September 9, 2025 • 37 mins
Today on The Breakfast Club, R.T. Thorne & Danielle Deadwyler On Black Storytelling, Independence, '40 Acres' Film. Listen For More!
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Don't know every day waiting clicks up the breakfast Club.
You're finish for y'all done morning.
Speaker 2 (00:07):
Everybody is the dj n V Jess Hilarious, Chelamage, the
guy we are the breakfast Club. Lola Rosa is here
as well. We got some special guests in the building.
We have Danielle did Willer Welcome, good morning, and we have.
Speaker 3 (00:19):
Artie Throwing Welcome brother, thank you.
Speaker 2 (00:21):
How are you feeling this morning? How y'all both feeling
this morning?
Speaker 4 (00:23):
Beautiful?
Speaker 1 (00:24):
Really great?
Speaker 4 (00:25):
We're happy to be together.
Speaker 5 (00:26):
Yeah, you know, I know y'all here to talk about
forty acres, but I gotta tell you a phenomenal job.
Speaker 1 (00:30):
Until phenomenal job, until you know.
Speaker 5 (00:34):
I always wondered about that role because it tells one
of history's most painful stories.
Speaker 1 (00:41):
How did you prepare emotionally for that role.
Speaker 4 (00:46):
The way I prevaire for anything. It's rigorous research. I
just grew up in Atlanta, and so the civil rights
community uh in Atlanta has reared me. I did you know,
volunteers and with the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. As a
kid went to Cascade United Methodist Church, which doctor Reverend Lowry,
(01:08):
who partnered with doctor Martin Luther King at the time
during that you know, pivotal time. You know, those are
people who are critical in defining my life and understanding
of society and community and so all of that kind
of like that intuitive uh personal history as well as uh,
you know, academic knowledge and history about that the era
(01:30):
went into creating that, that that role, and and and
just staying rigorous with the relationships with Chenoya who directed it,
and and and the family and just it's been such
a palpable thing for me.
Speaker 5 (01:44):
Once you tap into a role like that, like playing
the mother of em til, how do you get that
out of?
Speaker 1 (01:50):
How do you just go down?
Speaker 4 (01:51):
I don't know anything. Uh. That that is visceral like
that that stays with you. It's a wounded scar of
sorts and you walk with it. And I mean that's
the beauty of it, right, Like I get to talk
about this all the time. I get to talk the
history of the work and how it's supposed to have
this residual effect, this kind of echo, and it'll be
(02:12):
in conversation with any work that I do moving forward.
So I'm curating in that capacity.
Speaker 2 (02:16):
I wanted to go back, if you don't mind, I
wanted to what made you want to be an actress? Like,
what was the thing? What did you see on television?
What play did you go see? What did your mom?
And still you say, this is what I want to do.
Speaker 4 (02:26):
No, it's just been in my life. I've been acting
and performing since I was a child. My mom made
sure that myself and my siblings were always a part
of arts oriented things. Atlanta, Black Atlanta, black arts Atlanta
in the eighties is just pivotal, right. So I started
in dance and naturally segued into theater through critical cultural
(02:47):
markers in the city, Total Dance Theater, Gary Harrison Studios,
saw Jamandi productions all the time. I grew up as
a Kenny Leon's True Colors Theater Company young artists. So
this has just been which it should be right for children,
it should be for people in general. The arts is
just a part of our lives. It came a critical
(03:08):
moment after academic pursuits that oh, I'm missing something and
I had to return. And so one of the first
things that I did when I was making the professional
return was for Colored Girls and Jasmine God directed it,
and so it just bushed from there.
Speaker 5 (03:24):
Oh, oh, this is a question for both of y'all right,
because you know, going back to the Till thing a
little bit, but also talking about forty eight is what
did Till teach you about the responsibility of storytelling.
Speaker 4 (03:35):
I don't know if Till taught me that responsibility. I
think it's just always been present. Our history is integral,
Our history is just it's a brilliant thing that's a
part of everything that I do, everything that we do,
and which is the way that it works in forty right,
(03:58):
like she is teaching children not just about how to survive,
but how to uh synthesize history, with culture, with agriculture,
with you know, all of the qualities of life. Is
the spherical thing. Everything is connected.
Speaker 3 (04:15):
Yeah, they're they're they're roots of survival. In the film,
it's not just rooted in you know, they can kick
some ass, they've got military might, but the important thing
is is that it's rooted in their their preservation of
their culture, you know what I mean, that's also surviving
for them. And it's very much That's why in the film,
it's like you see the family, they're all about their
(04:40):
their culture, their their history. Like the book reports that
she gets them to indeed, you have to know yourself
as you're surviving, as you're moving forward, because you're the
only ones that are going to do that. It's you know,
the the language that they have, you know what I mean, Galen,
the father's passing down his language, the agricultural practices, it's
all rooted in their history. And that's how this family
(05:00):
is truly surviving in the future.
Speaker 4 (05:03):
And yeah, they're truly joyful right just sitting down telling
stories while she's doing their hair, or the games at
dinner time, like critical things that people talk about that
they don't necessarily get anymore, Like let's just sit down
and be a family and play and enjoy each other.
Like those things are are what people are fighting for.
Speaker 6 (05:22):
Yeah, in a time right now where like so many
of our spaces and like the things that you guys
are talking about passing all our stories, our history are
being like quieted by certain people creating this film. For
you guys, how did you pick and choose what you
wanted to teach us through it? Because we learned so much,
but there was so much we need to know in
order to be able to preserve our history at.
Speaker 3 (05:42):
This I mean for me, yeah, for me, it honestly,
it came very organically. It really. It really wasn't like choices.
It was just like, you know, my mother. You know
that the echo of the relationship in the film between
Haley and Manny is like it's an echo of me
and my mother. And and you know, she came to
(06:04):
Canada as a as a as a Trinidadian immigrant, you
know what I mean. And she, you know, as much
as people love to think that Canada is like this,
you know, bastion of like you know, racial whatever, it wasn't.
It wasn't in the seventies, you know what I'm saying.
So she came here, it was very much like she
experienced a lot of discrimination, and she was like, you
have to be prepared for this world. And from the jump,
(06:27):
my mom was like, I don't trust these institutions to
teach you your history. So you're gonna do book reports.
Why are you going to school? Why are you doing whatever?
You're gonna do book reports, You're gonna learn some culture,
You're gonna read, you know what I'm saying. You're gonna
read parable, You're gonna you're gonna you know. So, so
all of those things were directly from my life that
I just I gave to Haley to pass down to
(06:48):
her children, you know what I mean. And and just
that that understanding of who you are will preserve you
as we move forward, because as they try to erase us,
we are the only ones that are gonna keep our
stories prevalent and and and and important to our to
our descendants. You know.
Speaker 2 (07:03):
So now you tell a lot of stories. Canadian directors
tell a lot of stories. You started with music videos.
Why is the Canadian eye so good at telling those
music videos, which goes to television, which goes to film.
Why is that? Because we can name a list of
Canadian directors.
Speaker 3 (07:17):
Yeah, you know, I don't know. That's that's a real
good question, because I think I think I took my
influences from some of the greats, some Hype Williams, you
know what I mean. And I know you're talking about
the legacy of director X, you know what I mean.
But I think Canada has a very interesting perspective. We're
(07:42):
very close to y'all, and our culture is heavily influenced
by America, but we're very sort of diverse. And this
is this this people from all over the world that
come to Canada, And in Canada, you bring your culture
and you you keep your culture, and then we celebrate
people's culture. So the influences come from all over the place,
(08:05):
and we look at the world in a way, and
so you know, we're picking and choosing different things, and
so the influences come from all those places. And I
think that's why that in a way we can we
can kind of pull from everybody.
Speaker 2 (08:19):
You know, it was it difficult for people to take
you serious because you came from music videos? Was that difficult?
Speaker 3 (08:28):
That's interesting. I never really looked at it like that.
I mean, honestly, it's like, you know, anything's a huzzle,
you know, and and you pour your heart into something,
and I expect challenges, you know, and I expect I
expect to be able to have to prove things of people.
That's just that's just part of when you go with
your heart into something, that's just something that you have
to do. So I never really looked at it like that.
(08:49):
I didn't feel that way. And and I think coming
from Canada, I was just like, you know, what, my
voice is as equally as important as everybody else's voices,
and the story that I want to tell as equally
as important as that. So I'm just gonna go out
there and do it.
Speaker 4 (09:04):
I think it's also just doing your thing, yeah, right,
like you segue it into television and this is his
first feature, and so you just I think it's just
being stick to itive and yeah, making it freaking happen.
Speaker 2 (09:15):
Yeah, yeah, being good at it and being.
Speaker 5 (09:16):
Good at it right yeah, Oh to you, how do
you balance creating entertainment but also having deeper messages in it?
Speaker 3 (09:22):
M I think again that it's just something that's organic
to me, you know, coming from the history that I
just talked about with my mother and stuff like that
stuff is in me where I realize the importance of
it because of what she instilled in us. So I
want to make sure that, you know, it's reflective of that,
(09:43):
knowing that our history and things should they shouldn't be
infused in what we do. To make sure that I
get a chance to tell a story, I'm gonna make
a count. I'm gonna make it, you know what I mean,
Like I'm not wasting it. But at the same time,
I grew up on Spielberg, and you know what I'm saying,
Spike Lee and and and James Cameron. You know, so
(10:06):
I'm a comic book nerd, you know what I mean.
So I grew up on X Men, you know, so,
and these things were entertaining. So I'm like, well, I
want to do both. I want to entertain and then
I want you to I want you to walk away.
I want you to take the movie home with you.
I want you to walk away thinking about it the
next couple of days, you know. I want you to
want to talk about it with people. You know, there's
(10:28):
a lot of films out here. You know, people are
craving that. I feel there's a wave happening right now,
you know what I mean. People are craving original stuff
that they're tired of seeing such and such four and five,
you know what I mean. Like you know, and you
see you see the Brother you know, Ryan Cooler coming
with the Sinners, you know, you see you know, even
(10:49):
even Zach Kreigor with the Weapons movie. You know, it's
just like people are interested in give me something different.
Speaker 5 (10:55):
Very frustrating though, because that should have always been the
way in Hollywood, cause whenever you see the things that
really pop off and break through, it's really something new.
Speaker 1 (11:04):
I've never had seen Game of Thrones before. Yeah, right,
you know what I mean, Like, I never like it.
Speaker 5 (11:07):
It's the thing I've never of course centers, but I've
never seen those type of things. I never understood why
Hollywood didn't want to be original, Like it was a
time where originality seemed to be, like, I don't want
to take a risk on that what's considered safe.
Speaker 3 (11:20):
It's turned into theme parks. Right, It's like this is
for everybody. Come on the ride. You've seen it before,
you know what it is, so come pay your money
for it. And I don't know.
Speaker 4 (11:32):
It's I mean, there's something too ceial. I think the
serial framework is interesting to people. I just think that
there isn't that era is shifting. There is a great
level of fatigue, and the world is wanting something that
is more rupturous, something fresh, something that is more political
(11:52):
or deeply personal and just more queered and strange and weird.
Those kinds of things have always been uh, in the
in the in the framework. You know, it's just about
those things rising to the surface.
Speaker 1 (12:07):
For folks. You feel like you get presented like nothing
but dark roles.
Speaker 4 (12:11):
No, not at all. Okay, So I have a slate
of madness coming back like The last three things I've
done have been straight up comedy, dark, grounded, slapsticky kind
of uh like, I get the gamut, and I am
curating for that. I mean, we're not There is no
(12:31):
one dimensionality ever, you know. And I'm interdisciplinary and all
of the work that I do.
Speaker 5 (12:36):
You do that on purpose because you don't want to
be like typecast as the person that you can't.
Speaker 4 (12:39):
Who type cast and who ain't nobody going type ys
me I get to I'm creating. I am working with
a team of people who know who I am at
my core. I'm building from my inner world and I
select accordingly.
Speaker 6 (12:51):
You know you when you say that, you mean you're
also creating projects too that put you in different lights,
because I know you're yes.
Speaker 4 (12:56):
Yes, yes, developing works. I I'm in a performance, I'm
in an experimental film, realm. I'm things take time to
come out, right, like a project could develop over the
course of two to five years or more and whatnot.
But I am intentionally uh, circling a lot of different
genres because I want us to be witnessed in all
(13:19):
kinds of lights. Everything that I do will not be
the lovable woman, right, Everything that I do will not
be the villain. However, everything in that spectrum, the full
range of that is my interest.
Speaker 1 (13:32):
Now I've heard you referred to as a multidisciplinary artist.
Speaker 4 (13:36):
Yeah, multidiplined, I mean just multiple inter between, moving between worlds.
We all do sometimes, you know, folks, because of capitalism
in a certain kind of way, laying you. But you
can veer off. I mean, it's just don't hit no
other cars in the midst of doing it, you know
what I mean.
Speaker 2 (13:54):
Now you'll spoke about the movie a little bit. But
how did y'all connect them? What made you say this
is what I wanted?
Speaker 4 (13:58):
Oh, that man hit me with a letter, and I
was just at a pivotal moment where I was connecting
to land, particularly my my my farmland, farmland, my family's
legacy in Athens, Georgia. And he sent that letter. If
the pandemic didn't happen and the strikes didn't happen, not
(14:19):
in the pandemic, but the strikes wouldn't have happened. I
don't know what would have occurred. But he sent a
beautiful letter, just not to my house. Now, he said
to my.
Speaker 3 (14:28):
People, I was outside the house.
Speaker 4 (14:36):
That would have been peculiar. But he sent the letter
and I read it, and I read the script and
and then the work the time flip for the industry,
and I just I was indeared to it. He got
what is it, the the the joints because no one
could do films at the time.
Speaker 3 (14:54):
Oh yeah, we got a waiver, waiver, got a waivers
going on.
Speaker 4 (14:57):
So we got a waiver for it, and it was
just indipitous that it happened. And we shot it up
in north north of Toronto, and like.
Speaker 3 (15:06):
That was trippy because it was we were we were
we were two weeks away from camera and me and
me and her had that conversation on the phone. We
finally did it two weeks away from camera. So we
were moving forward with production regardless, regardless because we had
to be, because we were the farm up up north
is a specific time when corn could grow and that
(15:28):
was it. So we were barreling forward and just hoping
that you know, she would jump on and so.
Speaker 2 (15:33):
Wait a minute, so she didn't jump on. There was
somebody else. So what happened to that person? Without saying
the name, So she's in the wing waiting to go,
and he be like, excuse me.
Speaker 3 (15:41):
I'm gonna let you know, we didn't. We didn't have nobody. Really,
I'm I'll tell you right now, you do it, I don't.
You know, Look, that's an alternate universe. You know, this
is the universe that we're in right now. So I just,
I just I just I just had it. I just
had this feeling. Man, I just had this feeling. Like
you know, I've been following Daniel's career for a long time,
(16:04):
and I just I just felt she was just the
absolute perfect person to ground this film in, like that
sense of family and community and reality and like so
I just I was just and I was praying.
Speaker 5 (16:23):
The movie starts off with stating at the that farmland
is the most valuable resource due to the circumstances.
Speaker 1 (16:29):
How true is that in our present day condition.
Speaker 3 (16:31):
I still think that's absolutely true. It is, it is,
It's been true. Land is everything, absolutely.
Speaker 4 (16:41):
I mean food is critical right now, the economics of it,
like who is able to pay for what, who has
access to what, the freshest food or not, whether it's
genetically modified or not, who knows how to actually grow food?
And I mean our tea delved into this because during
the pandemic, what was happening.
Speaker 3 (17:02):
Yeah, we couldn't we get the grocery stores around my place.
I couldn't even get fresh fruit, couldn't even get fresh vegetables.
You know, it's like it was scarce, and it really
at that time, my wife and I were thinking about
to have this child, my little boy, and like, do
I actually know how to grow food? If I cannot
(17:25):
get this, if this fragile thing that we call you
know what I mean falls apart? Do I know how
to actually grow things that provide? So it was yeah,
I know how to survive. And so it became very
real during that time, and that's very much infused into
the script. That's that's really you know, the heart of
it is like when when all this stuff that they
(17:47):
say is taking care of us, whether it is or
not is a debate as well, do we know how
to take care of us?
Speaker 2 (17:54):
Did you learn?
Speaker 3 (17:55):
Oh yeah, yoh yeah. And there's and there's a lot
of that in there. You know, there's the there's the
you know, the Three Sisters is sort of an indigenous
practice of growing corn and squash and beans together because
they serve each other throughout the year. And so you'll
see some of that stuff. It's not explicitly talked about,
but it's there's a garden where they're actually working that garden,
(18:19):
you know what I mean. So we we I did
so much research and brought that into the film, and
Michael Gray Eyes and Michael gray Eyes, the great Michael gray.
Speaker 4 (18:29):
So much knowledge.
Speaker 6 (18:31):
The film talks or is very loud about black women
or black mothers fighting for their families, protecting their families
to the end. And I think that's always a conversation
with black women about like how protecting and nurturing we
can be. But what do you want black women to
take away from this film about how to protect and
take care of themselves in order to take care of
the family.
Speaker 4 (18:48):
That's so appropriate because in one of the scenes her
Galen talks about her deserving reprieve and that kind of
jewel and release and and we've I mean over the
slate of films that I have done, which is the
assumption that you know, I do things that are trauma
(19:11):
driven or different, you know, just black women in complete
ner toll turmoil there. I think that there's a diversity
of things emotionally that are happening, and we deserve to
explore the other emotions, just as much. I don't think
that it's a take your hands off and completely live
in utter soft era life. That's that's that's sure, one
(19:32):
would love that. But I don't think that struggle is
ever there's an ever, an end mark to it, you know,
just like healing isn't there's no end there's no there's
no there's no this is the death, this is it,
You've made it. It's continuous, and so I think there's
it is a continuous effort to to diversify the manner
(19:52):
in which you distribute labor, to encourage others to have
a greater independence and autonomy and the way that they
move through the world, and just and giving that over
and still doing our work for ourselves. So love that.
Speaker 2 (20:11):
I was gonna ask you when numbers are concerned, right,
everybody looks at box office when it comes to movies.
That doesn't necessarily say how successful a movie is, but
for some people it does. How does that affect mind
frame when you're doing these type of movies.
Speaker 3 (20:24):
I mean, I don't. I mean, I'm not in Hollywood,
so I'm an independent filmmaker, you know what I mean.
So that's not what defines it for me, you know,
And money comes and goes. So I think about legacy
and I think about telling a story that's gonna stay
with people. Like I said, I'm gonna make a film
that you take home, you walk with it in your
(20:45):
in your head, and to me, that means the most
important thing. And I if it's there and people talk
about it, you know, independent film lifeblood is word of mouth.
That's how independent film has always been. So people start
talking about it, they spreading it, and other people find it,
and you know, that's a beautiful thing when that happened.
(21:06):
So I don't mind that, you know, Like, look, you
know when on other projects it may be the benchmark
and that's cool. You're doing something with a studio, that's cool, sure,
But with this it's just about does this film resonate
and stay with the people, and does it spread and
make people think. That's the most important thing for me.
Speaker 1 (21:27):
But you're an independent film beker, so you're still gonna
need funding.
Speaker 5 (21:31):
Fair So how do you, you know, get these people
to continue to fund this great work that you're doing
if it's.
Speaker 3 (21:36):
Not an ROI well, I'll say this, like I think,
for this being my first film, the important thing is
to is to let them know that I got a
voice and this is what I'm interested in saying. And
I think people understand in the movie business, they understand,
you know, this was independent, This wasn't back by a studio.
They didn't have a promo budget. You know, normal studio
(21:57):
pictures have a budget equal to their budget to promote
the things. Right, So people understand that and they go, cool,
he's got a voice. Hopefully God willing, they want to
work with me. And then you know that other money
part that'll come when the bank comes, you know what
I mean.
Speaker 4 (22:14):
So that's and films are made at different budgetary levels. Yeah,
And I think people can be I just think can
connect to film in all kinds of ways and stretch
out the lifeblood of it. So till is having a
conversation every time I go to London, they're interested, They're
having a conversation about what was okay. So then that
(22:35):
connects to how they thematically connected to forty right, And
you can see stuff on certain streaming where the lifeblood
of it extends and it is exacerbated in a certain
kind of way because it registers for a particular moment.
Digital has just done something else for life, right, like
when it hits a streamer, it can it's a light
(22:56):
in a in a completely different fashion. And so that
enables to the residual nature of a thing to live
in a in a greater way. And so I think
that that's critical for indie filmmaking, and I think that
there will be new manners in which to for folks
to be connected to a thing and so that it
can live extensively in the same way that like we
think about you know, visual or fine art, right, like
(23:18):
we should be having a conversation about works across the board.
Don't let it's not going to fizzle out just because
it's not in the theater anymore. It's not fizzling out
just because you know, the digital the digital WM frame
has has closed. It's never closed. Everything's always open. So
keep connecting the dots, uh and and and and just
(23:42):
you know, build from there.
Speaker 1 (23:43):
You think great work is sometimes pointed because I even think.
Speaker 5 (23:46):
About like Till right, like they talk about, you know,
Till got snubbed by the Oscars, and they talked about,
you know, Till might have suffered from wokeness fatigue, and
you know, they were saying it was.
Speaker 1 (23:57):
A box office point.
Speaker 5 (23:57):
They were saying all of these different things in regard
to this just great body of work.
Speaker 1 (24:03):
Do you think that that can play a role into
it too?
Speaker 3 (24:06):
Uh?
Speaker 4 (24:06):
Ain't nobody listen to none to that? What's the snub
We're having continuous conversation about the work, about the themes
about you know, you're dealing with it in the frame,
right on the computer, on in the theater wherever you're
watching it, and then people are connecting to it outside.
(24:28):
They just you know, August was just here, you know.
I just talked to mis Debora, who helps with the
who runs the the Mattel Foundation. They're having continuous, you know,
conversation about it. This is since nineteen fifty five, you know,
and so you know, extending what this means to think
about survival. I don't know when forty takes place, but
(24:50):
forty is in the dystopic future, which feels very like now.
And so just the ability to bring this end of
the spectrum to this end of the spectrum, that's what's happening.
You know, It's not there's no snubbing. Snubbing isn't possible
if we are creating something and we are creating the
conversation around it.
Speaker 6 (25:10):
I know when the US snub happened. I don't want
to get her name wrong, but the director of till
Chanoya she had posted. She had posted on her Instagram
and it wasn't directly in response, but a the timeing
people took it as a response. But she talked about
how Hollywood, you know, treats black women horribly and they
push this white male stereotype. Do you feel like that's changing?
(25:30):
Has changed since the since the snub? I know you
don't care about the snub, but has that changed in
the work that you're doing or do you think it
will change?
Speaker 4 (25:36):
I think that we have always been present creating the
significant works for ourselves. The funding may not look the same,
the ubiquity of it and the marketing of it may
not look the same, But there are plenty of black women,
uh in a variety of other people of color joining
the fold of making the stuff that we want to see.
(25:58):
There is no uh true idea of us like not
being able to push, you know, towards the center. We
are the center period, right And should there be more support, yes,
but you can't. You can't hold down what's already you know.
Speaker 1 (26:19):
Moving up, moving That's dope.
Speaker 5 (26:22):
How do y'all see storytelling as a tool for social transformation?
Speaker 1 (26:26):
M M.
Speaker 5 (26:26):
That feel like the arts are going to be very
important to us moving forward, especially with them just taking
history out of everything.
Speaker 3 (26:33):
Always always been, always has.
Speaker 1 (26:35):
Been, you know.
Speaker 3 (26:36):
It's it's uh, it's a it's a foundation of of
like as we as we're talking about of our history
and inspiring the future, you know what I mean. It's
it's it's it's vital, you know. And and for people
to see things and reintroduce them to ideas that maybe
they don't that's that's the important thing. Is like as
(26:57):
as as a younger generation comes out, they don't don't
have to fight the trials and tribulations that like my
mother had to fight. I didn't have to fight some
of those things. But it's important to make sure that
people understand them, because they don't understand it, then they're
coming out with a certain sense of ignorance to the
world and may not think that certain things are are present,
(27:21):
you know, And and racism and discrimination and the isms
are there whether you whether you recognize them or not,
they're there. So it's it's I think it's vital for
art to keep speaking from our perspective, so that it's like, oh, no,
you got to know how to handle these things for
(27:42):
future generations. It's just it's vital.
Speaker 4 (27:44):
No, it's just a beautiful poetic looping right. I remember
doing this. It wasn't technically a play. It was like
a dance exhibition with that was called Women Hold Up
Half the Sky right as a kid with Total Dance theater.
And I learned about four little girls in that piece.
And then there was also this poem from Nikki Giovanni
(28:05):
in the piece Capitola Williams delivered that hard and then
that makes me connect to Okay, then I'm doing till right.
Like these stories, these fragments jump you know, between us,
right and oh okay, Nikki Giovanni she loved Tupac right,
and so then Tupac raps about this and then this.
You are to find the fragment and then expand upon it.
(28:27):
I think that that it's not just just in the art, right,
the art, that whatever it is that you connected to,
whether it's in hip hop or whether it's in a film,
you take whatever is magnifying for you in your mind,
and then you are to dig deeper. You are to
read more about it. This is the beauty of art.
(28:50):
Art takes a single thing, and it is to it
is to make it. It's supposed to enable you to
loop things further into the fold. For it, everything is
deeply connected if we but seek it out, if we
but make the effort.
Speaker 5 (29:04):
Absolutely, how do you decide when the story is worth
the emotional toll it takes on creators and the audience
because art can be healing, but it can also reopen
or wounds.
Speaker 4 (29:14):
Dude, Yeah, you mean for me? Yeah, I'm gonna. I'm gonna.
I'm gonna give everything to a thing if I choose
to do it. And we talk a lot about recovery.
(29:38):
I mean, I think it's something for me. Now I'm
a sabbatical y'all. Man, Was I supposed to be here?
Like it's it's I'm making conscious choices even more along,
you know, just along the trajectory of the career, right
like trying to make sure that I am well and
I'm okay in the midst of the things that I
choose to do. That's why I did three comedy maze
(29:58):
things in the course of the as a year. But
the other things are really valuable because you have to
Refield the cup or you have nothing to give, or
it suffers, or you know whatnot. But I am consciously
moving things around to do stuff so that I can
(30:20):
be Okay. I also have a child. I also have
a family. I need to be with them. I need
to This is not just for for me. This is
for a greater community and knowing how the community responds
to that thing just and I mean, we're constantly referring
back to Till. But like Youano, you talked about not
wanting to traumatize or trigger in the experience of things.
(30:44):
There are all kinds of ways to tell a story
and not not take people down into a into an experience.
In a certain kind of way, you can you can
tell a story and and and with nuance and modification
and a certain kind of way bring them into the
fold of the thing. It doesn't have to be utterly,
(31:05):
you know, drudgery and treacherous the way that it makes
yourself or the audience feel.
Speaker 1 (31:10):
What do you Till change.
Speaker 5 (31:13):
About you as a mother, because you are already are
black mother. But you know, tonight I went to go
see Till. I saw it at a premiere and Sabrina Fulton.
Speaker 1 (31:21):
Was dead and night.
Speaker 5 (31:22):
So that was like wow, you know, just watching that
what happened to you know, mother Tale? But then seeing
Sabrina day, I'm like, yo, you know, it's still happening
right now.
Speaker 4 (31:33):
I feel like it changed. I had a different understanding
of the rigor of the era of woman, to live
in that kind of femininity, to live in that kind
of presentation of self, that shifted for me. My motherhood
is is straight up, it was continuous. We have to
protect our children in a certain kind of way, in
(31:54):
the same way that Haley is in here, like you
about to learn how to shoot this gun, and you
about to learn how to beat these you know, like
that's the kind of thing that is always present. But
how do you present that? How do you? I think
the value is showing the diversity of your womanhood so
that your children know that you are a human. That
(32:14):
was critical and from from till two forty and so
you're always gonna you know, mother Tiger over your kids.
Speaker 5 (32:24):
But you know, I want to ask you, you want
to go back to the question about when you decide
when the story is worth the emotional tool it takes on.
Speaker 1 (32:31):
I think it's on you as a creator.
Speaker 3 (32:33):
And yeah, I think I think it's it's it's a
it's a gut thing, right Like it's it's it's something
that you you know, I mean, when you get into
a work and you know that just this is something
important for you, you're just willing to take on what
that process is gonna bring. And you know that any
(32:54):
process that we dive into, what our whole selves is
going to it's going to. Yes, it's gonna it's gonna
hurt us some days and some days it's gonna be challenging,
but it's also gonna make you grow at the end.
And I think at the end of the day, it's
like you you look forward to that growth truthfully, you
know what I mean. I look forward to coming out
the other side and learning from what the process brings
me and know that I'll be I hope that I'll
(33:17):
be a better person from the interaction and and and
the community that you do. When you build these things,
you come upon a community and you learn your lessons,
you know what I mean, Like, you learn your lessons
through that process and you say, Okay, cool, never gonna
do that this way again, you know what I mean.
But like, you know what I mean, So you just
(33:37):
you know those things, and so there's a beautiful thing
when you come out the other side because you you're
a stronger person for it, and that makes it worthwhile,
you know, that makes it go Okay, next one, I'm
gonna learn some more. I'm gonna grow a little bit better,
you know what I mean. So it makes a process.
Speaker 4 (33:54):
This is a baby, you're making a baby. Ye ride
with that thing for a few years, right, like, whether
you're writing it, like I mean, we're talking about this
from Pandemic. It's twenty three five now. This man has
been writing with this thing for that long. And so
you want to make an extremely conscious decision about what
you are, what you are rearing.
Speaker 5 (34:14):
What do you hope of future generations of artists, especially
black creatives, take from the work that y'all are creating
right now?
Speaker 1 (34:20):
What do you want me to take from forty in particular?
Speaker 3 (34:25):
I just feel like, you know, I think it's all there.
I think it's all there. I think it's like, you know,
I want people to to mine the past, make sure
that they have that expression, you know, because we're the
only ones that are going to tell our stories, you know,
Like the whole interaction between the indigenous and Black community
is like rarely talked about across history because history has
(34:49):
been presented in kind of one way from one perspective. So,
you know, we wanted to pay tribute to to some
of those things in this film. And I just think
it's important that we keep doing that, go back to
our past and remind people. But then also I'm about
creating stuff for the future, and and and and Cinema
(35:12):
for me, has always been a beautiful art form of
of of entertainment, you know what I mean of visceral thrills,
Like it's not I love better than being in the
theater and the whole audience moving with you. You feel it.
It's like a concert. Like you feel that you know
you people, You feel everybody tighten up when something's about
(35:33):
to happen. You feel that release when you know when
it does. And this there's something really beautiful about that.
And I encourage, you know, future generations and other directors
and storytellers to like embrace that feeling that you get
from whatever that.
Speaker 1 (35:47):
Art form is for you.
Speaker 3 (35:49):
You know, whatever that art form is for you.
Speaker 4 (35:51):
I would throw three things out. Rigor is critical, I mean,
and we're getting this from from the film to just
in real life too. Like rigor and discipline ease the
utmost imperative and essential for any kind of art making.
Learn the craft so that you can therein move to intuition.
The intuitive spirit is yeah, it's it's pivotal. You have
(36:13):
to have that so that it can have your stamp,
your unique imprint. And then love.
Speaker 3 (36:20):
Uh.
Speaker 4 (36:20):
Michael gray Eyes taught me uh. One of the Indigenous
terms for love. It's kasaka ten and it's to grow
into oneself right, Like, love isn't just this romantic notion.
It's it's about seeing something flourish. I think that's an
inner thing and an outer world thing. And so to
have the utmost of rigor and discipline and thing in
(36:43):
the thing that you do, move that into the intuitive
spirit and your own in a world and do it
with the utmost.
Speaker 2 (36:50):
Well, definitely go check out the film forty eight kres
and we appreciate.
Speaker 3 (36:53):
You guys and everywhere you know.
Speaker 2 (37:00):
All right, Well, Daniel Deadwiler, Artie Throwing, thank you so
much for joining us.
Speaker 3 (37:03):
Thank you, Thanks Breakfast Club, good morning.
Speaker 5 (37:07):
Hold on every day I wake, pass up the Breakfast Club.
Speaker 4 (37:12):
Finish for y'all.
Speaker 1 (37:12):
Done,
Don't know every day waiting clicks up the breakfast Club.
You're finish for y'all done morning.
Speaker 2 (00:07):
Everybody is the dj n V Jess Hilarious, Chelamage, the
guy we are the breakfast Club. Lola Rosa is here
as well. We got some special guests in the building.
We have Danielle did Willer Welcome, good morning, and we have.
Speaker 3 (00:19):
Artie Throwing Welcome brother, thank you.
Speaker 2 (00:21):
How are you feeling this morning? How y'all both feeling
this morning?
Speaker 4 (00:23):
Beautiful?
Speaker 1 (00:24):
Really great?
Speaker 4 (00:25):
We're happy to be together.
Speaker 5 (00:26):
Yeah, you know, I know y'all here to talk about
forty acres, but I gotta tell you a phenomenal job.
Speaker 1 (00:30):
Until phenomenal job, until you know.
Speaker 5 (00:34):
I always wondered about that role because it tells one
of history's most painful stories.
Speaker 1 (00:41):
How did you prepare emotionally for that role.
Speaker 4 (00:46):
The way I prevaire for anything. It's rigorous research. I
just grew up in Atlanta, and so the civil rights
community uh in Atlanta has reared me. I did you know,
volunteers and with the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. As a
kid went to Cascade United Methodist Church, which doctor Reverend Lowry,
(01:08):
who partnered with doctor Martin Luther King at the time
during that you know, pivotal time. You know, those are
people who are critical in defining my life and understanding
of society and community and so all of that kind
of like that intuitive uh personal history as well as uh,
you know, academic knowledge and history about that the era
(01:30):
went into creating that, that that role, and and and
just staying rigorous with the relationships with Chenoya who directed it,
and and and the family and just it's been such
a palpable thing for me.
Speaker 5 (01:44):
Once you tap into a role like that, like playing
the mother of em til, how do you get that
out of?
Speaker 1 (01:50):
How do you just go down?
Speaker 4 (01:51):
I don't know anything. Uh. That that is visceral like
that that stays with you. It's a wounded scar of
sorts and you walk with it. And I mean that's
the beauty of it, right, Like I get to talk
about this all the time. I get to talk the
history of the work and how it's supposed to have
this residual effect, this kind of echo, and it'll be
(02:12):
in conversation with any work that I do moving forward.
So I'm curating in that capacity.
Speaker 2 (02:16):
I wanted to go back, if you don't mind, I
wanted to what made you want to be an actress? Like,
what was the thing? What did you see on television?
What play did you go see? What did your mom?
And still you say, this is what I want to do.
Speaker 4 (02:26):
No, it's just been in my life. I've been acting
and performing since I was a child. My mom made
sure that myself and my siblings were always a part
of arts oriented things. Atlanta, Black Atlanta, black arts Atlanta
in the eighties is just pivotal, right. So I started
in dance and naturally segued into theater through critical cultural
(02:47):
markers in the city, Total Dance Theater, Gary Harrison Studios,
saw Jamandi productions all the time. I grew up as
a Kenny Leon's True Colors Theater Company young artists. So
this has just been which it should be right for children,
it should be for people in general. The arts is
just a part of our lives. It came a critical
(03:08):
moment after academic pursuits that oh, I'm missing something and
I had to return. And so one of the first
things that I did when I was making the professional
return was for Colored Girls and Jasmine God directed it,
and so it just bushed from there.
Speaker 5 (03:24):
Oh, oh, this is a question for both of y'all right,
because you know, going back to the Till thing a
little bit, but also talking about forty eight is what
did Till teach you about the responsibility of storytelling.
Speaker 4 (03:35):
I don't know if Till taught me that responsibility. I
think it's just always been present. Our history is integral,
Our history is just it's a brilliant thing that's a
part of everything that I do, everything that we do,
and which is the way that it works in forty right,
(03:58):
like she is teaching children not just about how to survive,
but how to uh synthesize history, with culture, with agriculture,
with you know, all of the qualities of life. Is
the spherical thing. Everything is connected.
Speaker 3 (04:15):
Yeah, they're they're they're roots of survival. In the film,
it's not just rooted in you know, they can kick
some ass, they've got military might, but the important thing
is is that it's rooted in their their preservation of
their culture, you know what I mean, that's also surviving
for them. And it's very much That's why in the film,
it's like you see the family, they're all about their
(04:40):
their culture, their their history. Like the book reports that
she gets them to indeed, you have to know yourself
as you're surviving, as you're moving forward, because you're the
only ones that are going to do that. It's you know,
the the language that they have, you know what I mean, Galen,
the father's passing down his language, the agricultural practices, it's
all rooted in their history. And that's how this family
(05:00):
is truly surviving in the future.
Speaker 4 (05:03):
And yeah, they're truly joyful right just sitting down telling
stories while she's doing their hair, or the games at
dinner time, like critical things that people talk about that
they don't necessarily get anymore, Like let's just sit down
and be a family and play and enjoy each other.
Like those things are are what people are fighting for.
Speaker 6 (05:22):
Yeah, in a time right now where like so many
of our spaces and like the things that you guys
are talking about passing all our stories, our history are
being like quieted by certain people creating this film. For
you guys, how did you pick and choose what you
wanted to teach us through it? Because we learned so much,
but there was so much we need to know in
order to be able to preserve our history at.
Speaker 3 (05:42):
This I mean for me, yeah, for me, it honestly,
it came very organically. It really. It really wasn't like choices.
It was just like, you know, my mother. You know
that the echo of the relationship in the film between
Haley and Manny is like it's an echo of me
and my mother. And and you know, she came to
(06:04):
Canada as a as a as a Trinidadian immigrant, you
know what I mean. And she, you know, as much
as people love to think that Canada is like this,
you know, bastion of like you know, racial whatever, it wasn't.
It wasn't in the seventies, you know what I'm saying.
So she came here, it was very much like she
experienced a lot of discrimination, and she was like, you
have to be prepared for this world. And from the jump,
(06:27):
my mom was like, I don't trust these institutions to
teach you your history. So you're gonna do book reports.
Why are you going to school? Why are you doing whatever?
You're gonna do book reports, You're gonna learn some culture,
You're gonna read, you know what I'm saying. You're gonna
read parable, You're gonna you're gonna you know. So, so
all of those things were directly from my life that
I just I gave to Haley to pass down to
(06:48):
her children, you know what I mean. And and just
that that understanding of who you are will preserve you
as we move forward, because as they try to erase us,
we are the only ones that are gonna keep our
stories prevalent and and and and important to our to
our descendants. You know.
Speaker 2 (07:03):
So now you tell a lot of stories. Canadian directors
tell a lot of stories. You started with music videos.
Why is the Canadian eye so good at telling those
music videos, which goes to television, which goes to film.
Why is that? Because we can name a list of
Canadian directors.
Speaker 3 (07:17):
Yeah, you know, I don't know. That's that's a real
good question, because I think I think I took my
influences from some of the greats, some Hype Williams, you
know what I mean. And I know you're talking about
the legacy of director X, you know what I mean.
But I think Canada has a very interesting perspective. We're
(07:42):
very close to y'all, and our culture is heavily influenced
by America, but we're very sort of diverse. And this
is this this people from all over the world that
come to Canada, And in Canada, you bring your culture
and you you keep your culture, and then we celebrate
people's culture. So the influences come from all over the place,
(08:05):
and we look at the world in a way, and
so you know, we're picking and choosing different things, and
so the influences come from all those places. And I
think that's why that in a way we can we
can kind of pull from everybody.
Speaker 2 (08:19):
You know, it was it difficult for people to take
you serious because you came from music videos? Was that difficult?
Speaker 3 (08:28):
That's interesting. I never really looked at it like that.
I mean, honestly, it's like, you know, anything's a huzzle,
you know, and and you pour your heart into something,
and I expect challenges, you know, and I expect I
expect to be able to have to prove things of people.
That's just that's just part of when you go with
your heart into something, that's just something that you have
to do. So I never really looked at it like that.
(08:49):
I didn't feel that way. And and I think coming
from Canada, I was just like, you know, what, my
voice is as equally as important as everybody else's voices,
and the story that I want to tell as equally
as important as that. So I'm just gonna go out
there and do it.
Speaker 4 (09:04):
I think it's also just doing your thing, yeah, right,
like you segue it into television and this is his
first feature, and so you just I think it's just
being stick to itive and yeah, making it freaking happen.
Speaker 2 (09:15):
Yeah, yeah, being good at it and being.
Speaker 5 (09:16):
Good at it right yeah, Oh to you, how do
you balance creating entertainment but also having deeper messages in it?
Speaker 3 (09:22):
M I think again that it's just something that's organic
to me, you know, coming from the history that I
just talked about with my mother and stuff like that
stuff is in me where I realize the importance of
it because of what she instilled in us. So I
want to make sure that, you know, it's reflective of that,
(09:43):
knowing that our history and things should they shouldn't be
infused in what we do. To make sure that I
get a chance to tell a story, I'm gonna make
a count. I'm gonna make it, you know what I mean,
Like I'm not wasting it. But at the same time,
I grew up on Spielberg, and you know what I'm saying,
Spike Lee and and and James Cameron. You know, so
(10:06):
I'm a comic book nerd, you know what I mean.
So I grew up on X Men, you know, so,
and these things were entertaining. So I'm like, well, I
want to do both. I want to entertain and then
I want you to I want you to walk away.
I want you to take the movie home with you.
I want you to walk away thinking about it the
next couple of days, you know. I want you to
want to talk about it with people. You know, there's
(10:28):
a lot of films out here. You know, people are
craving that. I feel there's a wave happening right now,
you know what I mean. People are craving original stuff
that they're tired of seeing such and such four and five,
you know what I mean. Like you know, and you
see you see the Brother you know, Ryan Cooler coming
with the Sinners, you know, you see you know, even
(10:49):
even Zach Kreigor with the Weapons movie. You know, it's
just like people are interested in give me something different.
Speaker 5 (10:55):
Very frustrating though, because that should have always been the
way in Hollywood, cause whenever you see the things that
really pop off and break through, it's really something new.
Speaker 1 (11:04):
I've never had seen Game of Thrones before. Yeah, right,
you know what I mean, Like, I never like it.
Speaker 5 (11:07):
It's the thing I've never of course centers, but I've
never seen those type of things. I never understood why
Hollywood didn't want to be original, Like it was a
time where originality seemed to be, like, I don't want
to take a risk on that what's considered safe.
Speaker 3 (11:20):
It's turned into theme parks. Right, It's like this is
for everybody. Come on the ride. You've seen it before,
you know what it is, so come pay your money
for it. And I don't know.
Speaker 4 (11:32):
It's I mean, there's something too ceial. I think the
serial framework is interesting to people. I just think that
there isn't that era is shifting. There is a great
level of fatigue, and the world is wanting something that
is more rupturous, something fresh, something that is more political
(11:52):
or deeply personal and just more queered and strange and weird.
Those kinds of things have always been uh, in the
in the in the framework. You know, it's just about
those things rising to the surface.
Speaker 1 (12:07):
For folks. You feel like you get presented like nothing
but dark roles.
Speaker 4 (12:11):
No, not at all. Okay, So I have a slate
of madness coming back like The last three things I've
done have been straight up comedy, dark, grounded, slapsticky kind
of uh like, I get the gamut, and I am
curating for that. I mean, we're not There is no
(12:31):
one dimensionality ever, you know. And I'm interdisciplinary and all
of the work that I do.
Speaker 5 (12:36):
You do that on purpose because you don't want to
be like typecast as the person that you can't.
Speaker 4 (12:39):
Who type cast and who ain't nobody going type ys
me I get to I'm creating. I am working with
a team of people who know who I am at
my core. I'm building from my inner world and I
select accordingly.
Speaker 6 (12:51):
You know you when you say that, you mean you're
also creating projects too that put you in different lights,
because I know you're yes.
Speaker 4 (12:56):
Yes, yes, developing works. I I'm in a performance, I'm
in an experimental film, realm. I'm things take time to
come out, right, like a project could develop over the
course of two to five years or more and whatnot.
But I am intentionally uh, circling a lot of different
genres because I want us to be witnessed in all
(13:19):
kinds of lights. Everything that I do will not be
the lovable woman, right, Everything that I do will not
be the villain. However, everything in that spectrum, the full
range of that is my interest.
Speaker 1 (13:32):
Now I've heard you referred to as a multidisciplinary artist.
Speaker 4 (13:36):
Yeah, multidiplined, I mean just multiple inter between, moving between worlds.
We all do sometimes, you know, folks, because of capitalism
in a certain kind of way, laying you. But you
can veer off. I mean, it's just don't hit no
other cars in the midst of doing it, you know
what I mean.
Speaker 2 (13:54):
Now you'll spoke about the movie a little bit. But
how did y'all connect them? What made you say this
is what I wanted?
Speaker 4 (13:58):
Oh, that man hit me with a letter, and I
was just at a pivotal moment where I was connecting
to land, particularly my my my farmland, farmland, my family's
legacy in Athens, Georgia. And he sent that letter. If
the pandemic didn't happen and the strikes didn't happen, not
(14:19):
in the pandemic, but the strikes wouldn't have happened. I
don't know what would have occurred. But he sent a
beautiful letter, just not to my house. Now, he said
to my.
Speaker 3 (14:28):
People, I was outside the house.
Speaker 4 (14:36):
That would have been peculiar. But he sent the letter
and I read it, and I read the script and
and then the work the time flip for the industry,
and I just I was indeared to it. He got
what is it, the the the joints because no one
could do films at the time.
Speaker 3 (14:54):
Oh yeah, we got a waiver, waiver, got a waivers
going on.
Speaker 4 (14:57):
So we got a waiver for it, and it was
just indipitous that it happened. And we shot it up
in north north of Toronto, and like.
Speaker 3 (15:06):
That was trippy because it was we were we were
we were two weeks away from camera and me and
me and her had that conversation on the phone. We
finally did it two weeks away from camera. So we
were moving forward with production regardless, regardless because we had
to be, because we were the farm up up north
is a specific time when corn could grow and that
(15:28):
was it. So we were barreling forward and just hoping
that you know, she would jump on and so.
Speaker 2 (15:33):
Wait a minute, so she didn't jump on. There was
somebody else. So what happened to that person? Without saying
the name, So she's in the wing waiting to go,
and he be like, excuse me.
Speaker 3 (15:41):
I'm gonna let you know, we didn't. We didn't have nobody. Really,
I'm I'll tell you right now, you do it, I don't.
You know, Look, that's an alternate universe. You know, this
is the universe that we're in right now. So I just,
I just I just I just had it. I just
had this feeling. Man, I just had this feeling. Like
you know, I've been following Daniel's career for a long time,
(16:04):
and I just I just felt she was just the
absolute perfect person to ground this film in, like that
sense of family and community and reality and like so
I just I was just and I was praying.
Speaker 5 (16:23):
The movie starts off with stating at the that farmland
is the most valuable resource due to the circumstances.
Speaker 1 (16:29):
How true is that in our present day condition.
Speaker 3 (16:31):
I still think that's absolutely true. It is, it is,
It's been true. Land is everything, absolutely.
Speaker 4 (16:41):
I mean food is critical right now, the economics of it,
like who is able to pay for what, who has
access to what, the freshest food or not, whether it's
genetically modified or not, who knows how to actually grow food?
And I mean our tea delved into this because during
the pandemic, what was happening.
Speaker 3 (17:02):
Yeah, we couldn't we get the grocery stores around my place.
I couldn't even get fresh fruit, couldn't even get fresh vegetables.
You know, it's like it was scarce, and it really
at that time, my wife and I were thinking about
to have this child, my little boy, and like, do
I actually know how to grow food? If I cannot
(17:25):
get this, if this fragile thing that we call you
know what I mean falls apart? Do I know how
to actually grow things that provide? So it was yeah,
I know how to survive. And so it became very
real during that time, and that's very much infused into
the script. That's that's really you know, the heart of
it is like when when all this stuff that they
(17:47):
say is taking care of us, whether it is or
not is a debate as well, do we know how
to take care of us?
Speaker 2 (17:54):
Did you learn?
Speaker 3 (17:55):
Oh yeah, yoh yeah. And there's and there's a lot
of that in there. You know, there's the there's the
you know, the Three Sisters is sort of an indigenous
practice of growing corn and squash and beans together because
they serve each other throughout the year. And so you'll
see some of that stuff. It's not explicitly talked about,
but it's there's a garden where they're actually working that garden,
(18:19):
you know what I mean. So we we I did
so much research and brought that into the film, and
Michael Gray Eyes and Michael gray Eyes, the great Michael gray.
Speaker 4 (18:29):
So much knowledge.
Speaker 6 (18:31):
The film talks or is very loud about black women
or black mothers fighting for their families, protecting their families
to the end. And I think that's always a conversation
with black women about like how protecting and nurturing we
can be. But what do you want black women to
take away from this film about how to protect and
take care of themselves in order to take care of
the family.
Speaker 4 (18:48):
That's so appropriate because in one of the scenes her
Galen talks about her deserving reprieve and that kind of
jewel and release and and we've I mean over the
slate of films that I have done, which is the
assumption that you know, I do things that are trauma
(19:11):
driven or different, you know, just black women in complete
ner toll turmoil there. I think that there's a diversity
of things emotionally that are happening, and we deserve to
explore the other emotions, just as much. I don't think
that it's a take your hands off and completely live
in utter soft era life. That's that's that's sure, one
(19:32):
would love that. But I don't think that struggle is
ever there's an ever, an end mark to it, you know,
just like healing isn't there's no end there's no there's
no there's no this is the death, this is it,
You've made it. It's continuous, and so I think there's
it is a continuous effort to to diversify the manner
(19:52):
in which you distribute labor, to encourage others to have
a greater independence and autonomy and the way that they
move through the world, and just and giving that over
and still doing our work for ourselves. So love that.
Speaker 2 (20:11):
I was gonna ask you when numbers are concerned, right,
everybody looks at box office when it comes to movies.
That doesn't necessarily say how successful a movie is, but
for some people it does. How does that affect mind
frame when you're doing these type of movies.
Speaker 3 (20:24):
I mean, I don't. I mean, I'm not in Hollywood,
so I'm an independent filmmaker, you know what I mean.
So that's not what defines it for me, you know,
And money comes and goes. So I think about legacy
and I think about telling a story that's gonna stay
with people. Like I said, I'm gonna make a film
that you take home, you walk with it in your
(20:45):
in your head, and to me, that means the most
important thing. And I if it's there and people talk
about it, you know, independent film lifeblood is word of mouth.
That's how independent film has always been. So people start
talking about it, they spreading it, and other people find it,
and you know, that's a beautiful thing when that happened.
(21:06):
So I don't mind that, you know, Like, look, you
know when on other projects it may be the benchmark
and that's cool. You're doing something with a studio, that's cool, sure,
But with this it's just about does this film resonate
and stay with the people, and does it spread and
make people think. That's the most important thing for me.
Speaker 1 (21:27):
But you're an independent film beker, so you're still gonna
need funding.
Speaker 5 (21:31):
Fair So how do you, you know, get these people
to continue to fund this great work that you're doing
if it's.
Speaker 3 (21:36):
Not an ROI well, I'll say this, like I think,
for this being my first film, the important thing is
to is to let them know that I got a
voice and this is what I'm interested in saying. And
I think people understand in the movie business, they understand,
you know, this was independent, This wasn't back by a studio.
They didn't have a promo budget. You know, normal studio
(21:57):
pictures have a budget equal to their budget to promote
the things. Right, So people understand that and they go, cool,
he's got a voice. Hopefully God willing, they want to
work with me. And then you know that other money
part that'll come when the bank comes, you know what
I mean.
Speaker 4 (22:14):
So that's and films are made at different budgetary levels. Yeah,
And I think people can be I just think can
connect to film in all kinds of ways and stretch
out the lifeblood of it. So till is having a
conversation every time I go to London, they're interested, They're
having a conversation about what was okay. So then that
(22:35):
connects to how they thematically connected to forty right, And
you can see stuff on certain streaming where the lifeblood
of it extends and it is exacerbated in a certain
kind of way because it registers for a particular moment.
Digital has just done something else for life, right, like
when it hits a streamer, it can it's a light
(22:56):
in a in a completely different fashion. And so that
enables to the residual nature of a thing to live
in a in a greater way. And so I think
that that's critical for indie filmmaking, and I think that
there will be new manners in which to for folks
to be connected to a thing and so that it
can live extensively in the same way that like we
think about you know, visual or fine art, right, like
(23:18):
we should be having a conversation about works across the board.
Don't let it's not going to fizzle out just because
it's not in the theater anymore. It's not fizzling out
just because you know, the digital the digital WM frame
has has closed. It's never closed. Everything's always open. So
keep connecting the dots, uh and and and and just
(23:42):
you know, build from there.
Speaker 1 (23:43):
You think great work is sometimes pointed because I even think.
Speaker 5 (23:46):
About like Till right, like they talk about, you know,
Till got snubbed by the Oscars, and they talked about,
you know, Till might have suffered from wokeness fatigue, and
you know, they were saying it was.
Speaker 1 (23:57):
A box office point.
Speaker 5 (23:57):
They were saying all of these different things in regard
to this just great body of work.
Speaker 1 (24:03):
Do you think that that can play a role into
it too?
Speaker 3 (24:06):
Uh?
Speaker 4 (24:06):
Ain't nobody listen to none to that? What's the snub
We're having continuous conversation about the work, about the themes
about you know, you're dealing with it in the frame,
right on the computer, on in the theater wherever you're
watching it, and then people are connecting to it outside.
(24:28):
They just you know, August was just here, you know.
I just talked to mis Debora, who helps with the
who runs the the Mattel Foundation. They're having continuous, you know,
conversation about it. This is since nineteen fifty five, you know,
and so you know, extending what this means to think
about survival. I don't know when forty takes place, but
(24:50):
forty is in the dystopic future, which feels very like now.
And so just the ability to bring this end of
the spectrum to this end of the spectrum, that's what's happening.
You know, It's not there's no snubbing. Snubbing isn't possible
if we are creating something and we are creating the
conversation around it.
Speaker 6 (25:10):
I know when the US snub happened. I don't want
to get her name wrong, but the director of till
Chanoya she had posted. She had posted on her Instagram
and it wasn't directly in response, but a the timeing
people took it as a response. But she talked about
how Hollywood, you know, treats black women horribly and they
push this white male stereotype. Do you feel like that's changing?
(25:30):
Has changed since the since the snub? I know you
don't care about the snub, but has that changed in
the work that you're doing or do you think it
will change?
Speaker 4 (25:36):
I think that we have always been present creating the
significant works for ourselves. The funding may not look the same,
the ubiquity of it and the marketing of it may
not look the same, But there are plenty of black women,
uh in a variety of other people of color joining
the fold of making the stuff that we want to see.
(25:58):
There is no uh true idea of us like not
being able to push, you know, towards the center. We
are the center period, right And should there be more support, yes,
but you can't. You can't hold down what's already you know.
Speaker 1 (26:19):
Moving up, moving That's dope.
Speaker 5 (26:22):
How do y'all see storytelling as a tool for social transformation?
Speaker 1 (26:26):
M M.
Speaker 5 (26:26):
That feel like the arts are going to be very
important to us moving forward, especially with them just taking
history out of everything.
Speaker 3 (26:33):
Always always been, always has.
Speaker 1 (26:35):
Been, you know.
Speaker 3 (26:36):
It's it's uh, it's a it's a foundation of of
like as we as we're talking about of our history
and inspiring the future, you know what I mean. It's
it's it's it's vital, you know. And and for people
to see things and reintroduce them to ideas that maybe
they don't that's that's the important thing. Is like as
(26:57):
as as a younger generation comes out, they don't don't
have to fight the trials and tribulations that like my
mother had to fight. I didn't have to fight some
of those things. But it's important to make sure that
people understand them, because they don't understand it, then they're
coming out with a certain sense of ignorance to the
world and may not think that certain things are are present,
(27:21):
you know, And and racism and discrimination and the isms
are there whether you whether you recognize them or not,
they're there. So it's it's I think it's vital for
art to keep speaking from our perspective, so that it's like, oh, no,
you got to know how to handle these things for
(27:42):
future generations. It's just it's vital.
Speaker 4 (27:44):
No, it's just a beautiful poetic looping right. I remember
doing this. It wasn't technically a play. It was like
a dance exhibition with that was called Women Hold Up
Half the Sky right as a kid with Total Dance theater.
And I learned about four little girls in that piece.
And then there was also this poem from Nikki Giovanni
(28:05):
in the piece Capitola Williams delivered that hard and then
that makes me connect to Okay, then I'm doing till right.
Like these stories, these fragments jump you know, between us,
right and oh okay, Nikki Giovanni she loved Tupac right,
and so then Tupac raps about this and then this.
You are to find the fragment and then expand upon it.
(28:27):
I think that that it's not just just in the art, right,
the art, that whatever it is that you connected to,
whether it's in hip hop or whether it's in a film,
you take whatever is magnifying for you in your mind,
and then you are to dig deeper. You are to
read more about it. This is the beauty of art.
(28:50):
Art takes a single thing, and it is to it
is to make it. It's supposed to enable you to
loop things further into the fold. For it, everything is
deeply connected if we but seek it out, if we
but make the effort.
Speaker 5 (29:04):
Absolutely, how do you decide when the story is worth
the emotional toll it takes on creators and the audience
because art can be healing, but it can also reopen
or wounds.
Speaker 4 (29:14):
Dude, Yeah, you mean for me? Yeah, I'm gonna. I'm gonna.
I'm gonna give everything to a thing if I choose
to do it. And we talk a lot about recovery.
(29:38):
I mean, I think it's something for me. Now I'm
a sabbatical y'all. Man, Was I supposed to be here?
Like it's it's I'm making conscious choices even more along,
you know, just along the trajectory of the career, right
like trying to make sure that I am well and
I'm okay in the midst of the things that I
choose to do. That's why I did three comedy maze
(29:58):
things in the course of the as a year. But
the other things are really valuable because you have to
Refield the cup or you have nothing to give, or
it suffers, or you know whatnot. But I am consciously
moving things around to do stuff so that I can
(30:20):
be Okay. I also have a child. I also have
a family. I need to be with them. I need
to This is not just for for me. This is
for a greater community and knowing how the community responds
to that thing just and I mean, we're constantly referring
back to Till. But like Youano, you talked about not
wanting to traumatize or trigger in the experience of things.
(30:44):
There are all kinds of ways to tell a story
and not not take people down into a into an experience.
In a certain kind of way, you can you can
tell a story and and and with nuance and modification
and a certain kind of way bring them into the
fold of the thing. It doesn't have to be utterly,
(31:05):
you know, drudgery and treacherous the way that it makes
yourself or the audience feel.
Speaker 1 (31:10):
What do you Till change.
Speaker 5 (31:13):
About you as a mother, because you are already are
black mother. But you know, tonight I went to go
see Till. I saw it at a premiere and Sabrina Fulton.
Speaker 1 (31:21):
Was dead and night.
Speaker 5 (31:22):
So that was like wow, you know, just watching that
what happened to you know, mother Tale? But then seeing
Sabrina day, I'm like, yo, you know, it's still happening
right now.
Speaker 4 (31:33):
I feel like it changed. I had a different understanding
of the rigor of the era of woman, to live
in that kind of femininity, to live in that kind
of presentation of self, that shifted for me. My motherhood
is is straight up, it was continuous. We have to
protect our children in a certain kind of way, in
(31:54):
the same way that Haley is in here, like you
about to learn how to shoot this gun, and you
about to learn how to beat these you know, like
that's the kind of thing that is always present. But
how do you present that? How do you? I think
the value is showing the diversity of your womanhood so
that your children know that you are a human. That
(32:14):
was critical and from from till two forty and so
you're always gonna you know, mother Tiger over your kids.
Speaker 5 (32:24):
But you know, I want to ask you, you want
to go back to the question about when you decide
when the story is worth the emotional tool it takes on.
Speaker 1 (32:31):
I think it's on you as a creator.
Speaker 3 (32:33):
And yeah, I think I think it's it's it's a
it's a gut thing, right Like it's it's it's something
that you you know, I mean, when you get into
a work and you know that just this is something
important for you, you're just willing to take on what
that process is gonna bring. And you know that any
(32:54):
process that we dive into, what our whole selves is
going to it's going to. Yes, it's gonna it's gonna
hurt us some days and some days it's gonna be challenging,
but it's also gonna make you grow at the end.
And I think at the end of the day, it's
like you you look forward to that growth truthfully, you
know what I mean. I look forward to coming out
the other side and learning from what the process brings
me and know that I'll be I hope that I'll
(33:17):
be a better person from the interaction and and and
the community that you do. When you build these things,
you come upon a community and you learn your lessons,
you know what I mean, Like, you learn your lessons
through that process and you say, Okay, cool, never gonna
do that this way again, you know what I mean.
But like, you know what I mean, So you just
(33:37):
you know those things, and so there's a beautiful thing
when you come out the other side because you you're
a stronger person for it, and that makes it worthwhile,
you know, that makes it go Okay, next one, I'm
gonna learn some more. I'm gonna grow a little bit better,
you know what I mean. So it makes a process.
Speaker 4 (33:54):
This is a baby, you're making a baby. Ye ride
with that thing for a few years, right, like, whether
you're writing it, like I mean, we're talking about this
from Pandemic. It's twenty three five now. This man has
been writing with this thing for that long. And so
you want to make an extremely conscious decision about what
you are, what you are rearing.
Speaker 5 (34:14):
What do you hope of future generations of artists, especially
black creatives, take from the work that y'all are creating
right now?
Speaker 1 (34:20):
What do you want me to take from forty in particular?
Speaker 3 (34:25):
I just feel like, you know, I think it's all there.
I think it's all there. I think it's like, you know,
I want people to to mine the past, make sure
that they have that expression, you know, because we're the
only ones that are going to tell our stories, you know,
Like the whole interaction between the indigenous and Black community
is like rarely talked about across history because history has
(34:49):
been presented in kind of one way from one perspective. So,
you know, we wanted to pay tribute to to some
of those things in this film. And I just think
it's important that we keep doing that, go back to
our past and remind people. But then also I'm about
creating stuff for the future, and and and and Cinema
(35:12):
for me, has always been a beautiful art form of
of of entertainment, you know what I mean of visceral thrills,
Like it's not I love better than being in the
theater and the whole audience moving with you. You feel it.
It's like a concert. Like you feel that you know
you people, You feel everybody tighten up when something's about
(35:33):
to happen. You feel that release when you know when
it does. And this there's something really beautiful about that.
And I encourage, you know, future generations and other directors
and storytellers to like embrace that feeling that you get
from whatever that.
Speaker 1 (35:47):
Art form is for you.
Speaker 3 (35:49):
You know, whatever that art form is for you.
Speaker 4 (35:51):
I would throw three things out. Rigor is critical, I mean,
and we're getting this from from the film to just
in real life too. Like rigor and discipline ease the
utmost imperative and essential for any kind of art making.
Learn the craft so that you can therein move to intuition.
The intuitive spirit is yeah, it's it's pivotal. You have
(36:13):
to have that so that it can have your stamp,
your unique imprint. And then love.
Speaker 3 (36:20):
Uh.
Speaker 4 (36:20):
Michael gray Eyes taught me uh. One of the Indigenous
terms for love. It's kasaka ten and it's to grow
into oneself right, Like, love isn't just this romantic notion.
It's it's about seeing something flourish. I think that's an
inner thing and an outer world thing. And so to
have the utmost of rigor and discipline and thing in
(36:43):
the thing that you do, move that into the intuitive
spirit and your own in a world and do it
with the utmost.
Speaker 2 (36:50):
Well, definitely go check out the film forty eight kres
and we appreciate.
Speaker 3 (36:53):
You guys and everywhere you know.
Speaker 2 (37:00):
All right, Well, Daniel Deadwiler, Artie Throwing, thank you so
much for joining us.
Speaker 3 (37:03):
Thank you, Thanks Breakfast Club, good morning.
Speaker 5 (37:07):
Hold on every day I wake, pass up the Breakfast Club.
Speaker 4 (37:12):
Finish for y'all.
Speaker 1 (37:12):
Done,
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