Starting her career as an actress in feature films such as Silence of the Lambs and Robert Townsend’s The Five Heartbeats and TV shows such as The Cosby Show and ER, Kasi Lemmons made the move to director starting with Eve’s Bayou in 1997. She followed that with the thriller The Caveman’s Valentine in 2001 and now her latest film, Talk To Me, starring Don Cheadle and Chiwetel Ejiofor about the legendary and controversial radio DJ and stand up comic Ralph “Petey” Greene who was a major force in Washington D.C during the late 60’s to mid-70’s. The film already has Hollywood insiders talking the Oscar buzz.
Ebonyjet.com had an opportunity to talk to Lemmons about her latest project and moving into the driver’s seat.
All right, first obligatory question: What attracted you to Talk To Me when you were sent the script?
Well, I think in many ways it was the originality and the bravura of Petey’s words. But when I started looking at the script as a director I realized all the opportunities there were to recreate the 60’s, to recreate the Johnny Carson show during that period, the D.C. riots…
On a limited budget…
Right! On a limited budget. But also to make something that was uproariously funny but also very serious. There were a lot of opportunities as a director to make something really powerful and interesting.
The script you shot is much better than an earlier version I’d read. What was your involvement in developing the script?
I read several drafts of the script and then realized what I could do with it as the director, how I could inform the story as a director. That was when I got interested, and really, really excited about it. It was good, you know, [the script] was good, but it didn’t speak my name. So then when I figured out how it could speak my name, that’s when I fell in love with it.
Admittedly, the character of Petey Greene has a lot of problems. He’s loud, abrasive, self-destructive and he keeps blowing a lot of great opportunities that come his way because of self-doubt. You want to say several times why can’t he just get it together? Wouldn’t you agree that one of the main challenges was to make Greene sympathetic and understandable to the audience?
Well, first of all you get the right actor to play it. When we decided it was going to be Don Cheadle and he decided that he wanted to do the movie, I knew that we had won a major battle, because Don is intimately likable. You are just drawn to him even when he’s playing killers, right? But it really has to do with feeling empathy for him, you know, and his ability to say: “Look, this is me!” [As Petey] he doesn’t change as much as the people around him do. He’s pretty much himself. What you see is what you get (laughs).
The film has a very intimate visual style with very few wide shots and a lot more close-ups than the usual film. What determined the style you created?
Well part of it has to do with the fact that a lot of it takes place at a radio station and in radio booths and part of it has to do with being in a time and place that’s not the common place you’re portraying. So in other words I have to be very controlled in what I allow you to see because it’s not really D.C in 1968. So we had to be very deliberate in what we were exposing to the camera.
Now having said that, we still had to recreate the D.C. riots and the James Brown concert where we really went all the way and let you see it.
Second obligatory question: Why did you decide to move from acting to directing?
Well for a lot of reasons. I was not completely fulfilled as an actor. I loved, loved, loved acting. But the feeling that I got from watching myself -- even the greatest films that I acted in like Silence of the Lambs -- compares not at all with the feeling you get when you’ve directed a movie (laughs).
Greater satisfaction?
Greater satisfaction, ultimate control and it’s tremendously challenging. Now I never had an acting career that could compare to my directing career. I mean, I never had the lead in a movie and I was in, for the most part, small movies. So I never had to pull that much of a film. Maybe if I had to or if I had had a part that was really fulfilling I would have stuck with it.
But I have to tell you I have more to offer as a filmmaker, than I did as an actor. There are lots and lots of wonderful, beautiful, fabulous actresses that are much more talented than I was. But as a filmmaker I really believe that I have something to offer.
You’re one of the very few black female directors who has directed a studio financed feature film. Most black female directors, and there are many of them, are independent filmmakers working outside the studio system
Independent film allows for much more experimentation and much more of a voice.
Now I know black women who have done more mainstream fare like Angela Robinson who directed <BEGIN ITAL>Herbie Reloaded<END ITAL>…
And Saana Hamri (Something New), Darnell Martin who’s directing a film for Columbia, Gina Prince Bythewood (Love and Basketball) and of course you. So in terms of making studio films is it getting better?
Well, the fact that we can name five who are making Hollywood backed films right now means that it is getting better. But I don’t know if we have broken the studio system and in fact when I look at the studio system I don’t know if they’re clear on who I am. Maybe after this movie, but they still have a list of the usual suspects to consider for directing a film and I don’t know if there are many of us there. But I’m glad to hear about these women who are working.
But it’s still a struggle, a battle?
Yeah, you can get battle weary if you let yourself and it’s so easy to be discouraged. But why get discouraged you know? It’s so easy to be discouraged that you take some sort of strength in it and say I’m not going to be discouraged, I’m not going to let this person reject me or say no. I have a vision, I have a dream; I’m going to keep going and it’s possible because I’ve proven it’s possible. Women around me and before me have proven that it’s possible. So you keep going. Your only shot is to persevere, to follow your dreams and have faith in yourself and your vision.
I have to ask, since your husband (Vondie Curtis-Hall) is also a director: any friendly competition in your house?
No competition at all. When I’m directing a film he’s on my side -- I’m the director. And when he’s directing, I’m on his side and he’s the director. We would not have been together this long except for the fact that we are completely supportive of each other. (laughs)
Yeah sure, you get the feeling that sometimes he would be on my set saying : ”Hmmm, I never would have made that choice… ” and I’ll be on his set and thinking: “Hmmm I would have done that a little bit differently…:”
(Sergio Mims writes about film from Chicago. His goal is to make the Midwest a film capital one project at a time.)
Links:
Emil Wilbekin on Petey Greene
Behind the scenes of Talk to Me