Kemp Powers talks directing the Spider-Verse, Obama, Blerds & more | S7 E11 | 1 on 1's w/Deuces - 1-on-1's w/Deuces

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:07):
Geek Sick Podcast Blurs in the game.

Speaker 2 (00:52):
Alright, alright, alright, alright, Welcome back to the geek Set podcast,
the only podcast that blend hip hop culture and geek
coacher together.

Speaker 3 (01:03):
I'm the boy Duces and this is one on one
with Deuces the player where I speak of creators, curators
and people.

Speaker 1 (01:08):
That you should know.

Speaker 3 (01:09):
And again, you guys know when I say this intro
that I do not say this lightly.

Speaker 1 (01:15):
But we are talking to a whole legend right now.

Speaker 3 (01:18):
And when I say a whole legend, I am talking
about an Oscar nominee.

Speaker 1 (01:23):
I'm talking about first African American to co direct.

Speaker 3 (01:26):
A Disney animated film and the person who was responsible
for the talk of the whole world across the I
mean beyond the across the Spider Verse.

Speaker 1 (01:36):
We have one and only Kemp Powers.

Speaker 4 (01:39):
How are you doing, brother, I'm good, partially responsible. Like
I said, I'm part of a team. Man. This was
this movie was like the ultimate team effort. I'm feeling good.
I mean, I'm tired. It's been a busy week. It's
been you know what I'm saying. Like it's just one
of those things where it's like yeah, yeah, like you
you do your work and you kind of sit down
at the in and you're like, I think, I think

(02:02):
I think we did something good. Man, I think this
is you know what I mean, Like you, I think
you got something good. I mean you're like, you know,
I think I think this is good. And it's hard
to get to that point where you can even say
that about your own work, you know, you know what
I mean, Like being an artist, being a writer and
a director, you're you're filled with this self doubt because

(02:25):
the process. So to be like there at those last
moments in like the sound mix stage and just being like, yo,
I think this. I think this is dope. So whether
the world loves it or hates it, I love it.
And then to actually have it come out and a
lot of people show that kind of love, man, it's
really validating. Man. It's really validating.

Speaker 1 (02:47):
Man. So you know, shout out the noriegg and the
drink champs.

Speaker 3 (02:50):
They make it more you know, acceptable, to make sure
that we are giving people their flowers while they're here.
And I know you've been hearing the praises and everything,
but I need to let you know, I mean, from
the blurred culture to you, bro, man, we truly appreciate
everything that you are standing for and everything that you're
bringing to this culture, telling these black stories, really pushing
the narrative on, trying to have just you know, different

(03:12):
stories told, you know, in animation. I see your love
for animation, love for this culture, and just being able
to integrate so many things, you know, with the music,
with the culture, with the sound, with the representation, and
so many different avenues.

Speaker 1 (03:27):
So thank you so much for it. Man.

Speaker 3 (03:30):
Like I said, I just we can't stop singing those
praises enough because just as much as it's important for
us to have those black actors and that representation in
front of that camera, it is highly important for us
to have so many people behind the scenes directing, writing,
you know.

Speaker 1 (03:46):
DP whatever, Like we need those people well.

Speaker 3 (03:49):
And you know, your stories one of those stories of
so much inspiration. You know, twenty the pandemic hit and
it caused everybody to pivot. And you are a person
who literally lived pivoting. You know, You've spent almost two
decades being a journalist and then you pivoted over because

(04:11):
you had this really in that like raw talent for
writing where some where people were giving you opportunities just
based off of that journalism, but off of that, worked
off of that and everything like that.

Speaker 1 (04:23):
So you know, I wanted to.

Speaker 3 (04:24):
Like dive into that, Like what was the turning point
for you where you pivoted from journalism making that big
career change and jumping into you know, directing and writing
and just expanding your your talents.

Speaker 4 (04:38):
Yeah, I mean the reality is it wasn't just one
turning point, you know what I mean. Like it's one
of those things where I've always loved to write. I've
always been one of those I mean I used to
write comic books when I was a little kid, you know,
and draw them myself, you know, And I always liked
to write poetry. I was always a creative person. But like,

(05:00):
let's be real, Like, you know, I grew up. I
grew up in Brooklyn in the eighties, and you know,
when you come from a community that's you know, not
that well off. You the jobs that the thing that
I do for a career now, I didn't know existed
when I was eight years old, you know what I mean.
So no matter how much you enjoy doing a thing,
it's like, well that's not something I can do from

(05:22):
my life, from my career. So you know, I knew
I loved to write, and I knew I love to read,
and journalism was like the natural career path to go into,
you know, going into college freshman year, I started writing
for my school paper and that turned into the start
of my journalism career. But I always wrote creatively for fun.

(05:42):
And that's just it is that when you're always doing
this for yourself, you know you your most important audience
because and I and I've kept that from when I
was a kid to now, Like I call it arrogance.
I think I have pretty good taste, you know, And
I think artists can often get caught up in this

(06:02):
like what does the market want to see? What a
people want? It's like, no, man, I'm a fan. I'm
a fan of film. I'm a fan of art. I'm
a film I'm a fan of animation. What do I
want to see? What would I want to go and
like put my money down and go out there and see. So,
you know, it's it's just about like trusting your own taste.

(06:24):
And honestly, for me, it was, like I said, it
was a multipart process. I was in the middle of
my journalism career and I got a fellowship. I got
basically take a sabbatical year away from journalism to do
uh what was called the Night Fellowship at University of Michigan.
So I got one year off to go to Michigan
in ann Arbor, and I was supposed to be like

(06:47):
studying global economics while I was there, and I wanted
to take a writing class. The only writing class that
was available with screenwriting. And I was like, oh, you know,
I've written comic scripts before, I've dabbled in writing plays.
I'm gonna give this a shot. So ied up being
in a screenwriting class at the university. And I was
about ten years older than all the other students because
I was almost thirty years old. So maybe it was

(07:08):
because of the age, my perspective whatever, you know. My
professor told me like, you ought to give the screenwriting
thing a chance. And that's really what kind of prompted
me to first move out to la way back in
like two thousand and three. But when I first got here,
it wasn't it just I got another screenwriting fellowship at USC.

(07:28):
You know, I did screenwriting there, got my first agent,
and it just it just washed out. Man, Like my
first I did my toe into Hollywood for like a
year and was like, yeah, this isn't for me, Like
this just isn't me. So I backed out of it
and went back to journalism for like over a decade.
And now that I kind of didn't care about breaking

(07:50):
into Hollywood anymore, I was doing my writing on the side,
writing little short plays. Short plays turn into full length
place and finally I got my first full length produced
and that play was one night in Miami. So I
got that play produced here in La at a little
ninety nine seat theater off of Pico and Librea. You know.

(08:10):
Literally the theater was across the street from Roscoe's and
it was one of those things where it kind of
caught fire audiences in the neighborhood and the community. I
lived like four blocks from the theater, so community kind
of started coming out to the play. It kept getting extended,
and by like the third month or four and fourth
month of that extension, it was Hollywood and the audience.

(08:32):
And so once again I got like a second invitation
to come back to give this a shot. And it
came at the perfect time for me because after being
a journalist all those years, I had just gotten laid
off from what ended up being my last journalism job.
I was. I was a senior editor at Yahoo, and

(08:53):
I was kind of at this crossroads where it was like, Okay,
I immediately got offered another job at another publication. But
I was like, all right, I just got laid off.
You know, I got my severance package, you know, my
stocks bested. I basically got like a year's worth of
salary in the bank right now, and you know, this

(09:16):
is it. Like I'm about to turn like forty years
old at the time, and I'm like, this is my
last shot. I've been this this thing I've been doing
for fun my whole life that I've really dreamed to do.
This is my shit to get off the pop moment,
you know. And so I basically decided to like not
take the other job and give myself until my bank

(09:36):
account ran down a little over a year to finally
try to make the screenwriting thing work out. So I
committed myself to it, and I kid you not, it
was like a couple of months before that bank account
was a zero. I sold my first TV show, you know,
and then the show didn't get made, but I got

(09:58):
put into developments, you know what I'm saying, And so
I got some money, I got to start working within
the within the system, you know, and and there were
lots of little things like that, Like you know, I
got into my first TV writer's room, didn't go well,
you know, I got to let go of that room,
and every time it also helped me a lot that
I was I still I just had a play that

(10:20):
closed just a couple of months ago. I write and
direct in different mediums, so whenever I would get tired
of one thing, I just kind of pivot over to
something that could give me happiness and satisfaction. I'm very
like driven by being my true self, you know, in
everything that I do. But I mean those are a

(10:40):
couple of like, really the the key moments. I think
it was getting let go of my last job at
the right time when my work was finally getting recognized,
and rather than like playing it safe, being like, well,
you know, dude, you know better keep that job for security,
I said to hell with it, and like, just like
I had enough money I don't want to make get

(11:00):
it twisted like I was working as a barista. I
was just like I had enough money in the bank
to float me for it. And rather than be like
all right, I'll get started on this in a couple
of months, like I was jamming. I mean, I was
doing meetings, I was pitching stories, you know, every good
idea that I had. I was kind of trying to
put it out into the world, and finally it started

(11:22):
to kind of stick.

Speaker 3 (11:24):
No, that's such an inspirational story, especially like something for me,
like I'm two months into where you were when you
just got let go from your job, right, and so
now I'm two months into voice acting, and just similar
to your story. Once that happened, like you know, I
do narration for watch Mojo, they started amping me up
like they need more of me over there, and I'm like,

(11:45):
oh man, I'm like, you know, yeah, same thing. I'm like,
I've been dipping my toe. And then his voice acting
and I was like, you know what, now I'm going
full fledged. And then just like two weeks ago, I
got my agent. So I'm listening to your story, like, yo, okay,
this is giving me inspiration.

Speaker 4 (11:58):
You know, is work and that's the thing, Like it's
art and it's fun and it's we have joy. But
I don't think people understand how competitive this is. Like, oh,
there are there's a million more qualified talented people, then
there are opportunities. So the difference between the talented people

(12:21):
who are here who are not, honestly is perseverance and
luck like you gotta be you got to be in
it and working hard like and it's honestly, that's a
lesson I learned from from my journalism days. I Mean
it was like, I don't have to be the best writer.
I gotta be the one who can deliver the story.

Speaker 3 (12:41):
There we go, you know, And that's the one that's
the one thing that I always try to whole, you know,
I preach to my team. You know, we're a team
of four essentially, but then we have like you know,
other people that help us out with this podcast. And
the one thing I tell them, I say, look, what
we are trying to do is be this reporters of
the culture. So when we look at things like the
stuff that you do, and like when then we are

(13:02):
able to get like you.

Speaker 1 (13:03):
Know, this interview with you, to me, I'm like, yeah,
that is us.

Speaker 3 (13:06):
We're helping tell Kemp's story, We're helping expand his story
and everything like that, and that's what we hang our
hats on. So like these wins like this I'm like, Yo,
this is huge, Like this is the biggest movie of
the year right now, we got the guy that's been
working on it, you know what I'm saying.

Speaker 1 (13:22):
So it's like, you know, I latch onto that.

Speaker 3 (13:24):
And you know what's really dope about you know your
drive again, your drive is always embedded and telling.

Speaker 1 (13:31):
Just different stories. Right. You know when you talk about
the Spider Verse and you.

Speaker 3 (13:35):
Talk about the art, I think that is something that
a lot of people, some people who didn't realize the
power of animation don't see, right, But Spider Verse forced
a lot of people to focus on themes, focus on art,
focus on animation and music. So in this movie, and
you know with everything you talk about like the individual

(13:56):
silos that you Justin and Joaquin have, right and you
now yours is like you really love directing the voice
actors and the editing process.

Speaker 1 (14:05):
So what is it about that process that really draws you?

Speaker 4 (14:09):
I think because of coming from theater, I like working
with actors and I like trying to get the best,
like most emotional performance out of it. And edit, Like look, man,
movies are movies are basically cut together and edit. That's
edit is where everyone every talented person's amazing work kind
of ends up in that edit suite, and that's where
you kind of piece this all together and you start

(14:31):
seeing what you have. And edit is as much about
having debates, you know, like you're seeing it up there
and you're having debates. It's constant debates about like what's
the best path to go down. It really taps into
the best part of my creativity. And again when I say,
when we say Silo ultimately understand we all had to

(14:52):
do everything. It's just that when you start getting down
to the wire for y's sake, you know, the early
part of making a movie like this is like being
at art school. It's so fantastic because you know, the
three of us, and then sometimes Phil and Chris, like
we're going to meetings with character designers and costume designers,

(15:13):
like we it was a running joke among the team
how much I obsessed over Jeff's shirt at the barbecue.
Jeff shirt at the barbecue. We went through so many
shirts and it became a joke. It's like, basically, I
just want him to wear a shirt that I would wear,
because you know, I'm like his aide. I got a

(15:34):
teamate son, and I want you know, like I just
want a dope shirt. And so you know, Breathe one
of our costume designers, like she she gave us so
many shirt for Jeff and Rio. And this was years ago.
This is like early on, before the scene is even built,
and we're obsessing over things like that, you know. You
know what I'm saying, Like Miles is Jersey in his

(15:55):
room is an alternate dimension, right, so and his dimension
is still the Knicks, but it's the Brooklyn Knicks. I'm
a Knicks fan Brooklyn. And then when you see his back,
the player he's wearing is sham God God sham God.
Now b being from New York God, Samn God the
sham God crossover is He's godfather of the crossover. And

(16:19):
I'm like, it's this is important, Like we got to
reach out and get the rights of this because, like
I love the idea that in an alternate universe, God
sham God was like a star player for the New
York Knicks. He wasn't just a free ball legend who
played a couple of seasons. So understand man, most people
will never notice that, but these film special is that

(16:41):
the to me, details like that feel like a tremendous win,
just seeing Miles get up off his bed and see
sham God across his Brooklyn Knicks jersey and all that stuff.
Like we're all coming. We're doing that together, you know
what I'm saying, Like me and Justin Joaquin, like we're
poor ring all of our passion and our all of

(17:03):
our nerdiness, but this shit that matters so much to us,
we're pouring it into into little moments of the film
like that, you know, making sure Miles is eaten a
Jamaican beef patty. You know what I mean, because that's
what I you know, it's like little details like like
that and not just related to Myles, related to to
like all of the of the characters, you know, like
that barbecue scene was a coming together, a mishmash of

(17:27):
so many people's black Latino, so many people's passions, like
Octavio Rodriguez, who was our head of story. Who's Who's Dominican?
You know, Like you know, we're pouring over every food
item on on plates, like trying to be like, Okay,
what do you eat this here? You know, like Phil
Lord who who who you know is of Cuban descent,

(17:50):
you know, it's everybody gets to be a part of it.
And I think that's just it. It's like the it
felt like I'm from New York and it felt like
everyone in the city got represented and got to like
jump in and play and feel like you know, they
got they got to put themselves in there.

Speaker 1 (18:09):
Well, I mean that's why it's so important to make
sure you have those people in the rooms.

Speaker 3 (18:13):
You know, Like I said, you know that sham God reference,
that is a cultural reference street ball, especially New York
in general, right, and so it's like, you know, that's
something that somebody who is from that culture doesn't really
understand that culture or know about that culture, would not
get the relevance of that, you know, the relevance of
the forty two, you know, using that number often and everything,

(18:35):
and like just knowing what that number represents. It just
and it's one of the things that is really dope
because you talked about even you know, the Indian Spider
Man and how you guys you know, consulted you know,
people to make sure the pieces that like what would
be a good representation on the suit and everything, and
you know, I didn't you know, the think the most
interesting thing is you know, when we talk about, you know,

(18:57):
being a geek. You know, one of our things that
we do on our podcast is we are changing what
the word geek is, right, you know, because the geek
it still has those negative stereotypes people.

Speaker 1 (19:08):
You know, still the butt of the jokes, the nerd
and all that stuff.

Speaker 3 (19:10):
Right, But to me, a geek is somebody who can
go into very in detail about a specific topic. You know,
we talk about sports and we can say, oh, Kobe
and Lebron is one of our favorite players.

Speaker 1 (19:23):
You know, Jordan's our favorite player.

Speaker 3 (19:25):
But you'll see somebody who can rattle off stats to
explain why Jordan is the best or Kobe.

Speaker 1 (19:31):
Is the best, or Lebron or whatever. Right, So, and
to me, those are sports nerds or sports geeks. Right.

Speaker 3 (19:37):
So, when you think about, like I said, when you
start thinking about like how much you guys study the art,
what was the what was the what was the most
interesting art fact that you uncovered while studying all these
different art styles?

Speaker 4 (19:50):
I think it was the POV's Worldmbotan, the Indian Indra,
y'all comic books, because I didn't know a lot. I mean,
I grew up reading comic books and I had my
you know, the Marvel comics, particularly of my world growing up,
but I did not know that Indrad y'all were basically
the Marvel comics of India. And in the process of

(20:12):
doing research, we got hundreds of Indridgill comic books. So
I found myself you know, reading these and in addition
to the art style and the comics being so strikingly different,
the stories they were trying to tell. So it was
really kind of cool making a discovery about a very
niche community of comic books and seeing how it evolved

(20:35):
in another part of the world. So I think, you know,
Thembotan Pavitra's world ended up being one of those worlds
we were like the most proud of, you know, and
for me personally being exposed to to like a different
culture in a much deeper way than I ever had before.
From the comic books to that writer's room where where

(20:58):
you know, like we assemble that writer's room to to
rebreak that section of the film. And that's something that's
really going to point out is that it had to
be bad first before we make it good, and so
much of the spirit of collaboration is you got to
give people room to make mistakes.

Speaker 2 (21:17):
You know.

Speaker 4 (21:18):
It's like we had a version of that scene that
we thought was looking pretty good, and our Indian animators
in Vancouver like wrote us an email and they were
just like, yo, we get what you're trying to do,
but like this doesn't feel good to us. Blah blah blah.
We did. We actually did a group zoom call, so
all the Indian animators were on the zoom call and
they kind of voiced all their different concerns. No one

(21:40):
got defensive, you know, and it's like, and that's both sides.
We didn't get defensive with them and they didn't get
angry at us for doing it wrong. So you've got
to give people room to grow mistakes and grow if
it's one of those things where if you make a mistake,
you're done. Then guess what. Then it's like like people
are going to be afraid to try anything new. And

(22:03):
I think this film is the culmination of people just
not being afraid for once not being because we got
to mess up forty times or fifty times before we
get to this version of the film that you actually like, No, yeah, and.

Speaker 3 (22:20):
That you know that makes sense, But it's also the
environment that you guys build you know, being able to
let those Indian animators know like, hey, we are tested
it out with you guys, not only just because we
want to say, hey, look at us giving you representation,
but we do want to make sure that this does
feel good. So and having that open discussion and conversation

(22:41):
it only breathes the best because you know, I can say,
you know, walking away from the Spider Verse and that
whole crowd, there was so many talks about how everybody
felt so represented.

Speaker 1 (22:54):
You know, nobody felt slighted.

Speaker 3 (22:55):
Everybody felt you know, there was people like, hey, that's
my parents or you know, hey that's how I grew up,
or hey, you know what, Oh man, that looks dope.

Speaker 1 (23:03):
I want to see more into that. So it's like
it's really dope.

Speaker 3 (23:06):
And then you know, obviously with any comic book movie
there's going to be all this talks and conversations, deep dives,
you know, especially with the Easter eggs. Now, one of
the biggest Easter exs that I feel like a lot
of people didn't realizing the first one but now really
are highlighting on this one is the fact that Donald
Glover is the reason for the creation of Miles morales

(23:27):
and so you know, you know, again I put spoiler
alert ahead of this so that way my listeners know
before they listen. But like you guys have them pop
up in there, like tell me about that experience. I
know that had to be extremely dope, especially as a
comic book heade yourself.

Speaker 4 (23:42):
Yeah, yeah, I mean, and that came together at the
last minute. The Donald Glover cameo. Like the movie released
June second, you know, we started screening it in late May.
I'm not kidding. I believe we recorded Donald on like
April fifth. Yeah, it was kind of like almost done,

(24:06):
and it was hard with the schedules. We knew we
wanted to do have that cameo, but we couldn't pull
it together. And we pull it together at the last
minute and got it and got it in there, and
it was just kind of again it was like what
what what was amusing to us? And like and we
experimented with it because early on, you know, the scene

(24:27):
is in two storyboards and then it goes into layout.
But like we actually screened a version for a preview audience.
Donald Glover wasn't in it. He and so in his place,
it was like a rough rudimentary, almost like cardboard cutout
looking animation. So it was like South Park where you
see the characters and they're like, oh, you know, like
it was just the flabby mouth thing. But even in

(24:49):
that version it hit so well, like the audience was
on the floor and they didn't see it coming, and
it was just there was all these rumors and speculations about,
you know, having someone live action, and it's like, we
don't want to do it just to keep doing it
and make it corny, like we want to get the
most bang for the buck. And again, like it could

(25:10):
be enjoyed on two different levels. Right if you're like
a super nerd and you're into it and you've you've
seen Spider Man Homecoming and you remember that, great, you're
gonna enjoy it. But then if you don't haven't seen
any of that and you just like, oh, look it's
Donald Glover, like a real life Donald Glover, you can
also be amused and enjoy that as well, because it's

(25:31):
really important that you know, while there are things for
hardcore fans to get, it has to work on a
base emotional story level that is universal that everyone can
get and everyone should be able to enjoy you know,
So it's a you know, it's it's the positive use
of the expression dog whistle, you know what I mean.

(25:52):
It's like dog moments for nerds, dog whistle moments for fans.
But my mom should be able to just kind of
sit through this, not having read any of this stuff,
and track the story and feel the emotion and be
drawn into and feel connected to these characters and understand
the emotional stakes.

Speaker 5 (26:11):
You know, like everybody has the stereotypical on what a
black geek is.

Speaker 4 (26:15):
Are you familiar with the term blurred blood? Some people
said it came off of scrubs. Some people said it
came off the internet. I don't honestly really know. Don't
you see the skin, eyebrows, the hair. Yo, My geeks
still rock, you know what I'm saying, dumps or or
Jordan's or whatever.

Speaker 3 (26:36):
Can I do that?

Speaker 4 (26:37):
It's exciting. It's like, holy, oh my god, it's gonna
start barking.

Speaker 1 (26:42):
That's all right. She's excited about it too.

Speaker 3 (26:46):
And same as you said, like a barbershop talk, like
we would go into really in depth conversations about these
theories and like well what if and I'll come.

Speaker 5 (26:58):
Right, But we we talk about anime, video games, comic books,
and stuff like that. But when you hear us talk
about it, the passion sounds like we're arguing Jordan and Braun.

Speaker 4 (27:08):
What does that even mean?

Speaker 3 (27:12):
Does that even mean?

Speaker 1 (27:13):
Like it sounds like barbershop talking because you don't know.

Speaker 4 (27:16):
The history.

Speaker 1 (27:19):
Broke that down right there. But when you see the
black geek, you don't see that. You see the socially
awkward glasses. Well, this is me, and that's not a
lot of us.

Speaker 4 (27:31):
A lot of us do sound and talk like us.
You know what I'm saying, because it.

Speaker 3 (27:34):
Becomes stereotypical, as if that's where our strength comes from.

Speaker 4 (27:38):
I don't know the geek that you talk with, that
you that you talked about before. I know the geek
you talking about right now.

Speaker 6 (27:45):
It was sort of a call sign so we can
find each other on message boards.

Speaker 4 (27:49):
Anime gives you life lessons throughout that whole thing.

Speaker 3 (27:53):
Like there's not one anime that I know of that
doesn't teach you to.

Speaker 4 (27:58):
Never give up.

Speaker 1 (27:59):
It's like, I just love seeing us go into the
roads and.

Speaker 3 (28:02):
Go into the different spaces and create things that weren't
there before.

Speaker 6 (28:05):
And then it was like miles Girls, like the normal
you know, black person in the United States. That was
my first like blurred moment was seeing you know, Storm
on an X Men cartoon series, and I was like, Wow,
that's a black woman and she's strong, she's powerful.

Speaker 1 (28:23):
That's what I want for us.

Speaker 7 (28:24):
I want us to be that voice boy. So you know,
and then you know, when you go into a movie
like this, you know, like you said, you guys, there's

(28:45):
you got you got the three headed Dragon between you,
Justin and Joaquin, and you know, there's so many other
people that's involved with it. And I know that there's
things that make you know, that make it and things
that get left on the cutting floor. Was there any
anything any Spider people that she was like, dang it,
I really wish that one would, but it just didn't
work out.

Speaker 4 (29:04):
There's things that were super cool man that, but I
don't want to say that I wish it were in there,
because I feel like if it wasn't serving the story
and the narrative, it had to go. No matter how
cool it was. There was a lot of other cool
shit that it was just like it's cool in all,
but like, one, we're not going to make a five

(29:25):
hour movie here, you know what? I mean, like it's
already it's already like the one of the longest animation ever.
So understand that, like it's all you know, you already
might need to take a bathroom break if you're In
order for them to not take a bathroom break, we
got to keep them engaged, right, right.

Speaker 1 (29:42):
We got to make.

Speaker 4 (29:43):
Sure that people want to just hold it because they
don't want to get up and miss something. But there
were like lots of cool ideas. I mean, it's it's
been mentioned in other articles. I mean there was one
point where, you know, the Spot went into the bar
with no name, and it was like all these like
mad supervillains there, like crazy you know, from you know
the Wall to like Hypno Hustler. Everybody was in the

(30:04):
bar and you got into like and he got into
like a fight with Hammerhead and it was and it
was wild, you know what I mean, Yeah, it was
like it was it was a while, like you know,
the bar was like hidden down and down a down
a subway shaft and like he knocked on the wall
and the wall speaks and it's the character of the wall,

(30:25):
you know what I mean, And it's like like what's
the password? And so it was fun, but it didn't fit,
you know what I mean, It didn't fit. And it's
not to say that it's something that can't be exp
a different version can't be explored you know later in
some other way, or that you might not see some
of these characters some other time. It's just in terms

(30:47):
of serving the narrative of the story. As cool as
it was, you know, it's it can it You don't
want to, like, no pun intended, go off the rails
and terms you try and tell.

Speaker 1 (31:00):
Know definitely definitely understand. And then you know again with
these movies, you have it where like.

Speaker 3 (31:04):
You know, everybody digs into the Easter eggs and everything
and an interest in Easter egg which is more of
like a meta Easter egg that I heard, and I
want to just double check and make sure you guys
used the kid to do the stop animation for that
stop animation world that is so dope, like that's being
so connected to the culture like that and making that

(31:25):
type of decision. Whose idea was that to involve the kid?
And how did that conversation him about?

Speaker 4 (31:30):
Well, I understand, we didn't know he was a kid
at first, so that was a bit of a surprise.
For us, because there have been some talk about adding
a Lego World, but we hadn't done it yet, and
it was right after we released our very first teaser trailer.
We leased it. We released a couple of trailers, but
the first teaser trailer. Preston Mutanga, who was the kid

(31:53):
who ended up doing it, he did like a shot
by shot recreation of that teaser trailer and Lego And
I'm not on social media much. I have a Twitter,
but I don't look at it much, but like I
saw that we were all sharing it with each other,
and when the conversation went on about like are we
going to do the Lego World, it was like, you know,
be cool, we should reach out to the guy who

(32:13):
did that, because I mean, Jesus, he obviously knows what
you're doing and that's kind of fun. So reaching out.
We found out that he was a fourteen year old kid.
First it was like okay, so we left it to
the producers and business affairs to figure out, you know,
you know, probably how to work it out. But of course,

(32:34):
after he actually believed that it was the film trying
to have him do it and not a frank because understandably,
you know him and his parent parents would be a
little bit suspicious, but once they realized that that it
was that was real, we managed to work it out.
He was and he I think he did a phenomenal job.
I mean, I thought, it's it's so great. It's one

(32:58):
of the to me, one of the moments in the
film that gets one of the biggest laughs. That's it's
a wonderful callback to you know, filling Chris and one
of their earlier things with the Lego movie. Yeah, it
was it just it just turned into something pretty special.

Speaker 1 (33:15):
No, No, that was super dope.

Speaker 4 (33:16):
Man.

Speaker 3 (33:16):
Again, that movie, hands down, Man, one of the best
that we've that we've seen out there and really killing
this year.

Speaker 1 (33:22):
Now. I do also want to talk about Man, you
work with the.

Speaker 3 (33:25):
Obamas on Higher Ground productions, right, What was it like
and what is like working on that project with them?

Speaker 1 (33:32):
Like I need the incitement.

Speaker 4 (33:34):
Yeah, I mean, I can't talk about it too much,
but I mean, look, Barack Obama is a I don't
want to necessarily call him a blurd, but I'd say
he's not not a blurd because I'm like the first
conversation I had with him, we bonded over undercover Brother.
You know, and a mutual a mutual love of Undercover Brother,

(33:56):
you know, because having a conversation and he quotes and
I was like, wait a minute, did you just the
Cover Brother? And he was like, yeah, that's one of
I'm doing a battle bomb. He's like, yeah, that's one
of the greatest movies ever. And I was like, oh shit.
And we like went down a rabbit hole talking about
Undercover Brother while the other execs in the room are
kind of looking at each other, and it was like,

(34:17):
haven't you all seen Undercover Brother? And a couple of
people were like no, and we were like, oh man,
you've all got to see Undercovered Brother. So he loves
he loves film and art and all those you know
what I mean. He loves all those same things. So
you know, with the with the project. When when I
came on board to work with them as as a writer,

(34:38):
initially I had to like interview and have a conversation
with him and kind of give him ideas. And I
realized that, like it's simpatico, you know, like this is
a this is a guy who who is thoughtful and
one of the smartest like people I've ever met, and
I like his taste you know what I mean, Like
his his list every year he does of top films.

(34:58):
I was proud to have Soul end up on his list,
you know. And and and that's how we first, you know, connected,
because when I was trying to work with them, they
wanted to see some of my work and Soul wasn't
out yet. So thankfully the folks at Disney accommodated me.
We arranged for them to screen Soul for him and
his family because this was during COVID in their house

(35:20):
over Father's Day. And so, you know, they watched Soul
and then you know, gave me a shout and really
enjoyed it and decided to kind of kind of work together.
And you know, he was, he was in town, you know,
not too long ago, and you know, got a chance
to to chop it up a little bit. But he's
just a thoughtful, smart guy with amazing taste who's trying

(35:42):
to produce incredible stories. And that's that's that's music to
my ears because I'm trying to go out there and
tell incredible stories that I hope surprise and delight and
move people. I mean that that's it. I'm trying to,
you know, connect people reconnect people to their own humanity.

Speaker 3 (36:01):
Yeah, and you know, you know, so two things. One,
you don't have to call him a blurb, but we're
definitely going to call him a blur.

Speaker 1 (36:08):
I'm letting you know that now.

Speaker 3 (36:09):
But here's the thing about blurred culture and why that
and what you said is so huge for this culture,
is that that's what we're trying to show.

Speaker 1 (36:19):
You know, we we ourself.

Speaker 3 (36:21):
We are doing an independent documentary called the Black Pep Documentary,
and the idea around this documentary is.

Speaker 1 (36:27):
To show that there's blurbs in every walk of life.

Speaker 3 (36:29):
And one of the inspirations came from, you know, one
of our cinematographers. He's a barber and you you know,
you know how the black barbershop is in our culture,
it's usually filled with hip hop elements, sports talks and
everything like that.

Speaker 4 (36:43):
But he's a blurb.

Speaker 3 (36:44):
So when you walk in his barbershop, it's anime, posters,
comic books, and he has anime on the TV instead
of like Sports Center and stuff like that, and he's
putting people onto anime. And I said, see, that is
a culture that I feel like the world doesn't know
because again, everybody still thinks but to find out, like, Okay,
this cool barber that you know, he's a blurd. The president,

(37:05):
you know, Obama, he's a blurred. And then like and
when I have these conversations, you know, I had a
conversation with Jay Ellis and it was revealed on the
conversation that he's a blurd and the world didn't know that.
I'm like, look, that's what I want to show. I
want to show the world that blurds is everywhere. This
culture is bigger than this little pocket that you guys
think we are.

Speaker 1 (37:24):
You know, we have whole conventions, Blurred Con and Dream Con.

Speaker 3 (37:28):
You know, we have creators that are putting things on
and so it's like, I love to hear those stories
like that.

Speaker 1 (37:33):
I did want to I didn't want to ask you though.

Speaker 3 (37:35):
The second thing is we heard about that legendary week
of dinners that they threw. Is there any chance we're
going to get one week at Brentwood Hotspot? You know,
like a man in a one week at Brentwood tell
that story, because there was a lot of powerful people
in that in that at those dinners.

Speaker 4 (37:51):
I'm sorry, I'm sorry, man, I'm sworn to secrecy. Man,
No I can make no, I can neither confirm that
those dinners or who was there or who wasn't there.
I'm sworn to secrecy. Sorry.

Speaker 3 (38:06):
All right, So we got two more segments. I do
want to have a little bit of fun with you,
all right. So the first segment, we generally do these hypotheticals, right,
but I got a hypothetical for you. I don't know
if you've seen it, because you don't you're not on
the internet as much. But there's been you know, to
talk around AI of course, you know, and I don't
want to get into I don't want to get too
heavy into that talk. But one of the things that

(38:28):
they get that somebody did was they made like Disney
Pixar versions of hip hop artists.

Speaker 1 (38:34):
And knowing you as a person, I'm going to share
my screen real quick.

Speaker 3 (38:37):
Knowing you as a person who wants to tell black
stories and everything, I wanted to get your take on
these on these and then also I wanted to ask
you if you had to choose out of these four
for you to attach.

Speaker 4 (38:54):
Your cell phone.

Speaker 1 (38:54):
So we have a little way going to a goblin.

Speaker 3 (38:57):
We have a Disney Pixar cock, we have a Disney
picks our Wallence for Big obviously that's probably the one
that probably gonna roll with. And then we got jco
Dollar and a Dream. So if you had to attach
yourself to one project, which one of these projects would
empowers attach himself to Wallace Wilence?

Speaker 1 (39:19):
Yeah, I think So.

Speaker 3 (39:20):
What's been great about the conversation around these that I've
been seeing is that like people are like, yo, we
need to get an adult animated studio that would be
able to adapt these wild theories and stories and stuff
like that, where like, yeah, you have these rappers who
have these big time stories, but if there's any way
that you can flip it and you know, appeal to

(39:42):
like that animation style, like a lot of people, like
I would love to see that, you know what I'm
saying embedded in our culture. Knowing that I think the
I think what you guys did with Spider Verse set
the blueprint on how to do animation right, Like you
have to have a combination of music and animation in
art styles with the good stories, because the stories can

(40:04):
be really good. But once you add that animation in
art styles, you got to think, for the most part,
we had movies that like that, you know, adults, we
really watched with our kids, but with Spider Verse, I
saw more adults like, you know, I can't wait to
see this myself. And so if we had, if we
had somebody that kind of jumped into those rioms, a

(40:24):
lot of people are interested in that. So knowing that
you have this thirst for animation and you know, telling
those stories, I mean I wanted to like, what is
your thoughts on telling more adult themed styles, you know,
with with animation. Maybe not nothing crazy like you know,
like New Jack City, but you know, do you see
something like you know like that, do you do you

(40:45):
feel like what's the interest you could be?

Speaker 4 (40:48):
Of course, man, you have to understand, like animation isn't
kid stuff to me. I mean it's a medium for storytelling.
I mean some of the best, some of the best
animated films I've seen in my life, like uh like
The Red Hurdle or Persepolists. You know, these are these
are these are solidly adult dark Watershipped Down is the

(41:10):
is one of my favorite animated films of all time.
And that's dark. I mean that terrifies a lot of kids.
So I I think it's just an incredible medium for storytelling.
That if that if it lends itself to doing it
in that medium. There's there's no story you can't tell
in animation. And you know, I don't just exist in
the world of animation. I do a lot of live action.

(41:32):
I do theater and and and I'm not thinking like, Okay,
I want to do something animated. I'm thinking, what's the
story I'm trying to tell? And is animation the right
medium for it? And something about that process is that
all the beautiful art and all the shiny stuff, like
the story, animation also can't save you. You know, if
the story isn't solid and not told well, polishing it

(41:57):
up with animation is still going to be trash.

Speaker 1 (41:59):
You know.

Speaker 4 (42:00):
Say so that's a that's an that's an elemental thing.
I describe myself as a storyteller, you know, like that's
what I do. That's ultimately the best distillation of these
things that I do is that I'm a storyteller. And
animation is a great medium for storytellers.

Speaker 1 (42:17):
And I feel like you've proven it on multiple platforms.

Speaker 3 (42:20):
That that's I think that's what makes your story and
your work so great because you've done it in plays.

Speaker 1 (42:27):
You've done it in movies, you've done it in animation,
You've done it in journalism.

Speaker 3 (42:32):
It's like you are you know, you are crossing off
all the great things. And then not only that, you
have your their standards, like you know what you want
to do, you you don't, you don't waiver in trying
to tell a good story. You know, you're you're all
about that. You've worked with some amazing people like Regina
King and stuff like that. So it was like, you know,
it's really dope to see what you're doing now. You're

(42:55):
a big comic book buff. I know that, you know,
based off of the kind of the research, I want
to get it from you.

Speaker 1 (43:01):
Uh, there's two top five. The first top five is
going to be just normal one.

Speaker 3 (43:04):
The second one we may use it as a clip
because it's going to cause the Internet to talk. But
the first top five top five comic book runs, because
I know you.

Speaker 1 (43:12):
Are a fan of like you know the writers and
their runs.

Speaker 3 (43:16):
I would like to get some top five comic book
runs from you and.

Speaker 4 (43:22):
Chris Chris Claremont on X Men Okay, Frank Miller on
Daredevil ooh Nice, Paul smith on on X Men, art Wise,
Bill Sinkevich on The New Mutants, and art Adams long Shot.

Speaker 3 (43:43):
Oh hey, you know what, that is a solid list
because it's it gives you different spectrums.

Speaker 1 (43:51):
From writing to art styles.

Speaker 4 (43:53):
Oh shit, I gotta add in a six I gotta
add in a six man. Larry Strouman on X Force.

Speaker 1 (43:59):
You know what, you the second person that recommended that
I need to check that out.

Speaker 4 (44:02):
Larry Larry Stroman that his art, his art, his X
Force run was was dope.

Speaker 1 (44:09):
Okay.

Speaker 3 (44:10):
So now this is the big one, this is the
one that everybody's talking about. I need your top five
Spider Man movies.

Speaker 4 (44:16):
I'm not doing that.

Speaker 1 (44:17):
Nah. I tried it. I tried it, try it so okay.

Speaker 3 (44:27):
So then outside of that, what was your favorite Spider
Man on the one though in Spider Verse, like the
one that you was like, hey, that's my that was
my favorite one.

Speaker 4 (44:34):
Wait what's that? Now? Say that again?

Speaker 3 (44:36):
Spider Verse and Spider Verse out of all the Spider
Man that you and so a lot of people are
saying the.

Speaker 4 (44:42):
Miles is my favorite Spider Man and Spider Verse, Miles
Morales is of our new characters.

Speaker 1 (44:49):
Though.

Speaker 4 (44:49):
I really really love Spider Punk.

Speaker 3 (44:53):
Yeah, Spider Bunk, he grabbed the world.

Speaker 1 (44:57):
Oh my god. Daniel Colulia did his thing.

Speaker 4 (45:00):
Yeah, and it was great to get to know and
work with Daniel too, Like it was a you know,
developing and finding that character with him, so both from
the writing, the performance, the design. He was probably the
most complex, difficult character for us to have in the
entire film. I'm really happy that that people managed to connect.

(45:21):
But I love all I mean, I love and then
when I say my favorite, like I loved every new
character that we brought into it, I mean, Drew Miguel
O'Hara is amazing, Oscar Isaac does a great job. I
mean it's a smaller character, but Amanla Stenberg a spider
bite was really a fun, fun, interesting new character. I've

(45:43):
already mentioned multiple times pov and krn Sony and what
he what he did with pavittro Man was. You know,
it's just it's almost like a movie's worth the work
went into each one of these characters, you know, and
people will never see how much time and love and
energy went into bringing them to life.

Speaker 1 (46:02):
Hopefully you guys put it in the art of book
because I love those I love.

Speaker 4 (46:05):
You gotta trust me, like I I talk about, I
think the art of book comes out the beginning of July,
and we are most times and I and I'm just man,
the art you it's you're you're You're in for a treat.
You're in for a real treat. Wait.

Speaker 3 (46:22):
Was there a moment when while with the movie that
you was like, oh wow, we doing that, like you know,
like when you were reading it or that, just like
you know, as a fan, one moment that like that.

Speaker 1 (46:33):
You was like, oh wow, okay, we doing that.

Speaker 4 (46:36):
No, not really, because I you know, like I was
a part of come you know, pulling it together. So
it was it was like you're having a conversation like
we should try this, we should try that. So there
was there were a few things where I was like, oh, man,
I think I hope this blows people's minds, you know
what I mean, Like I hope that like like the
the the reveal of Miles G. Morales in the in

(46:59):
at the end, Like I that excited me. The you
know figure having Maherschel and Uncle Aaron come back in
a different different dimension. Those things like made me like
really really hype, Like the first time we had that
animated and Miles G kind of drops down off the
rafters and like walks up to Miles, and the first

(47:22):
time I saw that scene lit in that world, I
was It's just one of those things where you're sitting
there and you're like, like, you know, like and you
want to know how it really tore people.

Speaker 3 (47:35):
So I don't know how the marketing team accomplished this,
but somehow a lot of us myself included for god,
that this.

Speaker 1 (47:44):
Was going to be a trilogy.

Speaker 3 (47:46):
Really yes, and so what So this is why, this
is why it got so many people, because as we're watching,
we love the movie and we're having so much fun.
But then after a while, you're like, yo, man, they're
really not going to be able to wrap this up.
And we you know, we got to see it early,
but we got to see by like a week and
a half early after like other people saw it. So

(48:06):
I'm like, I'm seeing I'm like, everybody keeps on talking
about how great this movie is, and I'm like, but
how is this movie going to be great if they're
not gonna they're going to rush the ending. So now
you're sitting there you're like, wait a minute, what is
going on? And then when the.

Speaker 1 (48:18):
Reveal happens, you're like, whoa, whoa, whoa?

Speaker 3 (48:19):
You guys are hitting us, hitting us, and then the
to be.

Speaker 1 (48:22):
Continued because just like wait, wait, wait, wait, cause I
just down started figuring out what's going on.

Speaker 3 (48:27):
And so it was like it was a great way
that y'all did it, because it was like, you know,
sometimes you feel slighter, like they get nah, I gotta wait.
But now it was like, hey, they ended it perfectly,
but now I really came.

Speaker 1 (48:38):
Wait for me.

Speaker 3 (48:38):
On the Spider Verse, it was just a lot of
emotion and those last ten minutes.

Speaker 4 (48:42):
You know, and it's okay. You know, we had a
feeling it might be divisive, but we hope that like
you know, don't you remember like walking I mean I'm
a little older, but like I remember walking out of
the Empire strikes back kind of like oh my god,
like what just happened? You know what I mean? I
mean like frozen in the carbonite, like oh, like I was,

(49:07):
so you know, it's it's it's it's okay. I think
to have some people scream at the screen a little
bit because that means that they were they went along
for the ride and the story is going to continue.
So yeah, that promise.

Speaker 1 (49:22):
Now before we get you out of here. Now I know,
you can't tell us much or anything, but you know,
beyond the Spider verse, the.

Speaker 3 (49:27):
Anticipation is I and I know you you've said you
guys got some of the voice acting done, not all
of it, because you guys are just really waiting to see,
you know, the lay of the land, letting everything go
and everything like that. But I mean, is there anything
that we can get to know about beyond and all?

Speaker 4 (49:44):
I can't. I can't share anything about that because again,
like you know, there's there's there's speculation any anytime anything
leaks out, and it's like we're we're happy we got
this finished and got it out, and like I want,
I really like, let's let people. Let's let people kind
of and debate this one, this one for a while,

(50:06):
you know what I mean. I know we're in an
instant gratification culture, but like I'm not, I'm not. Let
let let let let us have a little bit of
time to to just asking what we in this for
a bit.

Speaker 1 (50:19):
Has there been any interesting hot takes that you heard
or like theory.

Speaker 4 (50:24):
I'm not really I haven't really been listening. I mean,
like I said, the key to my happiness is like
you drop it out into the world, and then you
sit in your garden, you know, go for a walk
and just try to like, yeah, need were we all
need a little break, we all need a little vacation,
you know what I'm saying. Right, I've travel books about
maybe going to Egypt, you know, like I'm trying to Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1 (50:49):
So where where where can where can my people find you?
And and what do you need them to support you in
besides Spider verse?

Speaker 4 (50:55):
No, I mean, there's nothing anyone needs to do. If
I drop something and it looks interesting, you know, it's
up to me. It's up to me to get to
earn that support. There's nothing anyone needs to do, you know.
It's what I need to do is continue to try
to drop compelling stories on people that they feel like
compelled to go out into the world and check it out.

(51:16):
So there's nothing any There's nothing any of y'all need
to do. It's me. I'm the one who needs to
do shit.

Speaker 3 (51:21):
I love that perspective, bro, Like I said, you know,
you have our support, the blurred culture, nerd culture, film culture.
Like you, I've been seeing a lot of people singing
your praise, and it's well deserved.

Speaker 1 (51:33):
Keep on doing what you're doing bro. We appreciate you,
but as always, this is one on one with do Sis.
I've been your boy, Duces.

Speaker 3 (51:39):
This has been the amazing, the legendary temp hours and
we are out east

Speaker 1 (52:01):
PA

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Kemp Powers talks directing the Spider-Verse, Obama, Blerds & more | S7 E11 | 1 on 1's w/Deuces

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Kemp Powers talks directing the Spider-Verse, Obama, Blerds & more | S7 E11 | 1 on 1's w/Deuces