn't bathe for a week and I didn't recognize when
Speaker 1: she stepped in the room and that's how she got
Speaker 1: the park. Wow, I just did not see her. Finally,
Speaker 1: she was the opposite. I did not see it as
Speaker 1: as being a two dollar crack hole. She had an
Speaker 1: awesome she didn't she? So why I mean at a
Speaker 1: time where um were the seventies and the word mobility
Speaker 1: and you know a lot of our uh you know
Speaker 1: the way that black people expressed themselves creatively, usually through
Speaker 1: sports or singing. Right, why did you choose visuals? Why
Speaker 1: did you choose I mean, was it that you had
Speaker 1: a childhoo experience where you saw like Gordon Park Works
Speaker 1: And wasn't it When people ask that question a lot
Speaker 1: and I just say, a film chose me. I grew
Speaker 1: up in a very artistic background. My mother taught us
Speaker 1: great High School Brooklyn Heights called St. Anne's. She taught
Speaker 1: black literature. My father is a great jazz musician, composibility,
Speaker 1: and I just grew up in the very artistic household.
Speaker 1: My mother had the vision, not that she we're gonna
Speaker 1: be artists, but she exposed us, just not just me,
Speaker 1: but all my siblings to the arts. So she was
Speaker 1: dragging me the Broadway plays museums while I was you know,
Speaker 1: and I didn't want to go. We went kicking and screaming.
Speaker 1: Every single time we came home. We we would think
Speaker 1: it because that was that was fun. Well, you're going
Speaker 1: to going to play It's like my mother's one. It
Speaker 1: introduced me to Martin Squorsesey. She took me to see
Speaker 1: mean streets. My father hated movies, I mean love sports.
Speaker 1: So my love of sports comes to my father, my
Speaker 1: love movies comes to my mother. I was my mother's
Speaker 1: movie date. I was gonna ask, how how is one
Speaker 1: film buff before the age of the remote control the
Speaker 1: rewind button. Uh yeah, And just because they had you know,
Speaker 1: we I forgot the word from what we had did
Speaker 1: as that showed old films. So even back in the seventies,
Speaker 1: they would still show oh yeah, yeah, I mean it was.
Speaker 1: But was it film? You are like now, in the weekends,
Speaker 1: I know eleven or twelve movie theaters in New York
Speaker 1: that will show I mean, it's not something hotter, so
Speaker 1: it had the st mark. I'm forgetting the theaters, but
Speaker 1: they were certain theaters. That's all they showed was old films.
Speaker 1: And that's the only where. I mean, this is room
Speaker 1: before DHS. So I mean unless you stayed that, you know,
Speaker 1: watched with the commercials on challenge che Levin. He went
Speaker 1: to these retrospective theaters, but was there film are on
Speaker 1: the level of like, now, you know, I'll buy all
Speaker 1: the Criterion collections stuff and watch the you know, like
Speaker 1: what was that for you? Like what was the director's
Speaker 1: commentary for you? I mean it really seduced you into
Speaker 1: But it wasn't like that. I mean I went to films,
Speaker 1: but I was not a film buff. I didn't want
Speaker 1: to be a filmmaker. I wanted to play a second
Speaker 1: second base for New York Mets. But genetics conspired against
Speaker 1: that second baseman. I didn't have a stone up for
Speaker 1: short stop, but I only played softball. But but here
Speaker 1: here's the story though, And I said to many times.
Speaker 1: Maybe audience hasn't heard it. I went to Morehouse because
Speaker 1: I had to go to Morehouse. My father and grandfather
Speaker 1: went to more House, and my mother and grandma went
Speaker 1: the Spellman across the street, some educated Negroes. My father,
Speaker 1: my father was a fresh and Morehouse. Dr King was
Speaker 1: a senior Morehouse and Dr King's son Mark the thirty
Speaker 1: and our classmates were in the class seventy nine and
Speaker 1: Morehouse also with J. Johnson has to be ahead of
Speaker 1: home security, which we all class surdy nine and Morehouse.
Speaker 1: So my first two years in Morehouse, I was a
Speaker 1: D plus C minors student. It was because I was
Speaker 1: a smart I just was not motivated. And right before
Speaker 1: it's time to go back to New York, back to Brooklyn,
Speaker 1: at the end of myself with me, my advisor told
Speaker 1: me that had to choose a major. I said why,
Speaker 1: and she said, because you've exhausted all the electives. So
Speaker 1: I can't. This is now, this is this key, this
Speaker 1: is this historical because it's twenty years now, It's like
Speaker 1: it's a very important summer twenty years ago, summer seventy seven.
Speaker 1: So I came back to New York and New York
Speaker 1: City was broke. You couldn't get a job. Usually, you know,
Speaker 1: you get a job in a summer. Your newest New
Speaker 1: York City was broke. And it's a famous daily news
Speaker 1: front page. It said Ford, this city drop dead, Ford
Speaker 1: being president Ford. So I had nothing to do all summer,
Speaker 1: and I don't want to, you know, sitting in stupid
Speaker 1: and place dratmatic baseball, you know. And so I have
Speaker 1: a very good friend. The name is Vietta John says.
Speaker 1: She was always smart. The top three height, the top
Speaker 1: three public high schools New York City or Stuyveson, Bronx Science,
Speaker 1: Brooklyn Tech. And so you could take a test depend
Speaker 1: on your grade. The Terriostven's first ron Science, then Brooklyn Tech.
Speaker 1: Brooklyn Tech is on the same block where where of
Speaker 1: course street direct course street from Spikes Joint, on a
Speaker 1: block from my office. Now for you, because on the
Speaker 1: mule anybody went, don't be at this house. She's always
Speaker 1: smart and went to Stuyverson, went to Prince's undergrad Harvard
Speaker 1: Med's school. She always we always, she always knew she
Speaker 1: was gonna be a doctor. So so one day, and
Speaker 1: looking back on this, I understand it was not luck
Speaker 1: it was a spirit. The spirit told me to go
Speaker 1: see yet of that day because I wasn't doing a
Speaker 1: damn ship to do. That goes to be at a
Speaker 1: She lived on her lived on Ashton Place where University
Speaker 1: Towers is right across the street from l I U
Speaker 1: where the field is. And so we're sitting in a
Speaker 1: living room. It is the box in the corner. I say,
Speaker 1: what is that box? He said, that's Super eight camera.
Speaker 1: You can have it. WHOA. And then I say, what's
Speaker 1: another box? She says, stupid, that's the box. That's the
Speaker 1: that's the cartridge for the Super eight film for the camera.
Speaker 1: She says, you don't. I don't need this. I'm gonna
Speaker 1: be I'm you know, um, I'm gonna be a doctor.
Speaker 1: This is his sister. She's she's a doctor in Chicago. Now,
Speaker 1: so now I had something to do. So the entire
Speaker 1: summer nineteen seventy seven, so I didn't have a job.
Speaker 1: I ran around New York City with the Super eight camera.
Speaker 1: It was also one of the hottest summers on record.
Speaker 1: That's why there was a blackout. When Kan hasn't funked up,
Speaker 1: Black folks Puertoricus lost their mind. Gluten like mother, I
Speaker 1: was feeling it, filmed it on, filmed it on on
Speaker 1: Fulter Street in Brooklyn. Also, seventy seven was the first
Speaker 1: summer disco, so all the DJs were hooking up there.
Speaker 1: The wheels are still and to the turn to the
Speaker 1: in the terrible speakers, the street lamps, so I was
Speaker 1: still on the block parties, the dances a hustle. Also
Speaker 1: the film from the documentary, Yeah, yeah, that's where the
Speaker 1: footage comes from. So then we had this maniac called
Speaker 1: psycho David Berkowitz. Steve. Here's the thing that people forget
Speaker 1: about that summer. Black and Puerto Rican people were not
Speaker 1: scared of David Berkowitz because this is this is before Gentification,
Speaker 1: and the motherfucker David Burke was to come into Harlem,
Speaker 1: to come to South Bronx, to come the best side
Speaker 1: door die, he would have been killed. And it's not
Speaker 1: I'm not making fun of us because people lost loved ones.
Speaker 1: But the fact remains Black people Porterbrincos not. We weren't
Speaker 1: worried about Son of Sam. So I had this footage,
Speaker 1: came back to school in the fall and declared my
Speaker 1: major as communications. But Marston had that major, took the
Speaker 1: class from Majors across the street to Clark College Masterfications, Film, TV, radio,
Speaker 1: print journalism. I forget what other thing is. And there's
Speaker 1: a teacher there. He's still teaching that. His name is
Speaker 1: Professor Herbert Eichelberger. Yes, Dr Eichelberg. I went to Clark
Speaker 1: you the Clark Radio TV film. Dr Eichelberger was are
Speaker 1: you see are you senter? So he doctor her Bike
Speaker 1: was still teaching there. He's the one they encouraged me
Speaker 1: to be a filmmaker. He's went. When I talking about
Speaker 1: this foote I had. I took the footage back to
Speaker 1: the Atlanta That's what morals says, but I didn't know
Speaker 1: what I was gonna do with it. He encouraged me
Speaker 1: to make a documentary. That document turned out to be
Speaker 1: Last Hustle in Brooklyn. And there are many times so
Speaker 1: her Dr Eichelberger called Dr e. He had the key
Speaker 1: to the film lab and two or three times a
Speaker 1: week he would stay three four hours so I could
Speaker 1: work on the film. He wasn't getting paid over time either, right,
Speaker 1: And maybe you guys were experiences. In my experience, I've
Speaker 1: talked a lot of people, and anybody talks about that
Speaker 1: one teacher they had that saw something in you. Do
Speaker 1: you even see it? Hurt? Eichelberg was when he says,
Speaker 1: he said, you know what, I started to think about
Speaker 1: the h all this stuff. Then it came back in
Speaker 1: your full circle. My mother's started was taking me the movies.
Speaker 1: I remember my mother taking me. It's his son and
Speaker 1: see motherfucking by Bye Bertie and the opening No people
Speaker 1: noticed the opening credit sequence or do the right thing
Speaker 1: comes from Bye Bye Bie, Margaret that's where she came from.
Speaker 1: Rosie Panz comes from, and Margaret as Athough and Margaret
Speaker 1: she does, that's where it came from. So all these
Speaker 1: things that happened started to spring up again. But my mother,
Speaker 1: God blessed her soul. If you saw crookly know, you
Speaker 1: know my mother died while it was the stopol Morehouse.
Speaker 1: All these things she planted, you know, bore fruit many
Speaker 1: many years later. But I did not want to be
Speaker 1: a filmmaker. That just didn't happen, you know, Speaking of circles,
Speaker 1: I just want to mention real quick, in a strange circle.
Speaker 1: By the time I went to Clark, I believe what
Speaker 1: Bill Nunn was a teacher at Clark Atlanta. I just
Speaker 1: wanted to when he rest rest in peace. So Bill
Speaker 1: Nunn and Sam Jackson morehouse men. But they had graduated
Speaker 1: before me, but they were still in Atlanta doing local
Speaker 1: theater and that's where I met them. They are a
Speaker 1: couple of years ahead of me. So can I ask
Speaker 1: what is I mean now? In my mind? Like Atlanta
Speaker 1: culture became cool mid the late eighties, especially with music
Speaker 1: migration and people coming down there. But what was Atlanta like? Like?
Speaker 1: Were you rolling your eyes up in there? Like was
Speaker 1: anything cooler than New York? Like New York? And I
Speaker 1: can speak with authority if you were if you were
Speaker 1: from New York and you went down south. All of
Speaker 1: these motherfucker's were Bamas Florio has Bamas, and we were
Speaker 1: very arrogant. I understand now they hated us so that
Speaker 1: we get people from New York that confrontation, seeing that
Speaker 1: the KMFC in school days was like a real that
Speaker 1: was typical of well, that really was a New York thing.
Speaker 1: That's more like college students, the local yokels versus the
Speaker 1: real too. Here's the thing though, because it's called they
Speaker 1: called the butter milk the buttermilk bottom. So like even
Speaker 1: us seasonal hood yales in southern cow is in the
Speaker 1: hood yales in the hood. So you had these oasis
Speaker 1: in Columbia before they brought up all motherfucking Harlem not
Speaker 1: so hot either. These real estate motherfuckers they're trying, you know,
Speaker 1: they're trying to change the name of Malcolm X Boulevard
Speaker 1: to read Avenue. What Google happened to d C Already
Speaker 1: our Malcolm X turned to Meridian Hill. They changed the name.
Speaker 1: It's Meridian Hill Malcolm X Park. Nope, actually, are are
Speaker 1: the I lived on Avenue? Pal Yeah? Are our Malcolm
Speaker 1: X Park just changed to we We are now called
Speaker 1: h Walnut Oak Lane. I'm not even west really now
Speaker 1: it's it's they changed the name Walnut Lane. That sh
Speaker 1: ain't happen. And I'm sorry, Harlem. They want to change
Speaker 1: it back to read Avenue. Funk that it's like anything
Speaker 1: possible and gentification land. That's crazy. I'm sorry, but that
Speaker 1: that's crazy. But that's that's that's really the origin how
Speaker 1: I became a filmmaker. Wow, So the camera just basically
Speaker 1: just fell right in your lap. But that was you
Speaker 1: still have that camera? Where's that camera? I don't know,
Speaker 1: But here's the thing, though, do you have to pay
Speaker 1: for it? There's a new museum in Philly, but he
Speaker 1: has the thing. No, did you say if I don't
Speaker 1: think I think that was ordained because I don't think
Speaker 1: there's a mistake. That day I just decided to go
Speaker 1: see Vienna, and that day the Super eight camera was
Speaker 1: just sitting there in the corner, and that career and
Speaker 1: handed you your career, my life, you know what? Side
Speaker 1: note on a on a parallel tip now that I'm
Speaker 1: thinking about it. Spike Lee is also responsible for the
Speaker 1: roots because our story is very similar. Where after my
Speaker 1: audition at the New School and at Juilliard and Terrek
Speaker 1: came up with me to New York for the weekend.
Speaker 1: On our my training ride home back on on on
Speaker 1: Septa from Jersey to back to Philly, a girl walked
Speaker 1: up and thought that I was Chocolate the bucket drummer
Speaker 1: and that levise commercials you did. She thought I was chocolate.
Speaker 1: But it's only because but it's only because I I
Speaker 1: did Boys Demands Motown Philly video and our hair was
Speaker 1: sort of similar, so maybe I knew she meant, are
Speaker 1: you the drummer in the Motown Philly video? But She's like, oh,
Speaker 1: you're in that Spike lead commercial, right, and so we
Speaker 1: were like laughing like yo, man, like because that's that summer,
Speaker 1: Like fame just started a little taste of it, like
Speaker 1: people started recognizing you know, so me and t like
Speaker 1: oh this, this is kind of cool. But it was
Speaker 1: the next day when we were watching Soul Train and
Speaker 1: the commercial came on and it just hit us like eureka,
Speaker 1: Like we look at each other like, yo, wait, why
Speaker 1: do we do that? Let's do that in Philly And
Speaker 1: instantly we got the buckets and like the roots as
Speaker 1: you know, it was born that way. But when Coal
Speaker 1: when You're Levi's commercial came on, it was like, yeah,
Speaker 1: we need to do that. And then we four hours
Speaker 1: later we're on South Street busking and then now I'm
Speaker 1: sitting here with Spike Lee and allergically. Let me get
Speaker 1: this and is that you know a lot of people,
Speaker 1: you know, they tell you whether they like get film
Speaker 1: or not. But the biggest complex ever get it's when
Speaker 1: people of all generations say they went to a black
Speaker 1: school or they went to college because of school. I
Speaker 1: mean when people say that there's nothing better. When they
Speaker 1: said because of that film, motherfucker, are we even think
Speaker 1: about going to school? I didn't even know there there
Speaker 1: were things of black colleges and I didn't know the
Speaker 1: culture was that rich. Like seeing that then I was like, oh,
Speaker 1: like it kind of set off a different world. Who knew? Yeah,
Speaker 1: that was a mistake. That have the people that were
Speaker 1: in the same cast and director. That's right, because it
Speaker 1: was a different world first. That's how we knew it
Speaker 1: was ron and came out first. That's what I meant.
Speaker 1: I think it's the thing though, you know, and I can't.
Speaker 1: I can't fault Bill Cosby. I should have been on it.
Speaker 1: I should have. I just had a different ideal about
Speaker 1: you know, stupid me Miles TV. I'm not gonna do TV.
Speaker 1: And he saw the ideal and he swooped in on it. Wow,
Speaker 1: before we started your film career, how did you? How
Speaker 1: did you gather the months that will be You're in
Speaker 1: a circle, like, how did you meet Ernest Dickerson? How
Speaker 1: did you who? Who's your starting five? Like? Do you
Speaker 1: have the same light people? The same who's the starting lineup? Well?
Speaker 1: After Morehouse, I still knew I did not have enough
Speaker 1: skills as to be a director. Filmmaking the grammar the
Speaker 1: same way you put together a paragraph whatever. This is
Speaker 1: the thing called film grammar. So I applied. I did
Speaker 1: my research, applied to the top three film schools the
Speaker 1: United States America, a f I American Film Institute USC, Silinka,
Speaker 1: all the Trojans, and n y U. To get an
Speaker 1: a f I USC, you had to get an astronomical
Speaker 1: score in the g r E. I took the jury
Speaker 1: and I did not get the astronomical score. They were
Speaker 1: more forward thinking, progressive people thinking people in n YU.
Speaker 1: The grad films could think that what you know, they
Speaker 1: understood the standized testing could be biased. He has not
Speaker 1: to do being a filmmaker, so I didn't have to
Speaker 1: take a test. Applied always do submit have undergrad degree
Speaker 1: and submit your create portfolio. I got in also Ernest
Speaker 1: Dickinson got it. We were in the same class. We
Speaker 1: both from Black School's earning with Ernest with the Howard
Speaker 1: I grew up in New Jersey, so right away we
Speaker 1: hit it to Ernest. Ernest shot all my in Y
Speaker 1: you in Y you Grab films three years so he
Speaker 1: shot my second year film, my thesis film, Joel's Best
Speaker 1: Side Barbershop, which won the student Commy Award and and
Speaker 1: because that film this is key. Ernest shot Joel's best
Speaker 1: side barbershop and that's that's that film got him John
Speaker 1: Sales film Brother Another Planet. So so what was great
Speaker 1: because we always could work together. But it's great that
Speaker 1: Ernest had already shot a feature before we did. She's
Speaker 1: gotta have it, so he has more experience and knowledge.
Speaker 1: So Ernest the DP. My editors Barry Brown, Barry getting
Speaker 1: my first job he had. He he was owner of
Speaker 1: Independent Distribution, first Rount Features at that graduate n y
Speaker 1: U where I was just cleaning films and stuff like that.
Speaker 1: He cut it my father, Billy's composer wyn Thomas from
Speaker 1: Philly production designer Rufe Carter, the great Rufe Carter went
Speaker 1: went went to Hampton. Rufe Carter, Robbie Reid and Ray
Speaker 1: Dowell all were classmates, the same class in Hampton Man
Speaker 1: I did not know that, huh network, So that that
Speaker 1: was for many years. That was the like. That was it.
Speaker 1: So Ernest shot features for me. She could have its
Speaker 1: school days, do the right thing well better. Jungle Thief
Speaker 1: and Malcolm X was the last film real quick and
Speaker 1: Ernest came in to be a director I was gonna
Speaker 1: say he came into the director, but his cinematography was
Speaker 1: so tight that eventually he would become a director by
Speaker 1: being a DP. And so after Malcolm X, his first
Speaker 1: director of film was Juice. So I was right. Now,
Speaker 1: Ernest is the top one of the top episodic TV
Speaker 1: directors everywhere everywhere who decides the nine of it. Like
Speaker 1: I would assume that you know the presidents, the director
Speaker 1: and the vice president is a cinematographer and you you
Speaker 1: got to be married to each other. So I mean,
Speaker 1: how come you guys don't have a thing like Okay,
Speaker 1: we'll do this project and then I'll do cinematography and
Speaker 1: you do directing, or that it was not a cinematographer.
Speaker 1: What's the difference between Yeah, what is DPS to photographed
Speaker 1: the movie? The deepens in to the same thing. Yeah, right,
Speaker 1: but but but there's different, just totally two different. Someday
Speaker 1: are DP directors, but usually it's two different skills sets,
Speaker 1: and Earnest visual sense was so far advanced the mind
Speaker 1: that you know, when there was a question, you know,
Speaker 1: I'd say, we're talking about Spike Lee shot. The idea
Speaker 1: of the Spike Lee shot, you double dollar shot, well,
Speaker 1: not even that I'm talking about first before the dollar shot.
Speaker 1: I'm thinking of a lot of your frames were diagonal.
Speaker 1: That was the only in in do the right thing.
Speaker 1: You had some abstract looking stuff. And it wasn't those
Speaker 1: first He's gotta have it. There was some abstract looking
Speaker 1: Oh I never thought of looking at someone. I definitely
Speaker 1: remember the first time you cameras on the floor, more
Speaker 1: looking up, like making people taller, just things I've never
Speaker 1: seen before. Well like who decides whose idea is that
Speaker 1: it depends? I mean we usually back in early was
Speaker 1: Ernest ideal because his his visual sense so much evance
Speaker 1: in mind Ernest after graduated, Ernest was an architecture major
Speaker 1: at Howard and then he'd come in while you right
Speaker 1: away he was a medical photographer at the hospital. So
Speaker 1: I mean his visual sense was was that's why everybody
Speaker 1: wanted Ernest to shoot their films and why you grab films.
Speaker 1: So what's he the double dolly or was that you?
Speaker 1: We both there was a scene of more better blues
Speaker 1: where we had First of all, we did not invent
Speaker 1: that shot. We just did you first see it or
Speaker 1: was like okay, we gotta do that, and we did it.
Speaker 1: But it wasn't too later we discovered we saw this,
Speaker 1: people have been doing it. I think it was first
Speaker 1: when you were avoiding the thugs and move better. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that was See what was wrong about that? When you
Speaker 1: when we were on a double dollar you really shouldn't move,
Speaker 1: but I was trying to. I didn't We didn't know
Speaker 1: that trying to move like a walking But I had
Speaker 1: a real dumb question, is there as I'm sorry, I
Speaker 1: gotta is there a single dollar shot? Because you're saying
Speaker 1: if you're saying it's you're on one and then the
Speaker 1: cameras on one or no, it's just a it's a
Speaker 1: it's one dollar, but the actress sitting on a diet,
Speaker 1: so therefore we call the double dollars. So you're sitting
Speaker 1: on a store apple box. But here's the thing. Though
Speaker 1: Ernest and I would do it, but finally had we
Speaker 1: had we had a conversation. He said, you know what,
Speaker 1: we're out of film school, so we gotta we got
Speaker 1: to use this. So this shot means something. So example
Speaker 1: where it means something is when the best use probably
Speaker 1: is he's going to the bottom and ball room. And
Speaker 1: the reason why I did that doing research for the film,
Speaker 1: I think very I became very close with Dr Bai
Speaker 1: Sha Bass Malcolm's will, the late Great Dr Bai Sha Bass,
Speaker 1: and she told me she felt that Malcolm knew he
Speaker 1: was gonna be assassinated. We went to my boat that
Speaker 1: he wanted to be a martyr. When she told me that,
Speaker 1: I said, well, how we can convey that? And then
Speaker 1: we said we'll do that. The Double Dolly shot. Another
Speaker 1: example betwenty fifth, after the late Great Philippine moh Hoffman
Speaker 1: kisses and what's her last and kisses kisses the student
Speaker 1: and it was his bathroom and then it's like, oh,
Speaker 1: ship would I do? And that's when he's coming out
Speaker 1: the song Brock. I was gonna ask about that scene
Speaker 1: because that song is just too perfect for that. That
Speaker 1: whole scene was too perfect. Oh what's a about? An
Speaker 1: example Denzil again an inside man where we see what
Speaker 1: we think is all think of one of the hostages
Speaker 1: by Claive Owen's character, but turns out it's fake. But
Speaker 1: Dent's nowhere, so we want to so right then and there,
Speaker 1: and he feels that he's responsible for his hospital shot
Speaker 1: in the head because he roughed up Clive Owen's character.
Speaker 1: So that's when we have him doing that too. Do
Speaker 1: you use it a few times? Yeah, a conversation down
Speaker 1: the street, me and me and me and Wesley. That's
Speaker 1: when I admit that I I spilled the beans. Right,
Speaker 1: Oh yeah too too right right? I told my wife, so, um, befo,
Speaker 1: she's got to have it? Did you? I mean, what's
Speaker 1: how did you learn how to write a screenplay? Well?
Speaker 1: By reading screenplays? I mean we had it. And when
Speaker 1: it's a great film schooling, so that teach us who
Speaker 1: would we would show the film? They will show you
Speaker 1: the film, they will give you the screenplay. So it's
Speaker 1: a great learning experience to read something and see how
Speaker 1: that's directed translate. So that's that's how I shot she's
Speaker 1: having twelve days? Really is your life first to the
Speaker 1: four in the summer to six day weeks? Y? Wow,
Speaker 1: Like I'm trying to do the math in the visual semi. Sorry,
Speaker 1: we're making this a very little interview. And you shot
Speaker 1: one time we had to we having more money. Well,
Speaker 1: I was gonna say, did you Holly wud shuffle it?
Speaker 1: Did you just here's my card? How do you have
Speaker 1: a credit card? You have credit? We are we put
Speaker 1: that film. We really didn't. We approached in the four stages.
Speaker 1: First stage was shoot it. Second, this is film now
Speaker 1: we shot Super sixteen. The second stage would get the
Speaker 1: film out the lab. The third stage was crucial, was
Speaker 1: met half enough money to eat? Why was it? Because
Speaker 1: I edited film? And uh, that was very crucial because
Speaker 1: I was hanging out with the chef. You want the
Speaker 1: chef is che chef Bard, So don't front video that
Speaker 1: was pre pre romin. So I called one of my
Speaker 1: dad's business partners, like when you first started coming on
Speaker 1: the scene, because there was buzz at the same time,
Speaker 1: almost simon sanously about you and Whoope's rise in New
Speaker 1: York with her one woman and showing you're doing film,
Speaker 1: and I remember when I first ever heard of who
Speaker 1: you were. They were trying to describe the fact did
Speaker 1: you have to hustle T shirts or socks or something that, Oh,
Speaker 1: I know you're talking about. What was the story behind that?
Speaker 1: Well that In the trailer for the film, it begins
Speaker 1: with me saying tube socks, tube socks, you goo Google
Speaker 1: google it when I was selling. When I'm not selling
Speaker 1: tube socks, I'm a director, so maybe they okay, I'm
Speaker 1: thinking maybe they was like, yeah, he fronted it selling
Speaker 1: T shirts and two socks. Okay, I see, um, so
Speaker 1: before we get to school days and well, yeah, she's
Speaker 1: got to have it. How did you cast those people?
Speaker 1: Like what was that process? Like? We I put an
Speaker 1: ad in backstage and people standing head shots and it
Speaker 1: was just off the head shots that you you call
Speaker 1: them in and the fine was Tracy Camility and that
Speaker 1: was her in New Jack City or is that an
Speaker 1: urban legend? Okay? And that was the projected were projecting
Speaker 1: scarface on the right and you brought her back in
Speaker 1: when we jumping with you brought her back in. Yeah.
Speaker 1: And also she has a cameo in your Netflix version
Speaker 1: and she's got no Yeah it was on Instagram anyway.
Speaker 1: Yeah it's true. Okay, great, wait, I call him Flash
Speaker 1: from Five Parties. But Melvin, I knew you would you
Speaker 1: want to say, Melvin, listen, do you know this name?
Speaker 1: I was about to say, I've seen him once and
Speaker 1: I think he was doing an adaptation of both characters
Speaker 1: like a one Grand place and yeah, yes serious, this
Speaker 1: was like fifteen years ago. He put both character together
Speaker 1: as a woman show. It's it's it's like a retrospective
Speaker 1: of my history and cinema flash. It's slowly at the
Speaker 1: top instence in two weeks. So yeah, that's when I realized, like, oh,
Speaker 1: you live in Philly. Like it was like the summer
Speaker 1: of ninety four or something like, right when the Fruits
Speaker 1: Versus got started, and he's like, yeah, I'm doing a
Speaker 1: one man show about you know, my career and experiences
Speaker 1: of you know that that sort of thing. So um
Speaker 1: was not long running. The first grand opening, grand closing.
Speaker 1: All right, school days, so many questions can I get
Speaker 1: started on school days? First? The first question of school
Speaker 1: days predate school days by well. So after she's got
Speaker 1: to have it, um mars, Oh I forgot the videos too.
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, um. When you were, I guess, finishing up,
Speaker 1: she's got to have it. You were getting started on
Speaker 1: another movie called The Messenger. No, no, hold on, hold
Speaker 1: on that was legend. No, I got it backwards backwards, Okay.
Speaker 1: After I finished in Yu in the summer in May
Speaker 1: of eighty two, I tried to do a feature film
Speaker 1: called Messenger. We had it was starring Lawrence Fishburne, Jean
Speaker 1: cars Posito. I got involved with the friend of the
Speaker 1: family who said he's gonna finance the film, and uh,
Speaker 1: I got all my classmates, We're gonna shoot this the summer,
Speaker 1: just shoot this summer of eighty four. And the money
Speaker 1: never came. So I had to pull the plug. And
Speaker 1: my name was mud rightfully, so so I had to
Speaker 1: lay low, and I just said to myself, you know,
Speaker 1: I had three years of of being graduate film and yu,
Speaker 1: so I just be able to do a film with
Speaker 1: two or three people speaking, and that turned in that
Speaker 1: She's gonna have. But it was a complete disaster. Did
Speaker 1: you ever try to revisit that project later on the slay?
Speaker 1: It's not really for public consumption, and I just try to,
Speaker 1: like as an ex exercise it extacy. It got it,
Speaker 1: got it. But but here's the thing, though, there's a
Speaker 1: here's the thing I said to the other the other
Speaker 1: day in London, I was gave his speech there. There
Speaker 1: have been so many times in my life where I
Speaker 1: have one ft on the ground and that one foot
Speaker 1: that Spazi Air Jordan's is on the corner, is on
Speaker 1: the ground, but the grounds on the cliff, and that
Speaker 1: next the other foot is about to take that step.
Speaker 1: And as I've been I've I've been blessed because so
Speaker 1: many times, if I have taken another step, they had
Speaker 1: been curtains, and if I have gotten the money for
Speaker 1: made that film, I would not be here because I
Speaker 1: was not. I had people jumping off cars, off roofs.
Speaker 1: I mean, just crazy ship. There's no way I could
Speaker 1: have done it not have been the end of me.
Speaker 1: So it's just it's blessed a lot of times. Though
Speaker 1: we think about this a lot of times. Some ship
Speaker 1: happens and you're like, a ship, this is funked up.
Speaker 1: But in retrospect you said, you know what, I'm glad
Speaker 1: that this is how I think you can resurrect it.
Speaker 1: Similar to Uh, Mario doing bass, make a movie about
Speaker 1: this movie. I think that's the movie, right, she gotta
Speaker 1: have it was at the beginning of the Nike relationships.
Speaker 1: Somebody wanted me to ask you that. Yes and how
Speaker 1: famous story. Two gentlemens who worked for Whydeney Kennedy still
Speaker 1: Nike's agency, Jim Davenport, will Bill Widen Uh. They in Portland,
Speaker 1: they saw the film. They got the ideal to pair
Speaker 1: Michael Jordan my characters. Mars called me up, Sad, want
Speaker 1: to do this. We're shooting thirty five million black and White.
Speaker 1: You play Mars, you could direct. There's one thing, Michael
Speaker 1: Jordan's doesn't know who the funk you are. I've never
Speaker 1: heard of a film. And he's just on a big
Speaker 1: deal with with the Nike and he said, so he
Speaker 1: has director's approval, and so Mike could have gone with
Speaker 1: Bob Graaldy, those big time commercial directors, Joe Picker. I mean,
Speaker 1: these guys are great. And it wasn't until the All
Speaker 1: Star Game in Toronto, which is two years ago. I
Speaker 1: finally got enough. Curse asked Mike. I said, money, why
Speaker 1: did you choose me? Said? You know what he say
Speaker 1: said because you were wearing the sneakers. That's where it started.
Speaker 1: So you had to meet him first. And I mean,
Speaker 1: I mean he made the decision, he was gonna do
Speaker 1: it before I met him. But they yeah, but that's
Speaker 1: why he made that. That's why he'sad to go with
Speaker 1: me and not Joe Picker. He was locking him. You
Speaker 1: would be doing it if you wasn't meeting with them. Crazy.
Speaker 1: You know what, it probably was Mars to take off
Speaker 1: as George was making little to Nola. That's I was
Speaker 1: about to say, Yeah, you were rocking the threes by then, Yeah,
Speaker 1: damn no, those Jordan Ones. Yeah, yeah, do the right thing.
Speaker 1: You're right, trees were bugging out. I was gonna say,
Speaker 1: how did you How did you arrange for the Threes
Speaker 1: to make their debut in that film? Like I bought them?
Speaker 1: Wait they were out by then or just yeah they
Speaker 1: were off the sweite shot Do the Right Things Summer
Speaker 1: eighty eight. Okay, okay, okay, that makes sense. Where you
Speaker 1: keep them slight? What all your shoes all the nights?
Speaker 1: All Jordan's in the vault with the Oscar signed, Game
Speaker 1: War signed, So you I know that you mean by
Speaker 1: this point after the movie you also started making music videos. Um,
Speaker 1: you shot? Why did you shoot a video to White
Speaker 1: Lines when it wasn't a single? Ernst? Ernst and I
Speaker 1: were in film school, okay, and why you videos are
Speaker 1: coming out? So we wanted we did that White Lines did?
Speaker 1: It was on s spec It Siee Robinson commissioned you
Speaker 1: guys to do it. We did on Spec and God
Speaker 1: Rest Her Soul and Joe's Joe Robins. But they were crooks.
Speaker 1: We do this video for White Lines starring Laurence Fishburne.
Speaker 1: Give it to them. They say, we don't want it,
Speaker 1: and then ten years later they put a compilation of
Speaker 1: videos and do you even see the splice marks? It
Speaker 1: wasn't even finished. They put it on the compilation for
Speaker 1: sure record videos once they realized who cloks? What was
Speaker 1: it like shooting Miles? Oh here's the thing? What for
Speaker 1: I haven't seen that? So here's the thing. The Miles
Speaker 1: b Joan. Miles knew my father, so he'd cursed me out.
Speaker 1: He gave me everybody else. He called you the motherfucking
Speaker 1: a second. But we were coolin I know you your pa,
Speaker 1: you know your father's cool, so I'll leave you alone.
Speaker 1: But it was just great. No, I've been very lucky.
Speaker 1: Miles Prince Michael Phillis Hyman from from School Days, School Days?
Speaker 1: Can we go back to Miles real quick? So when
Speaker 1: you saw Miles ahead, um okay, well okay, so were
Speaker 1: you ever inspired to Can there ever be another Miles
Speaker 1: David's movie after there has been one? And ship there
Speaker 1: that wasn't really a Miles Davis. Here's the thing though, Look,
Speaker 1: I respect for Don Cheetle, and I just think that
Speaker 1: there's a thing called taking liberties right, but to event
Speaker 1: I mean he he practically said himself. He had to
Speaker 1: right right that story get fund and to get finance,
Speaker 1: and so the what's my man's name? The writer, what's
Speaker 1: the actor's name? That, and the whole thing about his
Speaker 1: his mass is being stolen that that never happened. M hmm,
Speaker 1: it never happened. I will say, though, and then he could.
Speaker 1: I just said real quick. That's why it pains because
Speaker 1: I worked on Jackie Robinson three years. I worked on
Speaker 1: James Brown for two years. I wanted to do Alite,
Speaker 1: But you can't do another film about Jackie Robinson. You
Speaker 1: can't do nothing film about James because the rights are
Speaker 1: gone that the States sold the rights later they locked up,
Speaker 1: so you can't come behind him double jeopardy like film
Speaker 1: double Jeopardy. I mean, there's multiple incredible hawks. There was
Speaker 1: the greatest. See. The thing is, though, I think you
Speaker 1: got very lucky. You got extremely lucky with Malcolm X
Speaker 1: for Startist. He had a short life, so you know
Speaker 1: him him cutting his life, his life being cut in
Speaker 1: his thirties gives you just enough space to wiggle and
Speaker 1: really tell a meaty story, a three hour story. But
Speaker 1: it's almost like it and your and your vision of
Speaker 1: James Brown, could you get from Augusta, Georgia all the way.
Speaker 1: Could you even get to nineventy four without really cutting corners?
Speaker 1: Because the thing is, okay, the Moles thing with Don
Speaker 1: might have been a little spotty, but at least like
Speaker 1: the fact that they just chose one story. I'd rather
Speaker 1: see a well put together story in the day of
Speaker 1: the life. Look, okay, you're gonna tell a three month
Speaker 1: story about him recovering. But but what you're talking about,
Speaker 1: dough Quest, is that that's direct this vision. Because, for example,
Speaker 1: the reason why I didn't get Jackie Robinson made because
Speaker 1: I wanted to tell this whole story and they just
Speaker 1: wanted the powers to be the gate que just wanted
Speaker 1: I just wanna do it on night he broke the
Speaker 1: you know, the color line. And I just think that
Speaker 1: the say that this one life, I mean this one year.
Speaker 1: How did he get there? You know? And how do
Speaker 1: we know do what we're gonna SHOWTI they testified against
Speaker 1: Paul Robinson, you know that that he was a Republican.
Speaker 1: Damn we missed me. You you leave all that stuff out.
Speaker 1: But again it say, it comes down to the director's vision,
Speaker 1: you know, so who you gotta hurry hip and swooped
Speaker 1: down on before somebody else right now that I was
Speaker 1: ready from Wesley to kill it. Damn, I really wanted.
Speaker 1: I wanted Denzela. Dude, it was an age where he
Speaker 1: could have played Jackie. Yeah. It also I like to
Speaker 1: say something again, this is all respect. However, how can
Speaker 1: brother man go from Jackie Robinson James Brown. I've ever
Speaker 1: seen a picture through from Marshall that was now now
Speaker 1: jack Boseman is playing Marshall. What Google? It's like Google,
Speaker 1: it's coming out when I learned from Nina, right, don't
Speaker 1: you even so? My brondo man think it is Jackie Robinson,
Speaker 1: James Brown, not Thurgood Marshall. M hmm, play man Deela next?
Speaker 1: If anything, I would see what's his name from Empire Philly?
Speaker 1: Uh Mari, No, no Empire if you would ye, no, yeah,
Speaker 1: you know he was third good. Marshall didn't have a
Speaker 1: co Hudson Yo, it was yeah, that was main Della.
Speaker 1: It was yeah, Terence Howard and Jennifer Hudson. They had
Speaker 1: they were winning in Nelson Mandela. We're gonna take care
Speaker 1: of a part to add main. That's the question. How
Speaker 1: can that move five man dollars? Jackie was this a joke? No,
Speaker 1: Jennifer Hudson, Jennifer does she have an accent? Yes, yeah,
Speaker 1: if you want to call it that. And then Terence
Speaker 1: Howard was main della, main della. I don't played this.
Speaker 1: I'm sorry, I'm sorry. That's a real question. How do
Speaker 1: you have five man dealars and one Jackie Robinson or
Speaker 1: one James Brown a state wise spike? How does that work? Comes?
Speaker 1: The state has the power. Like, here's the thing, though,
Speaker 1: you cannot do a film, a biopic about Jimi Hendrix
Speaker 1: and drugs being it. You're not gonna You're not gonna
Speaker 1: get the music. Yeah, you're not gonna. The state will
Speaker 1: not give you the rights to Jimmy Hendricks music. If
Speaker 1: you have drugs in the film, I'm not gonna get it.
Speaker 1: So they just don't want to James movie done right,
Speaker 1: it was one done though music in it? Yes, that's so.
Speaker 1: With Let's go to school, okay, I say, um? With
Speaker 1: Prince recent death, is that something that you thought about
Speaker 1: or you don't? Killy Holland for me documentary, Yes, I cannot.
Speaker 1: I cannot do a feature film about Michael Jackson. Can
Speaker 1: I cannot do a film about Prince especially it's just
Speaker 1: too First of all, it's it's too soon. And then
Speaker 1: who are you going to cast? Who do you think?
Speaker 1: I think Andre Holland would kill it. He was in.
Speaker 1: He was in that showed the nick he was also
Speaker 1: first first movie was Miracle Saint Ana. He was. That's right,
Speaker 1: he was. He's serious. Yeah, and I think Andrea Body
Speaker 1: and he got some super coolers. Oh hell yeah. We'll
Speaker 1: talk about complexion though. Sorry, maybe kind of this old school.
Speaker 1: I think that we just can't discount our pigmentation. But
Speaker 1: Michael Max now close close, they were close. All right.
Speaker 1: I'm putting this out there, Spike, Yes, I'm putting this
Speaker 1: out there. Um. I believe in my heart and hearts.
Speaker 1: And I told this to First time I told this
Speaker 1: to her, she laughed. Second time I told her, she's like, Okay,
Speaker 1: Now I think she hears me. I believe there's an
Speaker 1: oscar waiting for you and for Leslie Jones. If you guys,
Speaker 1: do I Nina Simone proper? I believe she is Nina Simone.
Speaker 1: I see it. I told I think she could pull
Speaker 1: she got that Nina Simone talk about putting on the spot, Okay,
Speaker 1: but I think she could do it. That's it. You
Speaker 1: don't You don't have to say nothing. I'm putting it
Speaker 1: out there, Spike, I believe that Leslie Jones in the
Speaker 1: position she is in Hollywood right now, if the right
Speaker 1: screen prey and the right film you you behind it.
Speaker 1: I believe you too can write each other to Oscar.
Speaker 1: I think I think you two can write each other
Speaker 1: to Oscar Glory and get the proper Nina Simone story.
Speaker 1: Let allow it now. I'm stuck on as a state daughters,
Speaker 1: but her doesn't run a state. They just made Spike
Speaker 1: do a movie. He even thinking, but the state. They'll
Speaker 1: come on out. They didn't like what's her name? Well?
Speaker 1: Who did? Yeah? That's he is not connected like the
Speaker 1: Caretaker had you know, that was his story. He sold
Speaker 1: his story. That happened to have Nina Simon. Actually, after
Speaker 1: that documentary, it's like, come on, I'm sorry, Yeah, back
Speaker 1: back to Prince really quick. Has the estate been in
Speaker 1: contact with you? I guess they're looking for for somebody
Speaker 1: to do the documentary. They have the footage three First
Speaker 1: Avenue Concert where they filmed or where they recorded in
Speaker 1: perfect Rain already told them, okay, well, the audience hasn't
Speaker 1: heard this story. So no, no, I'm just talking to
Speaker 1: you as a friend, like I begged them to go
Speaker 1: to Spike. Yeah, so the not heard from the State. Yeah,
Speaker 1: they're looking for somebody to do a documentary around this
Speaker 1: footage that they have of this concert where they half
Speaker 1: of Purple Rain was recorded. So I think that would
Speaker 1: be perfect for you after the Michael Jackson docks. Yes,
Speaker 1: I would love to see it through you guys. So
Speaker 1: just putting that out there too. And I want to
Speaker 1: thank you for being very helpful with the with off
Speaker 1: the Wall and bad Talk. Man, you're one of my
Speaker 1: favorite storytelling us. It's that but you got you got
Speaker 1: stories to man. Alright, Spike, I have some old footage
Speaker 1: for my bar mitsfied like didn't edit some kind of
Speaker 1: some of my family give the Spilburg. We got another
Speaker 1: music video to talk about what Anita Baker which one
Speaker 1: world beginning in the world because you're selling socks also
Speaker 1: and at the end of that video as well, Yeah,
Speaker 1: we shot at the world famous Apollo soon being called
Speaker 1: the Beacon. Really right, now, what episode? So Mike school Days,
Speaker 1: Yes days was my four years at Morehouse jam packed
Speaker 1: into a homecoming weekend. Yes, it was. Now Okay, I've
Speaker 1: probably watched all of your directed commentaries at least ten
Speaker 1: times each and because Spanish especially well even even the
Speaker 1: Criterion do the right thing, like they're so to me,
Speaker 1: that's better than college and you know you can learn.
Speaker 1: I I listened to directors comments. I mean you learn.
Speaker 1: Just yes for me real quick. One of the most
Speaker 1: important things I ever learned Curis Saw, the great Japanese Stilma.
Speaker 1: Curis Saw was in New York promoting ron and as
Speaker 1: journalists think it's the New York Times Journals asked him, Mr, course,
Speaker 1: you consider one of the greatest filmmakers ever a master
Speaker 1: cinema at your age like eight five a six, don't
Speaker 1: quote me, He said, what else can you learn cinema?
Speaker 1: And course I was said, there's still a universe, a
Speaker 1: center for me to learn. When I read that ship,
Speaker 1: I said, the minute you should not stop learning toil
Speaker 1: you're dead. That's why I learned. And also Rashamone, it's
Speaker 1: really the foundation where she could have it came from
Speaker 1: this film. In that film Roshamone, there's a rape in
Speaker 1: the murder and several people witness it tell their story
Speaker 1: and left up to the audience to decide who's telling
Speaker 1: the truths, Well, she's gonna have You had these three
Speaker 1: men who are who sleep on no and they're telling
Speaker 1: the audience you know what they think about heart, So
Speaker 1: that's where they came from. Are your n y U
Speaker 1: classes similar to this where you break down your filmography
Speaker 1: and you tell the mostly mostly other films. So I
Speaker 1: don't want to be just teaking about myself though, Okay, Okay, now, okay,
Speaker 1: I gotta schooldays cast. I just gotta jump to the
Speaker 1: sceat now. When you were given the director's commentary on
Speaker 1: the infamous, I want to be versus Jiggaboo, the Fight,
Speaker 1: the Greek Show. I mean I was watching it frame
Speaker 1: by frame, And why did you get the cameras running?
Speaker 1: Because that's it was good tell everybody what happened. Okay,
Speaker 1: so basically the story. Okay, So why did you decide
Speaker 1: to separate them? Were it really finances or did you
Speaker 1: have a mastermind that just okay, this mastermind, I'm starting
Speaker 1: School Days. School Days was the first film. A lot
Speaker 1: of people, right, and we can be shooting on location,
Speaker 1: and I really want to keep the friction between the
Speaker 1: two groups, the wannabes and the Jiggaboos because the young
Speaker 1: the first film, I don't want to come too chummy,
Speaker 1: So I made sure that the Wannabes got a better
Speaker 1: hotel and the jigibe has got the less hotel. So
Speaker 1: right then and there, that's where friction they They didn't
Speaker 1: know that they found out the thing. So so the
Speaker 1: culmination of that friction happened during the Greek show, the
Speaker 1: Steps show. As the fellows are coming on stage, Bread
Speaker 1: marks the great great brand from ourselves, grabs t shirt,
Speaker 1: camels head and pushes to his crotch. Oh that's what
Speaker 1: that's what she's doing. It insane when she so when
Speaker 1: the Gamma saw that, didn't was on. So it was
Speaker 1: not suposed to be a fight, I said, Ernest, do
Speaker 1: not turn that mother point, keep rolling, keep rolling at
Speaker 1: world point? How long did that fight? That real last
Speaker 1: fight last until until we ran out of secure? You
Speaker 1: didn't stop it? You were scared that they were like,
Speaker 1: I'm going fucking home. Did you save it for last
Speaker 1: or we We did not call off the We did
Speaker 1: not cut off the camera to the film run out
Speaker 1: of the magazine, So there was more where in the
Speaker 1: shooting schedule was that seem like in the middle of that,
Speaker 1: there was definite bad blood between the two groups. SA
Speaker 1: At what point did you reveal like, ha, ha, okay,
Speaker 1: this is what I really did. Guys before they I
Speaker 1: mean they got regularly, but I didn't make a confession though.
Speaker 1: Did they buy it once they found out or they
Speaker 1: just felt like, oh, you being a cheap motherfucker and
Speaker 1: you like Jasmine guy and nah, they just it really,
Speaker 1: I mean your dark skin, I mean you grew up.
Speaker 1: I mean you grew up with ship before you got
Speaker 1: before you got cast in the film anyway, you know,
Speaker 1: so we just want to play in this whole colouration thing.
Speaker 1: Did you write the chance your eyes a blue but
Speaker 1: you ain't white? I think that was teasing Jasmine that
Speaker 1: that did that, and the gamble that was I was
Speaker 1: a fellas that was rand from our syles. I think,
Speaker 1: say what to the side and was like, Yo, this
Speaker 1: is what we're gonna do. They worked on all those steps.
Speaker 1: They did that stuff themselves. Can't you some of them words?
Speaker 1: Did you come under budget or over budget? I mean
Speaker 1: we're under budget on that one. We're dealing with Columbia.
Speaker 1: It was Columbia Pictures, So dealing with a real uh,
Speaker 1: what do you a real studio? What was there? Because
Speaker 1: I definitely remember, like all Evany and Jet, there was
Speaker 1: like you know, the campus that was more House. As
Speaker 1: I went the Morehouse and at the two weeks, I'm
Speaker 1: a third deration more Morehouse man. At the two weeks
Speaker 1: we kicked off campus. But Clark gave you love, Clark
Speaker 1: gave his love and Morris Brown spell would never let
Speaker 1: us come on camp. Of course not. I'm surprised you're not,
Speaker 1: as you're not Morris Brown which which closed in we
Speaker 1: shot there too. But here's there's the president Morehouse name
Speaker 1: was Howard Gloucester and at the I met with them
Speaker 1: at the kicks off campus and he was mad at
Speaker 1: me and he said, why did you cast that man
Speaker 1: as a president mission college Joe Senica And he said,
Speaker 1: because it looks like a sambo. And he got the situation.
Speaker 1: They got him more so everything that we were depicting
Speaker 1: the film we were making it that he called Joe
Speaker 1: Seneca a sambo. That was a great actor. You're laughing
Speaker 1: too hard. I don't know what a samble the African
Speaker 1: American history and culture, but you can't you can't always
Speaker 1: laugh at that word. Depending on who you're with, whatever,
Speaker 1: I want a right, keep it moving? Alright? How did
Speaker 1: they get help? There's a really good story online about
Speaker 1: uh Marcus talking about the struggle that it was to
Speaker 1: make the butt. Oh yeah, of which I guess well,
Speaker 1: because the thing was it was like the oral history
Speaker 1: of of of the butt. Yeah, that was a good article,
Speaker 1: and I guess the EU guys were sort of like, well,
Speaker 1: you know, we're grateful for the single, but you know
Speaker 1: that wasn't real DC, Go Go, and we wanted to
Speaker 1: show you know what, and Markum was just like, well,
Speaker 1: you guys just do twenty minute jams with really no
Speaker 1: structure and you're based on other people's material. Yes, She's Jez,
Speaker 1: She's falling, known as Chocola City now Vanilla Swirld. It's London.
Speaker 1: It has to be said that, you know, at least
Speaker 1: from a good four or five year films, like very
Speaker 1: iconic story, so true story. The premiere of She's Having
Speaker 1: DC and at the part the U and d C
Speaker 1: excuse me go and EU was the band. Wow, I
Speaker 1: never heard Go Go in my life really, And when
Speaker 1: I went there was I said, oh ship and I
Speaker 1: was still I was writing and She's gonna. I was
Speaker 1: writing School Days at the time. I said, Yo, we
Speaker 1: gotta put we gotta put Eu in the movie. And
Speaker 1: so I knew Marcus through Raymond Jones, the late great
Speaker 1: Raymond Jones, and so crazy thing. I'm a big I
Speaker 1: mean the color scene and she's gonna have as a
Speaker 1: Homers Wizard of Oz. So I said, we gotta put
Speaker 1: this part. And then I go see a Sign of Times.
Speaker 1: You're but Night at the time came out this same
Speaker 1: time day, You're right because I opted to see Sign
Speaker 1: of the Times before my friend want to go to
Speaker 1: School Days. I went to Sign of the Times and
Speaker 1: we told each other about the field. Damn, that's crazy.
Speaker 1: How did you think he must like the balls too? Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean he's been doing it. He did it twice though. Yeah,
Speaker 1: he's doing my chance. I can't remember. I mean, it's
Speaker 1: going to be a beautiful night. Uh that and uh,
Speaker 1: I mean he all throughout eighties six he was That
Speaker 1: was his car response thing like in concert a lot.
Speaker 1: So he just capt it's going to be a beautiful night.
Speaker 1: Yeah too. But questions, but um number one, how long
Speaker 1: was that video shoot? Was it like one day? We
Speaker 1: shot at Brooklyn Tech and did you know at the time,
Speaker 1: because me and my girlfriend were literally just watching this
Speaker 1: video a couple of weeks ago. We were like, yeah,
Speaker 1: we didn't even realize that they were holding up the red,
Speaker 1: black and green flag and the most A lot of
Speaker 1: young people don't even know. I have been at that dance.
Speaker 1: But you're telling what the title should be. Yes, I said,
Speaker 1: I want the storm. He called the Butt and we
Speaker 1: got a dance. My mother's great. I told Marcus the
Speaker 1: name of the song gonna be the Butt, and we
Speaker 1: got to dance and he did the rest. Wow more
Speaker 1: I would have taken production credit, you know everyone else
Speaker 1: did and they didn't even write overduce. So you play
Speaker 1: that part Today'll still get down, Still works, Still works.
Speaker 1: Have a School Days question? Yes, so I understand that
Speaker 1: there was a little tension between you and Titia Campbell's mother.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, did that ever get resolved since or no?
Speaker 1: During the filming of the School Days? Okay, oh yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: it was the song won't be Along Tonight? We thought
Speaker 1: should be the hit with the it was called, but
Speaker 1: she had to be Teacher Cambell. He said, should be
Speaker 1: the race, and she said it should be teaching Campbell
Speaker 1: and the rays. So that was her brief. I thought
Speaker 1: she's met her daughter. Had to lick somebody's part. She
Speaker 1: at that. I swear to God, if Teacher camp walk
Speaker 1: through now she was cursed every time. She was like, hey,
Speaker 1: you spiking. Even today I came out, Okay, how you
Speaker 1: know that? I will say that. I mean, second, I'm
Speaker 1: through purporing away your love scenes in your field. That's
Speaker 1: the raising why Teacher to Campbell she wouldn't do a
Speaker 1: sex scene, so that was the sexy she was gonna get.
Speaker 1: So I had to come on. I had to think
Speaker 1: of something freaky. So I said, when you gotta increasing
Speaker 1: this head. She would not do a love scene. I
Speaker 1: want to do it, So I said, all right, and
Speaker 1: you gotta lick the part in Big Bro on my teeth. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and that made it worse. I will tell you though,
Speaker 1: that's like, yeah, that's upside down. Spider Man kiss for
Speaker 1: black people, the knickcap again that Rachel's sexty scene was
Speaker 1: also nice. With mother on my team, it was beautiful
Speaker 1: and just remember it in my head. Oh yeah yeah,
Speaker 1: Steve one, uh my man, keep John keep so only
Speaker 1: can be me? Oh that song right there, you know
Speaker 1: Stevies saying my winning my wife come out really about
Speaker 1: that ripping to the sky. Wow, we're still married to
Speaker 1: Riverside Church. Alright, we had another moment. You have another vote.
Speaker 1: Now you keep John back on do the right thing?
Speaker 1: Why don't we try joint? I love that record. All right,
Speaker 1: let's let's move. Maybe we'll get the six movies. Let's
Speaker 1: you also note that the first time Ozzie Davis was
Speaker 1: introduced into okay, I just because Dennis, I'm getting because
Speaker 1: the crew start, Yes, we'll have a lot of regret,
Speaker 1: regret question why didn't we ask, Okay, do the right thing? Um?
Speaker 1: That's the perfect First of all, thank you Spike, because Okay,
Speaker 1: Okay hate being that guy that can predict his own questions.
Speaker 1: We had the Crystal Ball and that felt We talked
Speaker 1: about global warming. I mean I was gonna say I
Speaker 1: showed Yeah, I showed that. I showed that movie to
Speaker 1: my son, my eleving role. This was like literally like
Speaker 1: a month though, because because when that came out, I
Speaker 1: was I think I'm the same age. I was like ten,
Speaker 1: so he's eleven. I was like, I'm gonna show you
Speaker 1: this movie. That movie and the thing I've always liked
Speaker 1: about all your stuff. I saw him as a kid,
Speaker 1: and it's like it's one thing, but seeing it as
Speaker 1: an adult has a completely different meaning. And I would say,
Speaker 1: to do the right thing is one movie where it
Speaker 1: is almost more relevant now than it was when it
Speaker 1: came out. And I mean even like and this and
Speaker 1: the thing that I thought was so brilliant about it
Speaker 1: even watching it, you know now it's like it is
Speaker 1: ah because I've watched it and I made him write
Speaker 1: an essay and simple the only question was yeah. So
Speaker 1: the question was you know, do you think Mookie did
Speaker 1: the right thing? And there is no right or wrong
Speaker 1: answer to that question. You could argue with a million
Speaker 1: different ways. And so to answer your question, though, thank
Speaker 1: you for showing your son at early age, at that
Speaker 1: age the film. But no black person has ever asked
Speaker 1: me why didn't movie throw the garbage can through the window?
Speaker 1: Only white people asked me. Not one single black pers
Speaker 1: ever asked me why did Mookie throw the garbage can
Speaker 1: through the window. A matter of fact, I still pay Bill,
Speaker 1: still pay Steve that way. Was this movie the first time?
Speaker 1: Did you had people in mind for characters or did
Speaker 1: you still just know I had I mean the film Messenger,
Speaker 1: which the uncle never happened. It was school was supposed
Speaker 1: to start John Carlo and Fishburn, So I mean, I
Speaker 1: knew had to put in a film after the success
Speaker 1: of She's Gonna Happen because he Fishburn turned on the
Speaker 1: roll RD around him. He didn't want to do it.
Speaker 1: He said, no, I can't like I'm shooting The King
Speaker 1: of New York or I don't like it and like
Speaker 1: the role Bill none Size made it like, Yeah, he
Speaker 1: definitely wasn't truth that Danny A Yellow didn't want to
Speaker 1: take picks with Chuck d for press. I never heard
Speaker 1: what I've never heard of. I never DeNiro. I wanted
Speaker 1: robbed There'll do it? What he didn't want to do it? Wow?
Speaker 1: But it turned up. Yeah, it would have been. Here's
Speaker 1: the thing though, with The Narrow when the great actors
Speaker 1: ever but would have kept it would have tipped the scale.
Speaker 1: Would have been a Robbing the Narrow movie instead of
Speaker 1: an ensemble piece. So okay for starters as and I
Speaker 1: was saying that I hate the fact that I can
Speaker 1: predict all these episodes the Quest Love Supreme, because I
Speaker 1: can't go an episode without mentioning soul Train and my
Speaker 1: my nolgeable wisdom of it. But you know, for the longest,
Speaker 1: I never knew what Rosie Perez's name was because you know,
Speaker 1: they don't give the names of the she. I mean,
Speaker 1: she did a scramble board once, but you know, I
Speaker 1: didn't realize that until like much later, like four or
Speaker 1: five years ago. There, Oh, there's Rosie Perez. So just
Speaker 1: for the longest, it was like me and my best
Speaker 1: friend in school was like our girl because even on
Speaker 1: soul Train, she was a star And it wasn't like
Speaker 1: going in the puberty or whatever, like, oh my god,
Speaker 1: who's this woman? Dad? It's just that she stuck out,
Speaker 1: literally got I got a story more than so, how
Speaker 1: did you discuss? Ever, that's two stories, rosy stories. So
Speaker 1: again it comes back to school days. School days? Is
Speaker 1: it hit? Mhm h. The butt is number one song
Speaker 1: R and B. So I'm having a birthday party in
Speaker 1: l A. I forgot funky. It was named the club
Speaker 1: Funky Something. Anyway, I'm holling you guys. Anyway, So the
Speaker 1: club is called Funky Something and EU we fly EU
Speaker 1: to l A for the party, and so we had
Speaker 1: a butt contest, but dance contests and this woman is
Speaker 1: on speaker dancing roll. She says that she was screaming,
Speaker 1: saying that this is sexist something else, but that she
Speaker 1: was dancing. M hmm. He wasn't doing that stuff is
Speaker 1: just the truth. And so I tell security to get
Speaker 1: this lady off the speaker because she's gonna fall and
Speaker 1: break her neck. So bring her down, and she starts
Speaker 1: to curse me out. I've never heard this. U. I
Speaker 1: knew she was Puerto Rican, but the way that I
Speaker 1: never everybody speaks like my motherfucking life. So I said,
Speaker 1: where are you from? This is Brooklyn, So I'm from Brooklyn.
Speaker 1: So where you from? I said, what name is just four?
Speaker 1: I live for Green and I was writing do the
Speaker 1: right thing at the time. At that moment, I said,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna make Mookie's girl from Puerto Rican. Mhm God.
Speaker 1: At that point, did you know you were gonna pay
Speaker 1: a Mookie? Oh? Yeah, yeah, but I knew, But I said,
Speaker 1: she has to be. I mean, she had the audition,
Speaker 1: but I still knew that that she was going to
Speaker 1: be played Mookie's girlfriend Tina. That's the real story that
Speaker 1: a star was born. I knew that. I knew that
Speaker 1: she was gonna be great in this role. I did not.
Speaker 1: I cannot predict you'd be great as Mookie's girlfriend. But
Speaker 1: at that point, you didn't say, like, oh, this is
Speaker 1: an Oscar caliber actress and she herself and we never
Speaker 1: talked about oscars. That's not there. I mean, we don't
Speaker 1: talk about that stuff. Well, not that, but when you
Speaker 1: see new talent that but I don't a lot of
Speaker 1: times people first films are yours. But I don't say
Speaker 1: she's going to Oscar. I don't do that. So do
Speaker 1: you direct? Like, are you the director that will? You know?
Speaker 1: I know something? Uh, what's his name? Who directed seven
Speaker 1: and Fish so Fincher, especially on House of Cars. Like
Speaker 1: his episode of House of Cars, he's been known to
Speaker 1: do fifteen, sixteen, seventeen takes knowing that the last three
Speaker 1: are finally going to be what he wants that seventy
Speaker 1: takes for you know, Oh yeah, I've heard that. Yeah,
Speaker 1: he'll he'll spend. First of all, I don't have I
Speaker 1: never had the budget to do that. We gotta go
Speaker 1: and he doesn't need I mean, so you're saying that
Speaker 1: riot scene was shot in one shot? You had one
Speaker 1: shot that just know it was like two nights we had,
Speaker 1: you had the right and you had excuse me, you
Speaker 1: had the when the fire trucks coming, the war and
Speaker 1: stuff like that. So for something in that tense, especially
Speaker 1: when you are with multiple cameras and that sort of thing,
Speaker 1: I know, there's a moment where it's like, you know, okay,
Speaker 1: cut and then Carl it's like okay, so everything is
Speaker 1: like do characters break now? I know forgotten Gan Carlos
Speaker 1: Posito said that because of the correct teach me, Jean Carlo, okay,
Speaker 1: take to keep it. My father gian Carlo, Giancarlo Porsito.
Speaker 1: So he he mentioned um that during the filming that
Speaker 1: him and Danny did some bonding because of their Italian connection,
Speaker 1: talk to each other Italian his his father's Italian right,
Speaker 1: and then there was Italian America. There was a scene
Speaker 1: well during that scene, uh where the radio gets beaten
Speaker 1: finally you know baba. Yeah. I think initially Danny decided
Speaker 1: to curse amount in Italian and said something two Sean Carlo.
Speaker 1: That really just infuriated him. And even when you yell cut,
Speaker 1: he was just like that. That ain't that. I never
Speaker 1: heard that stoke. What I would tell you is that
Speaker 1: there were certain words that people don't want to say.
Speaker 1: And so we Yet when when John the scene where
Speaker 1: Danny has the bat end the close of him, Giancarlo
Speaker 1: and Bill Nunn would stand on the side of the
Speaker 1: camera and they were, you know, going exchanging and what
Speaker 1: Giancarlo called him a fact getting bastard. That's when Danny exploded.
Speaker 1: Also was Danny that was upset. He was upset, but
Speaker 1: he don't like to be called fact getting bastard. And
Speaker 1: the fact that it wasn't in the script. Oh, I
Speaker 1: mean that that you're off script by then you just
Speaker 1: just go, you know, just say the worst things you
Speaker 1: could say. So you have a lot of old script moments.
Speaker 1: So in your screen plays it's just like you know,
Speaker 1: we'll we'll improvise. No, you don't write improvise, but you
Speaker 1: know that it comes in rehearsal. You start, you see
Speaker 1: where we can improvise there. So here's the thing though,
Speaker 1: not everybody can improvise, so you have to know who
Speaker 1: can do it who can't, and you work on improvisation.
Speaker 1: Improvisation during uh rehearsal and heated moments, people gonna get
Speaker 1: off script because it's really emotional and you're not really
Speaker 1: worried about it. This exact, exact words that are that
Speaker 1: are scripted. But at the table okay, so at the
Speaker 1: table read through, are they as heated as it will be?
Speaker 1: Because I don't do that worry to me. I don't
Speaker 1: want acting at it at a read through, I just
Speaker 1: want to hear the words. I tell nobody act, just
Speaker 1: read the words. Because except for auditions, where when you
Speaker 1: when you audition people only getting you're not this in
Speaker 1: the whole film. You're just different scenes. So if the
Speaker 1: read there was the first time you get to hear
Speaker 1: the words, it is entirely This is a strange phenomenon
Speaker 1: reading the script. It's not the same as act as
Speaker 1: saying the word. And so many times you might think
Speaker 1: that you wrote something that's good, but her active reason
Speaker 1: it's like, oh, ship, I gotta change that. So during
Speaker 1: my read through, I'm re writing, I'm I gotta keep
Speaker 1: up because like, well I'm crossing ship out. We gotta
Speaker 1: change you gotta change that, gonna change this. How could
Speaker 1: have an improv improper was Robin harris Man Sweetig Willie.
Speaker 1: Here's the thing Robin was at this. I forgot the
Speaker 1: name of the club, but Robbie read told me again
Speaker 1: to casting. Dirick said, you gotta see this guy Robin
Speaker 1: in l A. So this club the club to go
Speaker 1: to the to go to the bathroom, you got to
Speaker 1: go up the stairs next to the stage. In the
Speaker 1: back of the club. Robin Harris had a guy with
Speaker 1: a spotlight. He was he like this snapper fingers a
Speaker 1: point and I was there one night. Robin Harris tore
Speaker 1: Mike Tyson up. Mike Tys with I mean, you read
Speaker 1: a piss of your pants. You have to walk past
Speaker 1: Robin on the stage to go to the back. I mean,
Speaker 1: no better blues. I know we're jumping ahead. Even if
Speaker 1: you weren't working, if you act, you don't working that day,
Speaker 1: but you saw Robin Harris was on the call sheet,
Speaker 1: you would come. You will be there. He would remember.
Speaker 1: He told Denzel, He said, Denzel, you hit things like
Speaker 1: the question mark. I mean, I'm thinking that whole scene
Speaker 1: when they at the party and he just fucking with
Speaker 1: everybody likes that, you know, the whole thing. I mean,
Speaker 1: I mean, he a great, great law those all lips.
Speaker 1: I mean, people like that. You just gotta let him go.
Speaker 1: That's like, that's like Jordan's Get Green Light, Green Light.
Speaker 1: So by this point, when you're established, um, are you
Speaker 1: putting pressure on Robbie to find you the next unused
Speaker 1: Jim Town? Is she going to theaters? It wasn't pressure
Speaker 1: because we always stash away a couple of roles. But
Speaker 1: are they you know? Does does Martin Lawrence know? Oh
Speaker 1: there's an audition for Do the Right Thing? Or is
Speaker 1: it Robbie found Robbie. Do the Right Thing was Rody
Speaker 1: Prayer's first film, Rob Hash's first film, Lawrence film Rob
Speaker 1: Robbie found me. I didn't know these people. I know,
Speaker 1: I mean I found Rosie, but the other people I
Speaker 1: didn't know. Also, as you're building your actors squad, it
Speaker 1: seems like it's harder and harder to get to get
Speaker 1: for other actors to get in right because like by
Speaker 1: now you said you already had Giancarlo, you already had
Speaker 1: Bill None, you already had Can we talk about the
Speaker 1: tutoral relationship? Well, I was gonna go there, like how
Speaker 1: hard is it for your white actors two, especially especially
Speaker 1: in Jungle Fever? How they were at the Silverda Shop
Speaker 1: Like how and I know about the controversy of better
Speaker 1: Blues with you between the club owners more Josh Flappers
Speaker 1: played by Nick and John Deturo. Yes, how to write
Speaker 1: that down? Don't get it? So I want to talk
Speaker 1: about that. But no, No, that's the thing. It's like,
Speaker 1: how do you convey to them what the character is
Speaker 1: without saying like, Okay, well you're going to be the
Speaker 1: villain or you know, play it to the hilt, or like,
Speaker 1: I mean, how do you Here's the thing though, the
Speaker 1: white actors that I've worked with, great human beings. These
Speaker 1: are people artists and understand that their history and they're
Speaker 1: cool planet because it's not like we're making it up.
Speaker 1: But was there ever any indifference to or not indifference
Speaker 1: or objections to Okay, well you know who? Who? Where
Speaker 1: did you find that? What are waste? Guys? The two cops,
Speaker 1: the cops that killed Radio were also in fever. One
Speaker 1: is Dannielle little son. Which one the one is not
Speaker 1: Hispanic taller one? Oh what are waste? That's what's his name?
Speaker 1: I was? I knew that, Miguel Sandoval, Yeah, I knew
Speaker 1: that name. The no, the taller one, like the red
Speaker 1: on here that's Daniel's son. He's the woman. Yeah, ah man.
Speaker 1: But here's the thing though, is that people dig my work.
Speaker 1: They understand it, and then there they're there. They're great parts.
Speaker 1: In fact, John the Turtle used to say, Man, you know,
Speaker 1: Spike Man. I don't know when this before the Throne
Speaker 1: came out as a Spike Man. I ride the subway.
Speaker 1: He would say, Spike, the brothers come to me, give
Speaker 1: me that. They say, yo yo, yo, yo yo. So
Speaker 1: they loved the Turtle. Yo, you messed it up so good.
Speaker 1: I don't know what they are. I was like, wait,
Speaker 1: are you Jewish? Are you telling you sister too? I
Speaker 1: eat it too. I'm like, I don't. But here's the
Speaker 1: thing though, when up more better claim came out, I
Speaker 1: was accused of being antisi the Jewish Defense League a
Speaker 1: d L. So my lawyer at the time, he told me, says, Spike,
Speaker 1: this serious, this is this is the truth. He says, Spike,
Speaker 1: if you want to continue work in Hollywood, you have
Speaker 1: to write an op ed piece for New York Times
Speaker 1: saying why you're not Semitic. I know it's not fair,
Speaker 1: but you want to continue to work in this industry.
Speaker 1: And I wrote it. You could google it. I wish
Speaker 1: we had that kind of protection. Google it I had.
Speaker 1: He you know, he was Jewish. He died, but he said, Spike,
Speaker 1: you know you're a great filmmaker. I care for you.
Speaker 1: But if you don't write this outbed piece saying you're
Speaker 1: not anti Semitic, when you're done, you're done. Wow. Wait on,
Speaker 1: I'm forgetting the most important character into the right thing
Speaker 1: is the song, fight the power. I'm about to move one.
Speaker 1: How did you you know, like when you're growing up
Speaker 1: in the era, you just hear great music all the time,
Speaker 1: like you think like a cat like Prince will just
Speaker 1: you know, eat breathing ship, great songs and hits. But
Speaker 1: now that I realized that it takes a craft and
Speaker 1: and and and really a steady hand to to do
Speaker 1: perfection getting I'm asking a group to give you an anthem.
Speaker 1: I mean, that's some that's some hard as ship to do.
Speaker 1: And what's weird is that I guess later years when
Speaker 1: I've heard outtakes from songs that didn't make Nation a millions,
Speaker 1: and you know there's like five or six or seven
Speaker 1: other publicanmy related joints that where where can I hear those?
Speaker 1: Where does he get his stuff? He's hearing ship? Like? Look, man,
Speaker 1: by this point everyone knows that I'm the student. Like
Speaker 1: if I came off as a chisty guy that just
Speaker 1: you know, leaked the ship online and bootleg that ship,
Speaker 1: that a testament to people know that I just generally
Speaker 1: want to know stuff. And yes, you're a student of
Speaker 1: the music, I'll share with you. Bill. I'm sorry I
Speaker 1: didn't know anyway. So the point is that when I
Speaker 1: heard the other songs, I was like, wow, Like okay,
Speaker 1: so Public Enemy did have some misses. They had some
Speaker 1: misses with their with their hits, the songs that really resonated,
Speaker 1: and the songs that were like Okay, I'm glad they
Speaker 1: kept this off the record. Yeah, but you could do it. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but I'm now I'm just saying that the the the
Speaker 1: I mean, the likelihood of them having five major life
Speaker 1: changing songs in a row is some rare ship. And
Speaker 1: the fourth one of their you know, of their of
Speaker 1: their cannon being fight the Power, the first revel without
Speaker 1: a pause to me bring the noise. Uh don't believe
Speaker 1: hut or uh don't believe that it was necessary. I
Speaker 1: feel like bass Heads. I feel like bass Heads is
Speaker 1: just insane. At the time that it came out, it
Speaker 1: was just unlike anything we ever heard before uh, then
Speaker 1: the fourth being Fight the Power, and the last being uh,
Speaker 1: welcome to the terrib So when how many songs did
Speaker 1: they submit? Do they submit other songs that they just said, like,
Speaker 1: this is your song, Well, here's a story. Hit me.
Speaker 1: I knew, I knew that I need an anthem because
Speaker 1: every script, every time Radar Raheem appears on screen, he's
Speaker 1: gonna have a song blasting m hm. So every time
Speaker 1: he seem a song to be blast and so that
Speaker 1: ship gotta be hitting, and knowing the tone, I knew
Speaker 1: it had to be public enemy. So the first Fight
Speaker 1: the Power was the second submission. Aha, there we go.
Speaker 1: Have we heard the first one? No, I don't. I
Speaker 1: don't even see you don't want to play it safe
Speaker 1: in the summer radio like and to be like, okay,
Speaker 1: without a pause, we'll just stick to this or and
Speaker 1: I wanted a new song and the first one wasn't hitting,
Speaker 1: wasn't it? But it wasn't their fault because we didn't
Speaker 1: we didn't. We weren't at a point where we could
Speaker 1: show them the film. Okay, so earlier they didn't see anything.
Speaker 1: I just I just didn't have a script. I guess
Speaker 1: sending to Bill Stepney because Bill Stepnie living for Green.
Speaker 1: So I called him up. I got my bike roll
Speaker 1: four or five blocks. Here's the script. Boom he he.
Speaker 1: He knows that he remembers more of the story than anybody,
Speaker 1: Bill Stepney, So you just try to get his his
Speaker 1: his saying it. But but the second But we got
Speaker 1: to a point where we could show him something. I
Speaker 1: don't know we showed him a clip or the whole film.
Speaker 1: But once I saw that, Hank Shockley them, guys, do
Speaker 1: you remember what your place for song was that? Do
Speaker 1: you use your placeholder song? Yeah? That you used before
Speaker 1: you got there? You mean, like, what do you called
Speaker 1: temp music? We have it? We don't have any temp music?
Speaker 1: Oh exactly. So because I knew that there's a thing
Speaker 1: called temp love demis. That's so I don't want I
Speaker 1: don't want to contaminate my INSI I mean, I knew
Speaker 1: it was music is I don't have to take it.
Speaker 1: When I heard Fight the Power for the first time,
Speaker 1: what was that? Like? Man, I said, thank you Jesus,
Speaker 1: because this was the whole It summed up the whole
Speaker 1: motherfucking movie. And you asked for none of that. You
Speaker 1: didn't asked for Elvis, John Wayne, none of that ship
Speaker 1: like you just another do it that? Did you name
Speaker 1: the song and say I need a song called Fight
Speaker 1: the Power? Or no? They got five brothers, but I did.
Speaker 1: All I said was I need an anthem. That's a
Speaker 1: tall order, Spike, and that's why what the public m Okay,
Speaker 1: the pizza Rea that burnt down the fire which I
Speaker 1: assume that you burnt it down for real? How did
Speaker 1: y'all control that since you weren't on a studio like
Speaker 1: what stopping from spreading to have the fire departments there? Okay,
Speaker 1: but the fire department that was in the film fire
Speaker 1: department that's weird. Okay. But that that song, I mean
Speaker 1: sometimes I don't I can't even can you imagine do
Speaker 1: the Right Thing without Fight the Power. It's not the
Speaker 1: same movie. It's not the same as another character in
Speaker 1: the movie movie. I mean, but that it was a gift.
Speaker 1: It's a gift from God. That's that's all I mean.
Speaker 1: You You should ask Chuck and those guys, you know,
Speaker 1: their their their version. Eventually I'll get to that. Yeah yeah.
Speaker 1: Oh side note, um Spikes film inspired do the Right
Speaker 1: Thing inspired? Uh? The song that was originally the roots
Speaker 1: before Scott Storge gave it to his girlfriend Little Kim,
Speaker 1: the song that will eventually be Lighters Up. Well, when
Speaker 1: we got to the studio, um do the Right thing
Speaker 1: was on television and uh, Samuel Jackson was senior ladder
Speaker 1: lef Daddy and he was doing road Call. And when
Speaker 1: I heard that drum be the time, I said, I
Speaker 1: want to remake that sit and so I remade it,
Speaker 1: and my father see Scott starts. I remade dude, and
Speaker 1: Scott did the piano and then here's here's the crazy ship.
Speaker 1: Tarik stayed by to to write the first verse. This
Speaker 1: is gonna be like the first thing off tipping point. Uh.
Speaker 1: And then Scott was like, we're going to somebody's birthday party.
Speaker 1: I didn't realize that. That night is when I had
Speaker 1: dinner with O. J. Simpson. Long story of that night,
Speaker 1: and that was the first time literally we made that beat.
Speaker 1: And then we went to some friends of ours birthday
Speaker 1: party and and O J and Busta Rhymes and me
Speaker 1: and Scott Starts sitting at the small kid small kids
Speaker 1: stay able At the Thanksgiving it was very and we
Speaker 1: were like the four black people there, so we just
Speaker 1: sat at the small table all I got would say
Speaker 1: was that he he said that, um that you know
Speaker 1: the way that the rappers, uh, the way that Bob
Speaker 1: Dylan Uh. And and was it Patti Smith, Um, you
Speaker 1: know Champion Hurricane Carter that us US rappers need to chamon. Yes,
Speaker 1: very surreal night. Anyway, Thank you Spike who boo boo
Speaker 1: boo Boa Ladies and gentlemen. I hope you enjoyed that
Speaker 1: encore presentation of Spike Lee's interview on QLs Classic. Uh,
Speaker 1: stay tuned for next go round when we asked more
Speaker 1: questions about his history behind the count. Spike Lee Part
Speaker 1: two come out next QLs Classic What's Love Supreme As
Speaker 1: a production of My Heart Radio. This classic episode was
Speaker 1: produced by the team at Padora. For more podcasts for
Speaker 1: my heart Radio, visit the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts,
Speaker 1: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.