 They gotta go. At 501, not a Bible do, but they gotta go. We got a hard out. We got a beat. At 501. What's that, Calamari? We leaving then. MISSING SHRAPP, MY BOT. My brain is on. You want some? I'mma take some. Yeah. I want some. Yeah, then from that JJ. The Americans. Look, nigga, I ain't stopped grabbing. Hey! Oh, that nigga grabbed the extra two. Oh, he stopped singing that one, shit. Yeah, nigga. Let me have some fries. Got that nigga singing that, that shit's so good. OK. Thank you. All right, he take my pieces now. Shit, I'm on son. This nigga's gone. Got to have some fries. Oh, bless his head. All right, that's all I need. Appreciate it, man. Good day, gotta go. See, that's how you. You didn't warrant that at the right time. That's how you start off, break it, break it. God damn right. You got to keep it real, real nice and black with that. You know what y'all? Break red first, then get to the work part. It's a team building exercise. It's like this crap, man. Ask them. So you ask it. That was a manful. We breaking red. Are we? Yeah, no question. We in. Right now? Say no more. Remember that now, I'm looking you in your eye, nigga. All right. I'm talking about, come on. Didn't even say I was going to be in a holiday fall. My team fucked up. You hit that team? You meant to be in a holiday fall. You meant to be one of the Crimson Hooks. In that beginning shootout, I'm going to give you the reveal. You, 100%, fat. And because of that, you owe me one more shrimp. Yeah, gotta go. Warm on my tee, and when they leave. Oh, you need a new one. Y'all got me fucked up. Who you hit? I want to see the paper tray, nigga. My people hit your pee. Sometimes your people be lying. I need DC Young Fly, when it comes to costum, now I'm a COG. I'm a nigga that go to every research. I want to talk to them, faith and faith. But you hit my people, show me. Let me have one more shrimp. He finesse you now, fly. He finesse you. Yeah, the hell, I ain't got nothing. I feel like it's finesse. Yeah, yeah, nigga. You should go up to the board now. You singing your room. My mic dropped. Next time I'm going to put you in a movie, now one more shrimp. One more shrimp. Nigga, hold on. You want to be in a holiday fall. Now one more shrimp. The better the food, the longer the story is. That's right. You're too deep. I really didn't. You want a shrimp? They get ready to fix your mic, then we'll jump in. OK, OK. Someone fixing my mic? Yeah, they getting it. Yeah, you bitch, you busted. Welcome to the city. My boy, J.J. My time. Let me find some pies, I love. I'm talking off my food now. My time, all the shrimp. What? I'm talking off my food now. We ain't got to go. You shit must. That's hard. That's hard. That's hard. J.J. Nigga, you from London, nigga. Oh, you from London? That's why you was talking like the niggas. Oh, that go crazy. I was going to ask that nigga, where are you from? OK. Where are you from, man? That gone. That gone. You said I put a bit of heart in that fall. What's that inside? Stick it. No cap. Soon this shit over it. No, as soon as the shrimp gone, you're going to find out if you really were supposed to be on the movie. Nigga, eat this shrimp. I know you better not fall than I got there in faith. I'll tell you that. I hate my baby too close to head. That shit great. That's janky. It's over the fries and all the shit. Nigga will fall and act like they ain't fall it. Look at him. Especially niggas that wear purple. That's a farty color. That's a rock dog like he farted. Nigga that wear purple be farty. What's up, man? What's up, man? Dang. Y'all. My boy got to go to J.J. And I'll leave tomorrow. Nah, he going to have to go with somebody. Listen, when you guys around the corner. Before y'all five on one meeting. J.J. Now, how the hell are you going to go to J.J.? J.J. They're going to have to go with J.J. Man, they're going to get something. Go to J.J. Get them boys 20-inch shrimp with the fries. Y'all eat chicken. I don't fuck with chicken. You need to get two shrimp. You want some? Yeah. Three shrimp. Yeah. Y'all going to make it. Y'all boys like y'all like y'all see Chris. Chris and J.J. They're going to make the fries. Take the shrimp. What you eat? Y'all going to make the fries. They just had to stay five minutes. Now when your shit get here. Yeah. I'm on that like it mine. I'm just letting you know I'm already dipping on that. Exactly. But right now we going to do two things. Nah, you already put that on one time. You going to get the shrimp. Man, that nigga hungry some more. Oh, we busting that down. I'm busting it here. Yeah, I'm going to make the shrimp. I'm going to put the shrimp on it. You want to put it on again. Yo, put that bitch on again, my boy. Get your shine on, man. Fuck with me. Welcome to the city. Yeah, man. Put it on that. With my pinky. Yeah. I'm going to nail some. What made you deal with the color? It's emerald green. Right? Green is my dad's favorite color. You know what I mean? Yeah. You know what I'm saying? What made you just say fuck it? I'm paying them. Oh, I always pay my nails. Word. Always. You know what I mean? Like that way when I do a crime. You might come around to my house and paint your nails quickly. You trying to get caught? No, no. No, he's trying to get caught. You do the crime. You ain't even in the crime. I know, I know. You don't do crime? No, no. Remember. Why do you keep thinking I'm supposed to be in the crime scene? I'm supposed to be in the crime scene. I don't fuck with the streets at all. Man, the bed says different. Crazy. We'll be chilling right there in the streets. You see my sweater? It looks like I know they be doing crime. You do great shit at crime. I don't fuck with no crime. No crime. Now look at me. You think I'm going to jail in this size? No way. You got me fucking. You got the threes on me. You fucking right. Something. Ain't no crime over here, man. Hell no. Do y'all just like niggas in Africa, like in America type shit? Like different than the people in London? Like the black people in London? Yeah. They'd probably be like, hey, no, no. We're the same. They're niggas. It's different in America. We're the same, man. It's all love. It's all, you know what I mean? We're the same, man. Black people are black people. You know what I mean? I ain't been to London. You know what I mean? I want to go. I've been to London three times. Hell yeah. Yeah. And we're off on the show. Like, we watched. For real? You guys supposed to, yeah. What's going on over there right now in the black community? It's pretty much the same with what's going on over here. I know. You know what I mean? We're trying to make it happen. We're trying to, you know what I mean? Make better of ourselves, better of our circumstances. Right. You know what I mean? The same, same, same judgement. Same rules and regulations and restrictions they put on us. We're trying to break free of. You know what I mean? When did you first come to New York? In 93. Yeah. 93. Oh, damn. How old were you? I was a kid, man. I was a kid. Like, super kid. Then I moved to New York in 98. I signed my first record. I moved to New York in 98. I was there for like three years. I was a musician, man. He did all the music on the film, sang on it. His voice is crazy. Just multi-talented. It's crazy. So what kind of like started you with the art, with the Renaissance? Because people don't understand, like, when you in that era, in that room, that's theater, that's theatric, that's Renaissance, that's art. So it ain't just, oh, I'm an actor. It's like, it's way more behind it. Yeah. What brings the character to life? Absolutely. What like inspired you to start? You know, like, when I was a kid, my mom, she bought me like a Super 8 camera when I was seven. Right. And then she bought me like a Bolex 16 millimeter at age of 13. Uh-huh. I was always filming. But then there was instruments in the house. Well, that shrimp hit me different. That's your itchy. If you got it. We never had that. That's your itchy. That's your itchy. If you got it. We never had that. That's your itchy. What? That's your itchy. That's your itchy. That's your itchy. That nigga felt that it went in his heart. This is what they mean. This is what they mean. That nigga going to start smoking weed. What the hell is she mean? She went out here kind of different. That's your itchy. Yeah. Anyone for Cheeseburg? Yeah. So then she bought me a 60 millimeter at age like 13. And then I was always shooting. Right. But then there was instruments in the house. I was always doing music. So it's not really what made me start. It's what made me not stop. You know what I mean? And then we come from the era of, of, and some people have throwbacks. Like your throwback. Right. You don't just do comedy. You don't just act. You sing. You do all this, uh, this, uh, different type of stuff. And for me, that's what it was. Like we're, we're expressionists. Right. We're artists. And you have to always say, obey your crazy. All the ideas are in your head. All of the things people, the older you get and the more you're on this planet, people are just telling you what you, what you can't do. Right. That's impossible. That's impossible. That's impossible. Yeah. I don't know. Are you old as me? And my baby boy, 15, come here. Like a G. That's the first time to be in an old black man when they take how old a young is. You're my baby. 15. My young. My young. No, it's, it's practical. And so we just, you know, we just stay, stay doing it. And that's when my first film, The Harder They Fall, was, was, was like, you know, me kind of multitasking on that. And the same, same, same with this. You still need a team. You still need a Lacue-Stanfield. You still need a, you know, when you start acting bougie and start receiving my call. Hey man, you still need a DC young start. I'm gonna get you, I'm gonna get you. You know what I mean? You still need a. You need the right, the right team to take your, take your aspirations to the next, next level. You know what I mean? That was the nicest way of him telling you to get a new team. I heard it. You heard it. I heard it. But you're a special in the space, man, because not only are you ambitious, you're actually like multi-talented in different spaces. But it's like the way you can manifest things is unlike most people. It starts as an idea and an idea and you're able to actually make it become manifest. And I feel like that's a beautiful thing. And it's in the American spirit to make some shit happen. You feel me? So it was like, it's dope that cinema and you came together and manifested this way. You made the Heart of the Fall. It's like black people at Cowboys and shit. We ain't never seen that before. And the way that history tries to depict it, like we ain't there. And here we did it again with the book of Clarence. Now we in biblical time. And it's not just a joke. It's not just like, ha ha ha, look at the black people. There are some grounded moments in here, some real shit. And that's a beautiful thing for us to see ourselves in history, because we know we was there. But they try to act like we wasn't. So I think you're doing really important things. And I support that. Now how did y'all meet? How did y'all meet? Y'all have gone crazy too now. You been doing your shit for a long time. So how did this right here come about? We met, you was just talking about it. We met at the gold party some years ago. And they were just in passing. I don't think we was talking about... Nothing, just pizza. Yeah, we were talking about pizza and some shit. We didn't know. But always try to treat people well, treat them as they come. So we were just talking about that. You never know who you're talking to or who they're going to become. So it's just important to carry that golden rule. And years later, we crossed paths on the heart of the fall. So we did that one. And then at the end of that one, he was like, I got another one and I'm doing next. I just want to send you the script. So he sent me the script for this one, Book of Clarence. And when I got done reading it, I was like, damn, this shit is crazy as hell. Like I ain't never read nothing like this where it's like black people in a biblical time, Jesus is there and Jesus is black. Come on, bro, we doing this shit. So it was just like, it was easy. Once I saw the script and Clarence went through a story that was just like, man, he wanted to be somebody. He didn't have shit. It was a ragged, the richest story. And he did whatever he felt was necessary to get there. Like I moved to L.A. in my car. Just like, I'm about to be an actor for years. Just auditioning, failing, failing, finally got an opportunity and buzzed through. So I know what it's like to like want something and try to attain it any means necessary. And sometimes you go about it and you do things that, you know, don't feel good. And you go through things that don't feel good. I had to sleep on the floor, actors, houses who were like, you ain't gonna never be shit. You know, niggas just hating or whatever. But you know, you get through that and you get through the trials and tribulations and you open up at the end and you learn something. So Clarence went through that story and I figured, I want to share that because it felt like me, but also I know it felt like so many other people. So, you know, it was inspiring. Man, this will be the perfect time to tell the people, DC. Hey man, welcome back to the 8-5 Self Show. You know what time it is? You're doing your job. Come on. And that's exactly how we live in DC. We got some very special guests in the house with us today talking about a super dope movie. That's about to shake shit up. None other. Shit, you can already see it. This is a young legend right here, Luke. We love to throw that word around, bruh. New Black Hollywood. This guy don't even do a lot of podcasts and interviews and shit like that. So it's all in the privilege to have y'all in here with us today, man. None other than LaKeith Stanfield. Yes, y'all. Yes, y'all. Yes, y'all. Yes, y'all. Yes, y'all. It's an honor to be here as well, man. Damn, he ain't let me finish. Go ahead. He tried to bring it in. It's an honor to be here because I've been watching what you guys have been doing for years. I'm putting it down for years. I'm not even speaking to my guy right here now because you know what I mean? He fucked it up. I ain't called shit up. This is what happened. He gave us a sip. I don't speak to that speaker. And then we've been watching you guys for years, man. How you've grown, where you came from, and then from wiling out to this and then but before wiling out, Instagram, things when you and a black young star was in the video, I was like, thanks. You like that pretty shit? Yeah. I was like that. I wrote that down. Whose dudes is mad talented, man? And just to, you know, you're all renaissance men. You're all multi-talented individuals. And what I love about you guys is you defy expectations and you defy the restrictions and the boxes that you're meant to be in. Like you guys was doing this before podcasting was a thing. You know what I mean? And then you do your tours and we'll be watching clips of your tours from overseas. So it's an honor to be here, man. You know what I mean? To be amongst other black kings. It's important. Hey, man. It's an honor. It's a honor. All right. Now, if you cry, man. Because I see you throw work to the comedians. Yeah. I love the fact that you, with the heart of they fall, Deon Cole in there. You don't go? Yeah. That shit was perfect. It was fully. Yeah. It was like, oh, shit, my partner. You know what I'm saying? So it's just dope. I didn't even make him audition. I was like, I was like, hey, listen, man. I've seen this stand up. He's a wicked voice. And you know, like a lot of times comedians are the dopest actors. So I called him. I phased him. I think, yo, I'm James Samuel. Peace to the black god. Listen. Say this back to me. Treacherous Trudy Smith from Quik Draw Cherokee Bill. He went, treacherous Trudy Smith, a quick draw Cherokee Bill. Get ready to come to New Mexico. You're in the heart of they fall. Peace to the black god. Damn. That was it. That was the, yeah. That was it back. Yeah, that was it back. And I was like, how come he's in it? I was like, wait until you see. Right. When they were fighting, it was pure contact. Because Deon Cole do action movies. So he did, remember, you were there. He didn't know where to where to stand so the first time he threw a punch back. He connected And then when Idris went when he was fighting with the gun, Idris grabbed the gun from Regina I was like, back! Theon kind of moved in by accident And the T-shirt, bop, he sort of tipped, it go through his hole Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. That was real. Yeah, it was real. And then he came back But he was amazing. I knew that when people see him in the movie, they'll no longer see him as just a just a Comedian. They was like, you got an old-spice guy because he does an old-spice commercial. I'm not American I've never seen an old-spice commercial. I just know that he is the best guy for the role Mm-hmm. He's a person that defies expectations like all of us sitting here today. It's hard. It's hard. It's hard. It's hard. My name is James Samuel, by the way. He didn't get a chance. We like to build our shit up. It's a role. Damn! I think that was a good intro. That was a hell of an intro. They gonna be like, man, we fuckin' James. Man, give us the rundown, the book of Clarence. How the shit come about, bro? What made you go reach out to LaQuinx to bring that shit to life? I'll be honest, as soon as I saw the trailer and I saw the screen capture, I was like, man, what the hell going on? Yeah, yeah. I mean, you know, growing up, we grew up in, and I think a lot of us, right, grew up, you know, like, God is a huge thing in our communities. It's our light. And because of that reason, you know, our parents and our families, we love those Bible movies. Ten Commandments, Ben-Hur, and I love the Bible movies that kind of aren't about the Bible. They run alongside it. But then Jesus might pop up, like in Ben-Hur. He pops up to give him some water and he's in Crucified in the end. I love those kind of movies. But while the stories in the Bible are clearly about the environments that we grew up in, like Jesus was carpenter, right? And he was born in a manger. They didn't have bread. And the areas they're talking about are the neighborhoods that we live in. But you don't really see that in those films. You don't see people that look like us. Like, I've been all around the world. I've never seen a person that looks like Charlton Heston, even a white person. I ain't seen no person that looks like Charlton Heston, or Kurt Douglas, or Victor Mature, any of those dudes. But I've seen people that look like my brothers here and my sisters here. And we've all seen these people. So I wanted to do a story based around, I wanted to do a story based around, like, the area and that looked like the area and the environment that we all grew up in. I grew up in Mozart State. I grew up in Marci Projects. You know what I mean? Like, I wanted to do a story based around that looks like the environment I grew up in, but transposed it 2,000 years back. And to show how nothing's changed since those days. We said grace before we ate. Nothing's changed since those days. I wanted to show how in alignment we are. And I honestly believe that kids now, Hollywood stopped making those biblical movies. But kids now need those movies, man. We need to... And it's okay to believe and to... And also, Jesus was the first superhero. So let me just take that back right quick. Yeah. And give us a... You know, first I took him to the Old West. I delivered a New Testament. Hallelujah. What else have you seen? That's all. That nigga's this. You had to go out of space, though. You had to get a space out of there. Oh, yeah. We're going to go out of space. And I'll say, like, when I was, like, speaking to the cast for The Harder They Fall, right? Me and LaKeith had a conversation. We met for him to play the character of Cherokee Bill. And his phone rang, right? I mean, you could speak more to that, but LaKeith's phone rang. So he was talking to me about the film, about the role, about how he sees it. And his phone rang. It was his cousin. And he had to call me back in 15 minutes. And he was like, he just broke character. Like something real happened in the hood. And he started breaking that law. I just got to take this call. And he had to tell me why he took the call. Because, you know, it's a professional meeting. It was like, yo, man, my cousin's a car. And, you know, you know what's happening? Who knows? In that little 30-second description of neighborhood antics, when he put down the phone, I called my sister, Tanya. Tanya! Tanya! I wrote Clarence, because I wrote Clarence. Years ago, I wrote Clarence, years ago. But Clarence is an impossible person to cast. That movie does not stand up if you don't have LaKeith Stanfield. And when I had him, I knew it. From the minute he came to set every scene we shot, I was like, look, don't go too far. After this movie, I got signed out. After this movie, I got signed out. On the day we wrapped, I was like, yeah, yeah, yeah. But don't go too far. I got signed out for you. Like, I got something else. And it's something that, in 135 years of the movie and image, we've never seen Black King. We've never seen my brother in 135 years of the moving image. We've never seen Black people able to say, this Jesus of Nazareth. Yeah, and it looked like us. Even though he described Black us in the back. I got to ask you this. It's a touchy subject with how Black people, they're serious about Jesus. Have you faced any criticism or backlash or people saying, you can't do this? This is blasphemous. This is not right. Why are y'all playing with the Lord? I think people these days are really apt to fall victim to judgment without context. I think now the idea that everyone has a voice now on the internet gives them the incentive to want to speak about things and speak intelligently about things, whether they know the full scope or not. So you see some imagery and you immediately run to think that that's what it is. Absolutely anyone who sees this film, they will easily see that there's not anything that's blasphemous about it. In fact, it's not a story about Jesus or the Bible per se at all. It's really a story about maybe the person that lived down the street from Jesus, maybe lived around the corner from Jesus. What about the person that saw what Jesus was doing and he wanted to be like him? So we're capturing these outside stories that juxtapose a time and space that we all know and are familiar with and have never seen ourselves in. It is a brilliant, brilliant depiction and I think we underserve ourselves and go see what it's about and I promise you you'll leave feeling how I felt which is inspired. That's why we made this to inspire people. You know what I mean? It ain't about playing with God. It's about inspiring the God and you. And also, you know, the second when people saw the first teaser, which was a brilliant teaser, I saw a lot of voices of blasphemy but I would say one, we ain't got no backlash. My back ain't got no scars on it. This ain't backlash, this voice is on the internet. So let's just, you know what I mean? Let's just leave that behind. Ain't nobody who says you. I ain't got no lashes on my back. See, 300 years too late for them. Oh, okay. That's one. See, when they saw the first teaser, they're just like, oh, blasphemy, blasphemy, blasphemy is real ignorance for people to say that after 60 seconds of imagery. When we drop the second trailer, now people are seeing, okay, so Jesus exists and we ain't seeing Jesus like this before. If you don't see the blasphemy, you have to stand on it. I want to know why you're saying this is blasphemy. Why? Because all the people are black. Okay, because if you read about the Bible, people quote the Bible all the time and talk about the Bible. But they really know nothing about the Bible. If you say too average to your average Joe, what currency did they use in the Bible days? They will be stuck. What was the currency in the Bible days? Okay, Matthew 24.5 Jesus himself says, many will come in my name pretending they are the Christ, the Messiah, and they would leave many astray. In Matthew 24.5 in Jesus' time period there was like 200 to 300 people that were saying they're the Messiah. They're the Messiah. As foretold in the prophecy they are the Messiah. And the Romans used to crucify these people en masse. Any Google search would show you this. The Bible is all about sinners. It's a book for sinners. We wouldn't need the Bible if none of us sinned. He who is without sin cast a first stone. We wouldn't need the Bible if there was no sin. So the Bible is a guide for all of us to kind of live better. God had better things to do in this time than give Moses 10 commandments. But these ratty humans keep breaking the laws. So the Book of Clarence is literally the story about an everyman tell someone that doesn't believe about the virgin birth. Tell someone that doesn't believe about this man that walked on water and isn't any other. So Clarence is receiving all this information he doesn't believe at first and he goes on a journey of self-discovery and ultimately redemption and finding faith. It's a wicked film man. It's a wicked film. And I challenge all my peers to equal it. To do the same. I say this like in all humility. It shouldn't have to take us 135 years to see the Book of Clarence. It shouldn't have to take us that long. And it shouldn't have to take us so much convention to get people to support movies like this. Because this is the way these movies are continued to be made. It's made by support. So we gotta support this. So we're able to be imaginative and make films that move the needle. People say they're tired of the same ass movie in Hollywood where we're trying to shake it up. And the way you do that is support of the people. So go see it. I know I get animated. It's deep. You're convincing the fuck out of everybody. But it's a deep thing and it's easy to look at something and condemn it. It's easy to condemn your show when you haven't watched it. It's easy to condemn. I always say it's easy to be generous when you have nothing to give. It's easy to condemn something without sight. But it's ignorance. I don't even think it's really us like that. I don't even think it's people talking about it's too woke. These reverberating sentiments that anytime you see somebody black it's woke. Or anytime you see a populated cast of people that are non-white, it's woke. That's a way of trying to make it like that ain't, you know what I'm saying? Even though cinema... Don't understand what's really going on. You speak like I already know what side you play for. But I'm going to continue to speak wisdom The ones who hear me, let's go. We got stuff to do. And you know the crazy thing about the crazy irony black gods is Jesus only had 12 apostles. He didn't have 7.5 billion. Basically all the people that was around in Jesus' day did not believe he was the Messiah. He had crowds crowds and the rest of the people were condemning him. He had 12. He had 12,000. 12 like loyal compadre. And some of them weren't even loyal. Look at this, when Peter the Rock Peter the Rock said, how could Judas do that? How could Judas do that? Jesus turned to Peter. It said Peter the Rock. If you were called the Rock in ancient Jerusalem, in the Jesus days do you know how hard you must have been Jesus turned to Peter Don't worry bro. You will deny me 3 times by the time the cock crows. I'll never do that, the Romans came. Are you with him? No, I'm not with him. I'm not with him. Talk your talk. Talk your talk. This is what it is. This is literally in the book everyone claims to have read. And I believe me personally in this age of remixes and remixes and rehashes there's no original storytelling no more. Among all races, all cultures there's no original storytelling. We deserve this movie we deserve it. You deserve to see yourself in a biblical setting because if you read that book that's yourself. It's talking about. And everyone can relate. If you're white you can relate to this environment. Everyone has seen this environment. But do you know what environment we ain't seen? Charlton Heston. No one seen no one that looks like Charlton Heston. You know how they try to say the music don't match because it's hip-hop and it's biblical times but it's like if you think about Bach that don't match for biblical times they wasn't back there going you know what I'm saying? It's not orchestra. Tell me when I put me and all them reggae artists on the hard of day fall you put modern music on the western let me tell you something. Jesse James and Billy the Kid never even heard of electricity let alone the electric guitar that wasn't around in the western days back then all modern music if you're making a biblical setting anything you put on there is modern so when you hear like if you might hear Holmes works on sound original or you might hear Terry Kanye or George Mentor like a Brazilian legend on the soundtrack and weaving in and out of the score really it's just us it's just us and now your children right I love your children. I appreciate your family. I appreciate your family. Your children have something to look at for me to find strength because everything that you've gone through and everything that they've gone through me I lost my father at nine years old now like my son has something to look at and look at himself in those days like all of us because we deserve it and the one thing is because I'm on this podcast man it's so freeing nothing I won't do here's the thing black people man we are so quick to put ourselves down I say peace to the god every man black man I meet please black king kings it's so quick to put each other down it's only black people that talk about Jay-Z and Beyonce are the Illuminati yeah that's ignorant you never hear white people say Steven Spielberg's Illuminati it's us we're quick to do that with each other we're quick to see us rise and chop that it's gone it's to do it like you need to see yourself as regal I'll conclude this rant by saying my friend said to me yeah but we were kings and queens in Africa we're kings and queens now yeah but how do you know we were actual kings and queens I told him like look man what makes the royal family in England the royal family who anointed them royal are the humans I'm a human my anoint my people kings and queens we're royal we're regal deserve movies like this we deserve one in four cowboys that's what made the harder they fall one in four cowboys was black the name cowboy was for black people white people were called cowhands the name the term cowboy was the name they gave to blacks and people of color Mexicans and stuff white people were cowhands but Hollywood re-appropriated everything and just done this mad remit you're a woman in those Hollywood movies you're a whore, you're a lady in the night that's not how women work women from the beginning of time have led entire civilization so for me we have to come out of ourselves in the light that they give us and start demanding our regality and start taking it back this movie isn't about color it's not about color but it's important that you see yourself in the light yourself in the light you never see DC young fly it's a fact look at your steps you never see DC young fly I'm gonna say this with the ring up you never see DC young fly and him not talking about God every time you post every time you go through something God pray, pray, pray that's how you got through what you got through and then you take us through it with you so how come we ain't had no biblical movie how come we can't see ourselves in that light visually tell me how champion tell me how we can't see ourselves in that light by the minute we do blasphemy you saying blasphemy blasphemy you know what I'm like the blues brothers I'm gonna be on a mission from God and if I don't blast he gonna blast for me then you find out where you first came you putting together a hell of a portfolio just with the roles that you're taking like Book of Clarence the spookle set by the door type shit really just taking it to the next level people love your character Darius Atlanta and shit and give it your own flavor I think the approach is always different contending on what the mission is for this one I identify so much with Clarence that you know I really just had to seat myself in the environment and I tried to approach it in a way that it's funny that you mentioned regality because that's what I think about when I think of Clarence I kind of hold him in this way that makes him feel a little bit more regal so I kind of wanted to incorporate those little intricacies and then when I played his brother his brother had just a little bit of a slightly different posture and he spoke with an English accent and so I wanted to give them their own differences, their twins, they have subtle differences but the differences are more in the character and less in how they how they profess if that makes sense so I was just trying to let the characters find and build themselves because once you get there we shot Matera in Italy and it's like Stasi, it's like stone environment everything was made out of stone it was horses and camels and all these black people and robes and it was just like viscerally beautiful it just felt like I had been here if not in this life in another one and so you felt so seated in the environment that all you had to do really was just let James's words kind of permeate and move through the characters as well as the music, he was playing music on set the whole time so we had these giant dances and you know just everybody beautiful and black and dances so the environment just felt rich and we weren't worried about the shit that's why we had to shoot we've been doing so many of them you can't even this ain't one of them we can talk about hulls and all types of shit on this one yeah so we had we had just been through it was just a beautiful environment and it just felt rich and new and that we were on a cusp of making something special for us you know what I mean so finding these characters in particular was quite nice and different in that way it kind of takes the form it takes it's a secret formula I can't release it you direct it the harder they fall black being able to direct because Michael B on his journey to do he smashed how do we get in that position and when do we get in that position and how do we know that hey we're in this position we're in this time here's the thing here's when I always used to look at the word time when I was like 11 years old look at the word time does time mean this is my era she said no something else and probably gave me a dictionary whatever it meant it doesn't mean it time means this is my era second you're born to the last day of your life that entire period is your era there is no old and there's no young generations these things are just words this is your era what are you going to do with it we have to not think we have to not allow people to seal in our destination with their own limitations one the time is now if you feel your filmmaker and you have something to say and two how do you get there let me tell you something Quentin Tarantino, Eli Roth all of those people Robert Rodriguez at that time in the 90's when they all came out if that was today them dudes would have been using the iPhone these are powerful every single one of us can make shoot films with this I'm speaking to Apple now for a whole show I have shot solely on the iPhone right you're probably going to be in it now the time is now it's there and the tools are in our hands we just have to almost like jump out of the box that we've been putting because we weren't putting the box but it's us that keeps us there we have to jump out of that out of that box and know that now there are no rules about the rules that we set for ourselves otherwise my first movie let me tell you something there was a guy good guy Andre Evelino and he told me he wanted to meet me like 8 o'clock in the morning or 8.30 in the morning I said man I'm black 8 o'clock in the morning and meet him he better be having some money for me because he wanted to invest in the harder they fall and he met me 8 o'clock in the morning at Claridge's hotel I hate that hotel he sat me down, I'll be quick he said when he told me he was going to invest in the film he went James and he has like a word and he says James you are never going to make this movie I'll never forget that hearing someone kind of like start up on the word I thought he was going to say you are new, I'm going to give you 20 million you are never going to make this movie what? after he said he was going to invest you are never going to make this movie it's too big you are talking about it you are never going to make this movie now usually when I come for my brother I would slap someone for making me meet them at 8am to give me bad news he was coming over the phone but he learned something else that people don't know that's why I say his name so he would verify this I'll give you 5 million now do something small if you make something small it's successful I'll give you 6 million if that's successful 7 million and maybe your 5-6 million movie is the harder they fought at that time I was making a harder day for 25 million I thought the budget was getting 25 million I looked at this guy this guy is deep when a person wants to give you 5 million I can do it he was going to give us a movie for them we're not going to eat fries and shrimp tomorrow first I'm getting 2 of these I'll take them to the main and then I'll say I'm shooting a movie I'll shoot a movie for 1 million anyway he said take 5 million and I told him and I mean what I'm about to say black kings a human being's biggest mistake is that as soon as something is given a title we no longer call it magic watch this that's not magic that's not magic that's not magic as soon as we give something a title we negate the fact that it's magic when we are magic I hear it by itself my hand I used to be fascinated with my hands I love this station and I told him my brother just because my title is James you don't realise I'm magic this was in 2017 he offered me 5 million in 2019 I was gearing up to make the hard of day 4 for 90 that was my debut movie 90 or 19 90 million deal it was like 2 years later 2017 I told this guy an hour before the trailer drops I told him an hour before the trailer drops he called me bro bro in him I told him in years check the internet in an hour check the internet in an hour check the internet in an hour that just drops I did it bro I understand you are the physical personification of go for it I said no I'm not the time is now for all of us that want to do what it is we want to do we are filmmakers we are great we are don't let anybody ceiling your destination with their own limitation I hate the phrase the sky is the limit if the sky is the limit people would never have gone to space sky is the limit the whole solar system look at the solar system and see how insignificant we are what I look at the solar system and see how big I am oh wow look at my planets the world is ours we are magic we can do it all hence my first movie is the heart of A4 the second movie is the book of Clarence ladies and gentlemen he went crazy man he went crazy we can let him sit here and talk this kind of shit all day man but we amen just know you got some more success on your way congratulations on putting another dope ass project under your belt y'all got the full support of the 85 south show any time y'all want to whatever y'all got going on man we still got when you guys want to shoot something like for your drink hit me come on man put my number up on right now oh that boo 85 south show yo check it out let's break it down