Speaker 1: Quest Love Supreme is a production of iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2: Hey y'all, this is on paid bill from Team Supreme.
Speaker 2: We're back with part two of our QLs interview with
Speaker 2: Chris Robinson. Part one. Chris spoke about growing up in
Speaker 2: Baltimore and cultivating a career as one of the biggest
Speaker 2: music video directors of the nineteen nineties and two thousands.
Speaker 2: He shared some secrets about working with Eric Abadu, Lord Treka,
Speaker 2: Peter Gunns, and Ella Cool Jay. He also discussed his
Speaker 2: new project, Shooting Stars, which covers the upbringing of bron James.
Speaker 2: If you haven't already, please check out that episode. Now
Speaker 2: here's part two.
Speaker 3: I want to hear if there's a way that you
Speaker 3: can give cautionary tales without compromising your position or your
Speaker 3: relationships and whatnot. But this is a theory that I
Speaker 3: have now at this stage of my life, which is
Speaker 3: I think when we turn thirty or forty, this is
Speaker 3: when we start to become experts. And I don't think
Speaker 3: it's more or less that we become experts more than then.
Speaker 3: I think in the first twenty twenty five thirty years
Speaker 3: of our life we take an assessment of Okay, this
Speaker 3: is pleasurable and this is painful, and so we basically
Speaker 3: want to just do the greatest hits and just take
Speaker 3: a compilation of all the pleasurable things and then apply
Speaker 3: that to it, and then we become experts, Like we
Speaker 3: know that you know, if you touch the soul if you're.
Speaker 4: Going to get burnt.
Speaker 3: You know, if you walk across the street without looking
Speaker 3: both ways, you're going to get hit. So basically, you
Speaker 3: know it's a compilation of life lessons, and then that's
Speaker 3: how you're supposed to proceed on from forty and above.
Speaker 3: So for you are there never again moments for directing
Speaker 3: in terms of and I don't mean like I'll never
Speaker 3: work with this particular person again, but you already know that,
Speaker 3: Like all right, I can't double book that, Like what
Speaker 3: what lessons have you learned that are like never again?
Speaker 5: That's a crazy question. Open my brain up. It's wanting
Speaker 5: the gigs so bad that you compromise what your vision is.
Speaker 5: It is never ever, ever, ever ever worked for me, Right.
Speaker 3: And so you said yes to an artist before you
Speaker 3: even have a solid creative vision for it.
Speaker 5: Oh, I've definitely done that and that's worked out. That
Speaker 5: might be a timing thing right. What I what I'm
Speaker 5: talking about is like, you have to take this job,
Speaker 5: but you have to use this DP and you have
Speaker 5: to shoot in this city, or you have to use
Speaker 5: use this use either use someone or put a patina
Speaker 5: on it that we want it to be right now.
Speaker 5: Commercials are different, right because an ad agency works on
Speaker 5: that for a year before you ever get a phone call,
Speaker 5: so we understand their vision of what they're looking for.
Speaker 5: But when it comes to something creative, anytime I've attempted
Speaker 5: to do it it it didn't work or it wasn't satisfying.
Speaker 5: So my advice would be, never compromise your your your
Speaker 5: thought for the money. You know it just doesn't work.
Speaker 5: I have a dad thing, as I always tell my son,
Speaker 5: I go okay. When I was on JV, I could kick,
Speaker 5: like so we were just in practice and I was kicking,
Speaker 5: booming the ball and the coach was like, Robinson, you
Speaker 5: could kick, you're aligneman. I ain't never seen a lineman kick.
Speaker 5: I go, yeah, I can kick, so he gives me
Speaker 5: the job. I'm kicking off. So before that, a coach
Speaker 5: comes up to me and he goes, hey, man, you're
Speaker 5: planning your foot all wrong. You got to put your
Speaker 5: foot closer to the ball so you can get more
Speaker 5: lyft on. So here we go our first scrimmage against
Speaker 5: our high school rival, and I go out to the coach.
Speaker 5: I plant my footwear, he tells me, and the ball
Speaker 5: goes straight up and straight down, and I get fired.
Speaker 5: I'm no longer kicking the ball, And that, to me
Speaker 5: is the metaphor of when I'm listening, I'm in my flow.
Speaker 5: I know how to do this, I know the people
Speaker 5: I want to use, because it's a it's a business
Speaker 5: in an art form where you you collaborate, but then
Speaker 5: somebody tells you not to do what you do with
Speaker 5: you working for you. And the reason you called me
Speaker 5: because this is what I do, and I've done it
Speaker 5: a couple times regretfully, because the opportunity was so big.
Speaker 5: And so when they come at you, when they go, hey, man,
Speaker 5: this opportunity is big. You're going to do what we say.
Speaker 5: It's difficult to turn it down, you know, and if
Speaker 5: you have enough political acumen, then you know how to
Speaker 5: twist it and turn it to still do what you
Speaker 5: want to do. Cool. I really don't have that gift,
Speaker 5: you know what I mean. I'm like I'm true to
Speaker 5: whatever that so I would say, never ever do that.
Speaker 5: And I know it's a difficult thing, you know, because
Speaker 5: the opportunities are what they are. But I think that
Speaker 5: for me is the biggest one.
Speaker 4: Are you the type of director?
Speaker 3: And I don't mean micromanaging that annoying way, like always
Speaker 3: over your shoulder looking, But for me, I feel like
Speaker 3: at the editing is the most important part of your presentation,
Speaker 3: like because editing can be I know, for some what's say, well, no,
Speaker 3: the story concepts the most important part. And some people
Speaker 3: would say no, it's actually the look of it, like
Speaker 3: the art, direction, the lighting. Some people say the SHOT's
Speaker 3: the most important part. For me, I fall in love
Speaker 3: with the editing. I mean a lot of you know,
Speaker 3: nine times out of ten, I'm working with footage that
Speaker 3: already exists already, so it's not like I have to
Speaker 3: shoot all my content. But in terms of storytelling, do
Speaker 3: you allow your lighting person, your linsman, your editor, do
Speaker 3: you give them free reign to do what they do?
Speaker 3: Or are you always over their shoulder from soup to nuts,
Speaker 3: like micromanaging what it is.
Speaker 5: Like I do in that I'm giving everyone the vision.
Speaker 5: I'm going, Hey, this is how I see it before
Speaker 5: we ever get out there on the playing field, and
Speaker 5: before we ever roll one second of zeros and ones.
Speaker 5: It's not film anymore. So I always like to meet.
Speaker 5: I like pre pro I like setting down, I like
Speaker 5: looking at references, and I include the editor in that, right,
Speaker 5: I'll send the treatment. If it was a video, I
Speaker 5: would send the treatment to the editor before we ever shot,
Speaker 5: you know. And there were certain guys like Jeff Sellers,
Speaker 5: amazing dude, and he was like Scorsesees editor to me
Speaker 5: because I could give him, you know, when we were
Speaker 5: shooting two videos a week back in the day, I
Speaker 5: had to have trust, you know, to go all right,
Speaker 5: here's this, I'm going to shoot this. When I get back,
Speaker 5: we'll talk. And Jeff ninety percent of the time, you know,
Speaker 5: he would hit it, you know. So, But those kind
Speaker 5: of relationships are few and far between, right, So in videos,
Speaker 5: I worked with like four or five different editors.
Speaker 3: When you were in the in the eye of the
Speaker 3: storm of video making, how many videos, well, you said
Speaker 3: a week, how many videos a month would you book?
Speaker 5: Well, I know this, for three years in a row,
Speaker 5: I hit between forty eight and fifty.
Speaker 4: Wait, wait.
Speaker 5: For three years in a row, right, I noticed because
Speaker 5: that's when I had left part as in left HSI
Speaker 5: and I had my own company. I did between fifty
Speaker 5: videos a year to fifty. Probably the year I did
Speaker 5: the most videos were like fifty six, so that was
Speaker 5: doing a video one by the video with and Had.
Speaker 5: I had three rotating producers who only worked with me.
Speaker 5: I had about five rotating editors and my executive producer Roseanne,
Speaker 5: which too early as well. He really managed all that well.
Speaker 5: And it was go ahead, Chris, get on a plane,
Speaker 5: go and I would have to show up and do
Speaker 5: my job. And I you know, it was such a
Speaker 5: beautiful time that we were able to do it and
Speaker 5: still keep the integrity of the art right, because that
Speaker 5: was big on that too.
Speaker 6: No vacation, No vacation Crystal in three years.
Speaker 5: Let me tell you, I was upset, but wanted to
Speaker 5: take a vacation.
Speaker 4: I remember listens.
Speaker 5: I had this guy Michael Lucero. I don't know if
Speaker 5: you guys know, yeah, Michael Sarah was amazing. He's passed,
Speaker 5: you know, rec in pees. Michael Lucero did ninety three
Speaker 5: to Infinity. Yes, he did busting dirty. And when I
Speaker 5: when I first had a company interested in me, which
Speaker 5: is where I met Roseanne. She was the executive producer
Speaker 5: of his company. It was called What You See Is
Speaker 5: What You Get, and they were in San Francisco, so
Speaker 5: I flew out from Baltimore to San Francisco, met them,
Speaker 5: and the whole nine. Well. He was such a good dude.
Speaker 5: He was kind of like a you know, one of
Speaker 5: these guys who climbed mountains and you know, kind of
Speaker 5: kind of that kind of dude, but an amazing direction.
Speaker 4: As that video. Okay, Yeah, learned.
Speaker 5: A lot from him, learned a lot from him, learned
Speaker 5: how to write treatments. Was such a such a good man.
Speaker 5: But he every year he would take us on vacation
Speaker 5: and we would going to Mexico. He would take the
Speaker 5: company on vacation. And the first year I was there,
Speaker 5: I wasn't really you know, getting a lot of work.
Speaker 5: And I was pissed that they wanted to take a
Speaker 5: vacation and he wanted to fly me in, pay for it,
Speaker 5: pay for my room, and I did not go. And
Speaker 5: I was like, who's taking a vacation. We need to work.
Speaker 5: So I was a little over indexing. I was sitting
Speaker 5: back then because I wanted it so bad. And you know,
Speaker 5: there's great photos that Robin Frank, who was my rep,
Speaker 5: has sent to me recently, like of that trip that
Speaker 5: I missed that that I could have been at. You know, well,
Speaker 5: I was sitting at home in Baltimore convention about you know,
Speaker 5: not working instead of going on vacation exactly.
Speaker 3: So can you walk me through the process, because I'm
Speaker 3: learning now that in order to be creative, you should
Speaker 3: really dedicate, or at least for me, what works for
Speaker 3: me is a lot of silence, a lot of soulas
Speaker 3: a lot of silence. I used to be the type
Speaker 3: of person that sort of reveled and chaos, but I realized, like, oh,
Speaker 3: like during the pandemic, then every idea came to me
Speaker 3: and suddenly inspiration came. So okay, so in the eye
Speaker 3: of that storm, So all right, let's go to let's
Speaker 3: go to two thousand and five. Okay, right, Like, how
Speaker 3: long do you sit with And I'm going back to
Speaker 3: videos because I feel like video I feel like videos
Speaker 3: are harder than movies because you basically have four minutes
Speaker 3: to tell a story and really knock it out the park.
Speaker 3: So what is your process? How long do you sit
Speaker 3: with the song. Do you sit with a team of
Speaker 3: people and think of ideas? Do you look at the
Speaker 3: physical build to the person. Do you do you get
Speaker 3: to know them and see if they're athletic, if they
Speaker 3: know how to run, if they know how to drive
Speaker 3: a car?
Speaker 4: Like what they're in Walk me through the basic like.
Speaker 3: How long do you sit with the song before you
Speaker 3: suddenly see what it is?
Speaker 5: It for music videos? Man? It is? It was. It's different.
Speaker 5: It depends on what the song. The song truly inspired me, right,
Speaker 5: So a script will inspire you, but the song really
Speaker 5: inspired would inspire me. For instance, you know when I
Speaker 5: heard you know, I received Nojega song what what what? What? What? What? What?
Speaker 5: So super Thug? I got super Doug. I wrote that
Speaker 5: in twenty minutes because I had had this idea about
Speaker 5: camels in the desert and it had been around for
Speaker 5: a long time in my head, is rolling around in
Speaker 5: my head. So I wrote that. And it's funny because
Speaker 5: my rep was like, this is the quickest treatment you've
Speaker 5: ever written. Are you sure you want me to turn
Speaker 5: this in? And I was like, yeah, this is it.
Speaker 5: Because I was a little notorious for sending in a
Speaker 5: treatment late because of exactly what you're describing or taking
Speaker 5: your time living with it. So when I did, I
Speaker 5: received you don't know my Name from Alicia. I remember
Speaker 5: sitting in the house eight hours just listening to it,
Speaker 5: and I kept almost s getting it. Then I flew
Speaker 5: to La and I had an assistant. Her name was
Speaker 5: Nia Andrews. She's in music like her dad was in
Speaker 5: He wrote all freak out like he's part of that legacy.
Speaker 5: So we drove around LA for eight hours. I remember
Speaker 5: we went to Mallebook. We just were listening to this
Speaker 5: song on repeat. And then later that night she called
Speaker 5: me and she goes, well, what about you know? And
Speaker 5: then the idea so she it would pingpong back and forth.
Speaker 5: So there's some things I would do totally solo. There's
Speaker 5: some things. Jesse Terrero used to be my assistant, good
Speaker 5: brother and one of my best friends, and he would
Speaker 5: he may come up with something. Neil Feldman was an
Speaker 5: assistant minor. I'd given the outline and do it. But
Speaker 5: about I'd say a good seventy percent of the time
Speaker 5: it was just me dipping out. You know. I got
Speaker 5: a house in Maryland, sitting on the back porch and
Speaker 5: playing it in the headphones and just vibing and sometimes
Speaker 5: that could take me two days, three days.
Speaker 6: And I just say, says, you mentioned Alicia Keys video.
Speaker 7: Did did you have everything in your head even the
Speaker 7: casting of that video when you were thinking of the concept.
Speaker 7: You don't know my name?
Speaker 4: And did most steps show up on time?
Speaker 5: Listen? I don't remember, Listen. He's an artist, brother, he
Speaker 5: was never on schedule, always on time.
Speaker 6: But yeah, but did you think so in your mind?
Speaker 7: Is that did that come out the deck directly way
Speaker 7: you wanted it to players and everything, or that just
Speaker 7: came later.
Speaker 5: Most, however, I really truly can't remember how most became involved.
Speaker 5: But Alicia's very she still isn't she was? She lives
Speaker 5: that whole complete life, right, So she wasn't just down
Speaker 5: for some video model, you know, coming through. She wasn't
Speaker 5: down for people all up in her mouth kissing her,
Speaker 5: you know, even no matter what the concept was. She
Speaker 5: was very focused on, you know, being authentic telling the story,
Speaker 5: but also being respectful in her life versus just just
Speaker 5: the art. And I don't I I've known most through
Speaker 5: my boy Set Free another Philly Cat for.
Speaker 8: Minutes Free, shout out to set Free and I truly
Speaker 8: can't remember, but when he came through, I was so
Speaker 8: happy because I love the movies he'd been in, and
Speaker 8: he was down.
Speaker 5: You know. It was not a lot of money involved
Speaker 5: in it or anything like that. He just came through
Speaker 5: and represented. And you know, I still think that video
Speaker 5: I should create a movie. I love Frank Frankie and Johnny.
Speaker 5: I think it would be so dope to to, you know,
Speaker 5: do that. And we shot it pan Pan in Harlem,
Speaker 5: and Pan Pan's not there anymore, right, So that brother
Speaker 5: made the best sans yeah, Pam Pan was Do.
Speaker 6: You mentioned that? Chris?
Speaker 7: What's another video you feel that way about that? You
Speaker 7: could have just continued on and it could have been
Speaker 7: a whole like Christy, break You off to so many videos.
Speaker 4: Chris did so many videos. I forgot he did my video.
Speaker 3: I'm sitting here like, wait a minute, I think Chris
Speaker 3: directed the Roots video and I just oh, ship because
Speaker 3: when you said the wire I was like, wait a minute,
Speaker 3: A couple of wire cats are in my video for
Speaker 3: break You And then that's right.
Speaker 5: But I produced that video, so I was, and we
Speaker 5: did the thing under the bed and the whole joy,
Speaker 5: but it was that was no I love that video.
Speaker 9: You know, the era of kind of the big budget
Speaker 9: videos just kind of pretty much evaporated. How did you
Speaker 9: and the other directors how did y'all transition during that period?
Speaker 4: Went to movies?
Speaker 5: Listen? Listen?
Speaker 4: And what was that like?
Speaker 5: Man?
Speaker 9: Kind of seeing that that ecosystem just kind of dwindle.
Speaker 5: You are, man, it's such a great question.
Speaker 4: And it's YouTube your Napster.
Speaker 5: Oh yeah, Napster is my Napster because Napster is the
Speaker 5: reason the video budgets disappeared too. And I'll tell you man,
Speaker 5: I once again, I wish I could say I saw
Speaker 5: it coming, but we did not. And we I remember
Speaker 5: literally there was there was like a week where the
Speaker 5: bottom dropped out. I think fortunately I had already like
Speaker 5: maybe started working with Kevin on Real Husbands or whatever
Speaker 5: it was. But you know, my bread and butter, it
Speaker 5: was chopped at the knees. And it was very much
Speaker 5: like almost thinking it was a joke at first, Like
Speaker 5: you know, labels would call and go, yeah we got X,
Speaker 5: and I'd be like, really, now we're okay, so what
Speaker 5: is it really? Because you know who you know this
Speaker 5: artist and what they you know, the budget you're telling
Speaker 5: me is what they need for their you know writer,
Speaker 5: you know, like what this artist is. So I think,
Speaker 5: you know, for me, it was just a it was
Speaker 5: just a very difficult switch. But I started to understand it,
Speaker 5: and I actually would call people. I'd call all the
Speaker 5: people I met over the years and go like, Yo,
Speaker 5: what's going on, Like what's happening? Like I didn't understand
Speaker 5: the ramifications of napster and digital and all that time,
Speaker 5: I was still going to the record store getting CDs.
Speaker 3: Yeah, you know, see, I think or you know, in
Speaker 3: the music business, many people look at Usher's Confessions as
Speaker 3: the last album of that era. I mean, it was
Speaker 3: the last album. It's the last brick and mortar album
Speaker 3: where it sold ten million units.
Speaker 4: Wow.
Speaker 3: And then you know, like it came on two thousand
Speaker 3: and three and then the age of ripping and all
Speaker 3: that stuff really came into play. But I also feel
Speaker 3: like I have a theory that maybe for the video world,
Speaker 3: even though it wasn't financially responsible, I kind of feel
Speaker 3: like the Rock the Boat video really marked an end,
Speaker 3: even though other opulent videos were made kind of after.
Speaker 3: But I feel like the effect of the Rock the
Speaker 3: Boat video and kind of what it represented like just
Speaker 3: the whole thing with the Leah's death flying to other locations,
Speaker 3: private planes.
Speaker 4: Da da da, Big Boxers, Dad on a boat on
Speaker 4: a yacht, Da da Da.
Speaker 3: I definitely remember a moment where that just kind of
Speaker 3: paused the whole entire industry for a second. So even
Speaker 3: though it wasn't like a direct thing where it's like,
Speaker 3: you know, like a nine to eleven thing that changes
Speaker 3: the world, or a January sixth thing like where you
Speaker 3: can literally see a tangible thing, but I kind of
Speaker 3: always wanted to know, like in the video world, was
Speaker 3: was that a moment that gave you personal pause.
Speaker 5: Like like your your soul, like your soul was like
Speaker 5: put on pause. And I think we all had been
Speaker 5: moving at one hundred miles an hour for so many
Speaker 5: years and have had all these relationships and were so
Speaker 5: deeply entrenched and you know, going for excellence that we
Speaker 5: didn't realize the you know, how precious life is right
Speaker 5: because we were so indexed on working. An example is
Speaker 5: when the pandemic happened and I was home for three
Speaker 5: weeks and I was bugging out a little bit. I
Speaker 5: realized that I hadn't been anywhere for more than two
Speaker 5: weeks for twenty years, right, so I had to stop
Speaker 5: moving around. And I'm sure you guys went through that
Speaker 5: same thing. And to your point, you know, when that
Speaker 5: video happened and all those things happened, there was a
Speaker 5: real the party will almost stopped, right, There was a
Speaker 5: there was a halt, and because we all felt like
Speaker 5: a Leo was our little sister, a little cousin, and
Speaker 5: we loved it. It was a different kind of a
Speaker 5: feeling when that happened. And and you know, we're all
Speaker 5: jumping on planes and jumping on private planes and we're moving.
Speaker 5: You know, we've been to I've been to Brazil to shoot.
Speaker 5: We never really took We never thought about it about
Speaker 5: safety and what could happen. And I think, look, that's
Speaker 5: just something that happens in life. And I think it
Speaker 5: just was business as usual for us to achieve a
Speaker 5: great art form. I think we're hype. I think that
Speaker 5: video is beautiful, and I think, of course, like you know,
Speaker 5: you know, Hype himself as an artist wasn't only a
Speaker 5: music video director. He was like our north star, and
Speaker 5: he was tight with these artists and had relationships with
Speaker 5: these artists in a way where you know, hi Williams
Speaker 5: video could change in life as a musical artist, right,
Speaker 5: And it just felt like all of our business, all
Speaker 5: of our craft, had took a moment to breathe in
Speaker 5: when that happened. So I agree with you, man, it
Speaker 5: was It was tragic and beautiful at the same time.
Speaker 3: I always wanted to know, if you can name a name,
Speaker 3: what artist always makes you go back to the drawing
Speaker 3: board and re does Like for me, I will say
Speaker 3: that I was in a situation where I know never
Speaker 3: to give the song that I want to give Jill
Speaker 3: Scott or ericabad As the first song, like I actually
Speaker 3: create and sometimes trek like it's always it's almost like
Speaker 3: I had to do a horse and pony show, like
Speaker 3: all right, here's the song, and it's not the song,
Speaker 3: and then I'll do a second song. All right, I
Speaker 3: tried hard, here's the song, and then I'll do the
Speaker 3: song really want to give you.
Speaker 4: All right, here's a song that like, yeah, this is
Speaker 4: the one.
Speaker 3: So is there an artist that always makes you go
Speaker 3: back to the drawing board to read I don't like
Speaker 3: this treatment. I don't like this treatment or where you
Speaker 3: have to explain to them like in other word, okay, well,
Speaker 3: I guess with the Honey video and you said Erica,
Speaker 3: you didn't say she's michaeromanergy.
Speaker 5: But you know, I know, no, I am not saying
Speaker 5: she's micro. She is of an amazing artist.
Speaker 3: Yeah, we're going to recreate these classic album covers, which
Speaker 3: looks good on paper, but absolutely what artist like makes
Speaker 3: you always go back to the drawing board because they
Speaker 3: just don't see it in the paragraph that you're.
Speaker 6: Challenge. It's a good challenge.
Speaker 4: Yeah, no, no, an annoying challenge.
Speaker 5: I immediately know too. Artist one is busted.
Speaker 7: By that's a good challenge, that's a good chanter.
Speaker 5: Hymes is a visual he you want to talk about
Speaker 5: somebody who's paying attention to the visual I mean, and
Speaker 5: wants to call you at two a m. Because he's
Speaker 5: on that time as a musician in the studio, exactly exactly.
Speaker 5: I don't understand why you didn't pick the phone up
Speaker 5: at two am like he is, you know, to his credit.
Speaker 5: I mean, look at I just on his tribute. I
Speaker 5: was looking at the Janet Jackson video that he did,
Speaker 5: and that thing is is crazy just booha. Everything he
Speaker 5: does has a visual component to it. So what happens
Speaker 5: is he likes the first treatment too, But then you
Speaker 5: get there and he's in the details. He's going classic classic,
Speaker 5: busted rhymes and bust I love you, my man, and
Speaker 5: we already know what it is, classics. But when we
Speaker 5: did past the cavassier that was each set up was
Speaker 5: a conversation like he classically, he didn't. He Diddy's fight
Speaker 5: scene he felt was better than his fight scene, and
Speaker 5: he wanted to rechoreograph the fight scene to make sure
Speaker 5: that it's his video. So I get that we re
Speaker 5: choreographed that that fight scene in that room. Now at
Speaker 5: the time when the clock is ticking and you're gonna
Speaker 5: go into overtime, and you've written the treatment, and you've
Speaker 5: done the costume design, and you've got all the martial
Speaker 5: artists who are going to be in it, and you
Speaker 5: have the moment that seems like a request that is
Speaker 5: gonna be tough to create, but it doesn't matter because
Speaker 5: we still did it. And when you when you look
Speaker 5: at that video, when I look at that video, I go, wow,
Speaker 5: we probably had sixty five percent of that on paper,
Speaker 5: sixty five percent of that plan. And what Buster will
Speaker 5: will do is he's not just making arbitrary request. He's
Speaker 5: so deep in it that he's pushing you. He's pushing
Speaker 5: for greater, he's pushing for better. So he's not the
Speaker 5: guy who just disappears and goes and smokes. He's on
Speaker 5: the set setting in the director's chair, looking at playback.
Speaker 5: And as you're moving through your data as a director,
Speaker 5: you you know there's certain time things you have to hit.
Speaker 5: But interestingly enough, I think we did shoot like an
Speaker 5: extra eight hours on that video.
Speaker 3: So do you already have overages written in the budget?
Speaker 3: Do you already have overages written in the budget?
Speaker 5: When you know that is what you try to do,
Speaker 5: right and like once again my executive producer, Roseanne Cunning,
Speaker 5: that's what you try to do. But the reality is
Speaker 5: you cannot predict some things. Now, the tough conversation that
Speaker 5: I've seen many times is when the producer goes over
Speaker 5: to the you know, music video reping goes, okay, we're
Speaker 5: having this is this much time? Or Chris wants a crane,
Speaker 5: the crane broke and we have to bring in another
Speaker 5: whatever that is. The record label has to sign off
Speaker 5: to say, okay, you know cost plus if the crane
Speaker 5: costs you another ten thousand dollars, we'll pay for it.
Speaker 5: And usually that's where the power shifts, right, because the
Speaker 5: power because we already have a contract. So no matter
Speaker 5: what happens, I need to do what's on this treatment
Speaker 5: to fulfill the contract to get paid. Like that's just
Speaker 5: a reality of the business that it's really the only
Speaker 5: way that you can do it right. You have to
Speaker 5: make sure that it's done. But there's extenuating circumstances that
Speaker 5: I've seen over the years. But if the artists in
Speaker 5: the label are like down with you, right, you can
Speaker 5: you can change things a little bit to accomplish the
Speaker 5: same goal. But you know, I think I think Buster
Speaker 5: is is you know, he understands it early. He understands like, Okay,
Speaker 5: this even if this treatment is a we've got to
Speaker 5: move quickly. So this treatment is a blueprint. We're going
Speaker 5: to get it where it needs to be once we
Speaker 5: get there, you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 3: Okay, I vowed to never do this on this podcast,
Speaker 3: but since you're here, I gotta know the politics.
Speaker 4: Of video jawns. Come on.
Speaker 3: Now, there's entire careers and Instagram accounts that have made
Speaker 3: legends out of the right seven seconds in a.
Speaker 6: Video is that still a thing? No, y'all think that.
Speaker 4: I don't think videos are.
Speaker 6: As the Baxter, you know, like I'm thinking of like so.
Speaker 3: But the thing is that by this by this era,
Speaker 3: you know, even video uh models have just as much
Speaker 3: leverage as the artists themselves. And so is there how
Speaker 3: do you wrangle like and I'm not trying to objectify,
Speaker 3: like their product placement, but is it written ahead of time?
Speaker 3: Like Okay, I'll make sure that you know when you're
Speaker 3: wrangling with her manager whoever it is Gloria, like dude,
Speaker 3: that when when Grace was a jib, like Grace was
Speaker 3: responsible for like half from from Kreem.
Speaker 4: All the way down, like all those videos.
Speaker 3: So but but she told me that she was there
Speaker 3: to ring, not only wrangle, but also to protect them,
Speaker 3: you know what I mean.
Speaker 4: And so, but I.
Speaker 3: Didn't realize that there's like negotiations where this particular artist
Speaker 3: has a certain cache and she wants to be featured
Speaker 3: and da da da da da. Is that just is
Speaker 3: that just decided or is it random or is it
Speaker 3: already pre planned at the gate? Like Okay, we'll make
Speaker 3: sure that you're the you're the featured and we're not
Speaker 3: going to feature your rival that you might have beef
Speaker 3: with and said video or is it just like up
Speaker 3: to the artist who gets in or not.
Speaker 5: Now Listen, in my experience, it's always been this is
Speaker 5: gonna be a boring answer. It's always been like casting
Speaker 5: on a feature film. Yeah, you would think like, oh,
Speaker 5: that's kind of random, you know, or you look kidding,
Speaker 5: you go, that must be random where they get all
Speaker 5: old girls from a club. No, the answer is there's
Speaker 5: a casting director. Ulysses Torero. Jesse's brother is one of
Speaker 5: the best of every wow. And you know at that
Speaker 5: in that point, there was an era where those young
Speaker 5: ladies that were you know, video vixens or whatever you
Speaker 5: want to call him. It was a portal. Right, so
Speaker 5: now you decide, you know, like there's very memorable moments
Speaker 5: of different video vixens in videos, right, So, but then
Speaker 5: it was it's literally a portal. Like think about every
Speaker 5: actress who does shot shout out to Melissa for it.
Speaker 5: I mean, you want to talk about the hype Williams
Speaker 5: of video vixens like he was she was go you
Speaker 5: know that Datakis video knocked yourself out, like she's amazing.
Speaker 5: But but let's let's talk about her the portal. Now
Speaker 5: she is in another part of the business. Now she
Speaker 5: does podcasts. Now she's she she was, you know, part
Speaker 5: of that era with the magazine with Daytwine Thomas and
Speaker 5: you know what I mean. And then let's talk about
Speaker 5: Lauren London. The first thing she did was she was
Speaker 5: Paul Hunter's assistant number one. He was in Drop It
Speaker 5: Like It's Hot, which is a new video. She was
Speaker 5: in Parell's video. Right, and my assistant at the time,
Speaker 5: brother named Carl Reid. They were friends and he goes, Chris,
Speaker 5: you should you should audition Lauren for atl And I
Speaker 5: said absolutely, No, No, I'm not. I'm not I'm going
Speaker 5: I'm not having a video girl. I'm trying to be
Speaker 5: a serious filmmaker. But he was like, look, man, you
Speaker 5: got to just be a good brother, man. You got
Speaker 5: to get her a shot. She wants to be an actress.
Speaker 5: And she came in and it's a great story because
Speaker 5: she came in and she was late. We had packed
Speaker 5: the film equipment up right. She she came and she goes,
Speaker 5: I got a pee, I got a pine. Can I
Speaker 5: go to the bathroom? So she delayed us further in
Speaker 5: the bathroom. Okay. So I'm just sitting there looking a
Speaker 5: car like see okay, and we said action and I
Speaker 5: had been looking for new, new for probably eight to
Speaker 5: ten weeks. Wow, and it was her.
Speaker 4: Wow.
Speaker 9: Was it true in the ATL that a lot of
Speaker 9: big boys lines that heat improv a lot of that
Speaker 9: or how did how did that?
Speaker 4: Because we got it?
Speaker 3: I wanted to ask about it.
Speaker 5: Let me tell you something. What he said, you do
Speaker 5: that money in my face, like try not to let
Speaker 5: Big Boy is genius with his his ad libs. And
Speaker 5: the way big Boy was moving was, you know, he's
Speaker 5: big boys from outcast. He didn't really understand you know,
Speaker 5: oh it's a six am call, Yeah, to be there
Speaker 5: all these things. And he would come directly from the
Speaker 5: studio to set, not having slept or whatever it was.
Speaker 5: And every day I'd be worried. Every day he delivered
Speaker 5: every scene. Uh, you know he always added that extra
Speaker 5: that was beyond the script. Yeah, he had lived a
Speaker 5: lot of that stuff.
Speaker 4: And how was it with I? Was that was him?
Speaker 4: I don't think that was his first Was that his
Speaker 4: first feature?
Speaker 5: It was? It was? It was It was similar in
Speaker 5: the fact that he wasn't he didn't he never worked
Speaker 5: on a set before, so you know, me and him,
Speaker 5: I had done his very first video I'm serious before
Speaker 5: before exactly, so so I was always like, man, this
Speaker 5: kid is dope and Dallas awesome. Was like, I think
Speaker 5: t I could really play the scroll, So Tim would
Speaker 5: I think. He came in the first day in a
Speaker 5: Rose Royce and he came to said he pulled up
Speaker 5: for the set was a Rose roy and then he
Speaker 5: had a big like you know, when it's a movie,
Speaker 5: it's favorite nation, So every actor has the same kind
Speaker 5: of a trailer, and he had he had his own
Speaker 5: winner bagel and all the other actors were in like
Speaker 5: a two banger. So you know, I talked to him
Speaker 5: and I said, brother, you know you're leading this like
Speaker 5: this is everybody's looking to you. You are number one
Speaker 5: on the call shoot, So I mean in our other world,
Speaker 5: in your music world, because he's in the studio every
Speaker 5: night too. He's super popular. He's becoming the king of
Speaker 5: the South. I just had a conversation with him and
Speaker 5: we just got on the same page about work ethic,
Speaker 5: coming in being the leader because we're all looking to you,
Speaker 5: and is the lead in this picture and you know
Speaker 5: he I think the hardest part for any artist is
Speaker 5: not being ti or being tipped to your audience. Being
Speaker 5: with Shad, who is the high school a guy who
Speaker 5: just got out of high school, who has got to
Speaker 5: show vulnerability. But I think what we both learned for
Speaker 5: each other because both of our you know, you can
Speaker 5: never do your first movie again, right, so everything was
Speaker 5: bet on Tip for me. Everything for Tip was bet
Speaker 5: on me. Like, so we both had to you know,
Speaker 5: we're gonna win the super Bowl. The quarterback and the
Speaker 5: receiver better be connected. All references, so, you know, we
Speaker 5: I think we did a good job. I think it's
Speaker 5: you know, people still reference it and still love it.
Speaker 5: And I watched him turn into a superstar. That's the
Speaker 5: one human being our watch turned from a really hot
Speaker 5: commodity into a superstar through that process. That was up.
Speaker 4: How did you know that Evan Ross was right for
Speaker 4: that role? Hm?
Speaker 7: Hmm.
Speaker 5: He you know what he came, he came into the audition.
Speaker 5: I didn't know who he was. I met him in
Speaker 5: the Los Angeles and and I didn't know he was
Speaker 5: Diana Ross's son until we were shooting. Okay, really good, good,
Speaker 5: but yeah, I just was Evan as a restaurant out here. Now,
Speaker 5: Evan's look, good man, Evans, what the restaurant leons?
Speaker 6: Leons? Okay, thank you.
Speaker 5: It's on Venture and he has a club called Warwick
Speaker 5: on Sunset.
Speaker 7: Then there didn't didn't know that was his People will
Speaker 7: look at Evan Ross and like, what is he doing
Speaker 7: besides being married to Ashley Simpson.
Speaker 5: That's dope counting.
Speaker 3: I have one more question about videos mhm, and be
Speaker 3: honest about the mind state of directors.
Speaker 4: I know you're saying I can only speak for myself, but.
Speaker 3: Half the time, do you guys already have treatments in
Speaker 3: your head or stock footage pre shot already that you're
Speaker 3: just waiting for the right artist to sell that one?
Speaker 7: Like?
Speaker 3: In other words, is every video a bespoke kind of
Speaker 3: customized video. I'm only asking this because you know, I
Speaker 3: had a situation with I don't know, I don't know
Speaker 3: if you know who Sanji is. He did far size,
Speaker 3: passed me by yep, and a dude always wanted to
Speaker 3: work with Sanji and we finally got a chance to
Speaker 3: work with them on our Tipping Point record, and my
Speaker 3: manager was always like summing right here, like what a
Speaker 3: we were?
Speaker 4: Like?
Speaker 6: Hold up?
Speaker 4: Wait a minute, we did the Star video.
Speaker 6: Oh, I was wondering which one okay?
Speaker 3: And Rich is like, why do I feel like he
Speaker 3: shot this video already and just basically sold us a
Speaker 3: bit because the thing was we weren't there for it.
Speaker 3: When you talked about shooting your b shots without the
Speaker 3: artist first, I was like, wait a minute, that might
Speaker 3: be a Sandy trick from which it's my manager, Rich Nichols,
Speaker 3: rest in peace. It's this assessment that we got got
Speaker 3: and basically like he had already shot the video already
Speaker 3: and sold it to us, and we just shot our
Speaker 3: shots like at the end for a day or whatever.
Speaker 3: But like, do you do stock shooting of stuff, you know,
Speaker 3: like neighborhood shots or just random things that doesn't have
Speaker 3: a home yet.
Speaker 4: Is that a thing?
Speaker 5: No? I listened in my experience. I'm just kidding.
Speaker 6: I don't go watch this video again.
Speaker 5: Chris.
Speaker 6: I think they might've got got a look.
Speaker 5: I think they're all Everything is bespoke for every director.
Speaker 5: One reason is, you know, the label owns everything. So
Speaker 5: we would finish a video, you would see two thousand
Speaker 5: feet of it, but we'd send the whole twenty thousand
Speaker 5: feet of film to the label. So I don't know
Speaker 5: if they that's when we were shooting film, but the
Speaker 5: label owns everything, period, point blank.
Speaker 4: But yeah, but I mean, like right, okay, back in
Speaker 4: the day, like all.
Speaker 3: My reels go to the label. But now by turning
Speaker 3: a record, I'm just turning that record. They're not getting
Speaker 3: the demos and the stuff that didn't make the record, right,
Speaker 3: they're opposed to you.
Speaker 5: I always here's what's funny. I always talk to my
Speaker 5: producer and I say, you know, we should do and
Speaker 5: it's exactly what you said. I said, when we shoot
Speaker 5: a video, why don't we have this conset? Because let's
Speaker 5: say this, for every video you shoot, you wrote five
Speaker 5: treat there's five videos I didn't get right. I'm battling
Speaker 5: hype Benny. We're all battling each other. So for every
Speaker 5: video I did, there were five concepts that are setting
Speaker 5: on my shelf. I always thought it would be a
Speaker 5: genius idea to shoot all the components of the video
Speaker 5: and then put the artist in it. But you never
Speaker 5: really could do it because everything has a certain vibe.
Speaker 5: Every song had a certain vibe. Like I said, I
Speaker 5: thought that would be a great, great idea and maybe
Speaker 5: artists would like it where you could go, hey, here's
Speaker 5: a video, and here's how we would insert you in it.
Speaker 5: I always wondered that never had the opportunity to do it.
Speaker 4: But it's got watched because I hate roots videos.
Speaker 10: Just rewatched it. I was like, wait, anyway, let's talk
Speaker 10: New Edition wrap up.
Speaker 7: I just wanted to know about New Audition as a
Speaker 7: director from your vision. First of all, what were the
Speaker 7: You have to have these things in place for you
Speaker 7: to direct this project. You have to have power over this,
Speaker 7: Like did you have any of those those moments?
Speaker 4: Can I answer them to your question?
Speaker 6: Yeah? Before please?
Speaker 4: All right?
Speaker 3: You remember the guy who did the bel Air thing
Speaker 3: like actually pitched, hey, why don't we do it you, Matt?
Speaker 4: And he did like a real or a fake trailer?
Speaker 3: Yes, there was once a fake trailer for the New
Speaker 3: Edition biopic that was like roaming on you in the
Speaker 3: early days of YouTube, like back in two thousand and six.
Speaker 4: Did you have anything to do with that?
Speaker 5: I did not, did you do?
Speaker 4: You know what I'm talking about?
Speaker 5: Absolutely? And I met the brother? All right, I met
Speaker 5: the brother and let me tell you what else. He
Speaker 5: showed up on set with Maurice Starr oh wow. So
Speaker 5: look he uh look, God bless him. That's a Hollywood
Speaker 5: lesson man like we are. I've been the same way
Speaker 5: early in my career, like yo, I'm just gonna shoot
Speaker 5: the sizzle and then they'll know that.
Speaker 4: I'm a guy.
Speaker 5: I did it seven eight years ago. I shot at
Speaker 5: at L two trailer. I got everybody together, paid for
Speaker 5: me and titall. Okay, we're trying to get We're trying to,
Speaker 5: you know, create momentum. So you know studio would say, hey, man,
Speaker 5: yeah we'll make it. You know, it just was it
Speaker 5: was an effort to you know, show all those people
Speaker 5: together again. So nothing has come of it as of yet.
Speaker 5: We hope that we can make ATL two. But I
Speaker 5: do remember that quest and I met that brother, and
Speaker 5: he was a young director and he was really dedicated
Speaker 5: to wanting to make that happen. And you know, I
Speaker 5: didn't have anything to do with it, but I do
Speaker 5: know that he he got so far as he showed
Speaker 5: up with.
Speaker 6: And what did they want?
Speaker 5: Well, Westar of course we invited him and said okay,
Speaker 5: you know, to see to watch. But he was there
Speaker 5: with him and I actually had a conversation with him.
Speaker 6: His heart must have been broken.
Speaker 5: Oh lord, it's tough. It's it's tough. But that is
Speaker 5: a that is a Hollywood one oh one lesson. That's
Speaker 5: hard to get. But I think he's still like, he's
Speaker 5: still pursuing the art, he's still pursuing directing, and and uh,
Speaker 5: I think he's I think, look, it was dope for
Speaker 5: him to do that, right, he had to love and
Speaker 5: he just kind of came up with it and he goes,
Speaker 5: I'm going to do this. The fact that he made
Speaker 5: that happen and I got to go back and look
Speaker 5: at it, but I remember thinking, this is pretty good,
Speaker 5: you know what I mean, before I was over involved
Speaker 5: in any any New Edition project.
Speaker 3: I kind of thought that was the impetus that allowed
Speaker 3: this to happen, because that thing was so viral that
Speaker 3: about a year or two later then it was like, Yo,
Speaker 3: we're really going to make this happen. I thought he
Speaker 3: was a part of that.
Speaker 5: So no, you know what I knew about this project,
Speaker 5: Jesse Collins produced it. So Jesse, Jesse told me about
Speaker 5: this maybe seven years before we shot it, but he
Speaker 5: had the project obviously, you know, he does BT awards
Speaker 5: and everything, and so he got with them, so you
Speaker 5: can imagine in order to develop it with all those
Speaker 5: human beings, to do the life rights and to come together.
Speaker 5: It took that long. So about seven eight years later,
Speaker 5: I mean no, I remember the New Edition was my
Speaker 5: first concert fifteen Spectrum Philadelphia. I went to see New
Speaker 5: Edition Lisa Lisa Coult jam and they was a fresh
Speaker 5: fst and you know, stole the car from my parents.
Speaker 5: Did the whole thing so.
Speaker 3: Well, you can't just casually say that what what?
Speaker 9: Yeah?
Speaker 5: That That was my first concert as a kid, like
Speaker 5: I love the New Edition.
Speaker 4: At that point, did you get away with it?
Speaker 5: I did not?
Speaker 4: We uh was the bunishment?
Speaker 5: I didn't steal the car. I took the car when
Speaker 5: they told me no, and I drove all my cousins
Speaker 5: up there. Worst we gets man, We got the car
Speaker 5: told one of my uncles had to drive from Maryland
Speaker 5: to Philadelphia to get us some silence on the way back.
Speaker 5: It was worse than Vanessa on The Cosby Show.
Speaker 6: I'm thinking about that episode. Literally, think about that episode.
Speaker 4: It was explained Bill and Steve Good. I watched the
Speaker 4: Cosby Show.
Speaker 6: It was ship. What was your question about, Oh, oh
Speaker 6: did you get away with it?
Speaker 5: Oh? No? Did not did not. But when I finally
Speaker 5: did it, I made sure my uncle and my dad
Speaker 5: got to see it, and they were like, Okay, it
Speaker 5: was worth it, you know what I mean?
Speaker 3: How long was your initial treatment because I'm almost certain
Speaker 3: it was the three parter.
Speaker 5: Right, three nights.
Speaker 3: I'm almost certain that you had enough content for almost
Speaker 3: an entire week, like your original vision.
Speaker 4: How long would it have been?
Speaker 5: Well, the script it was. The original script was one
Speaker 5: big script, right, it was like one hundred and sixty pages.
Speaker 5: And then Stephen Hill and Bet said, look, we want
Speaker 5: this to be like an event. We want this to
Speaker 5: be three nights. So the writer Abdul, who's amazing, we
Speaker 5: started that process. So Jesse told me about it seven
Speaker 5: years Prior all those seven years, I was like, man,
Speaker 5: I wish he would I wish I could do that
Speaker 5: new edition movie. And then he asked me, would you
Speaker 5: be interested in doing this? I was like yes. So
Speaker 5: it's interesting because I was just I this was two
Speaker 5: thousand and fifteen, sixteen. I just decided to move back
Speaker 5: to the East Coast. So at a house, I hear
Speaker 5: the whole thing. We shut the house down, you know,
Speaker 5: gave up the lease, and I was headed to the
Speaker 5: airport when he called me to say, would you want
Speaker 5: to do this movie? It's a green light with BT
Speaker 5: We start next week. So I had to change everything
Speaker 5: that I was doing, stay out of there, and but
Speaker 5: so then it happened, and then we worked for maybe
Speaker 5: six months before we started shooting. So I think the
Speaker 5: one of the questions was how did we pull all
Speaker 5: those actors and what not together? And that was a
Speaker 5: real casting thing with Robbie Reid. We'd have Robbie Reid,
Speaker 5: Spike Lee's casting agent for years and years the show. Yeah,
Speaker 5: she's amazing. She's amazing, And it's just so for each
Speaker 5: person like wood Woody McLean, who's now you know, doing
Speaker 5: the thing, he's killing him. He used to be he
Speaker 5: used to be a dancer for Chris Brown.
Speaker 6: What wait wait wait wait wait wait.
Speaker 5: He was dancing for Chris Brown before he had ever
Speaker 5: acted in anything. So I had called for Tima Robinson
Speaker 5: to go, hey, do you know anybody who I'm looking
Speaker 5: for Bobby Brown, and she gave the reco for Woodie.
Speaker 5: Then we saw Woody and wood was really like he
Speaker 5: was a dancer, so he wasn't used to acting. He
Speaker 5: was rather shy, but he could dance his asshle, you
Speaker 5: could do all the Bobby Brown stuff. And we had
Speaker 5: the conversation and I just was like, listen, I'm going
Speaker 5: to bring you back for like the third audition, be
Speaker 5: bold brother.
Speaker 6: Like he's not an actor, believe it.
Speaker 5: And then he's but but look what he's done. That's
Speaker 5: what I always say, Like, you know, that's something that
Speaker 5: me and Jesse Terrell always said, like a lot of
Speaker 5: times we weren't able to work with the big actors
Speaker 5: in our career, like they weren't checking for us as directors,
Speaker 5: that they always looked at us as video directors. So
Speaker 5: we said, let's make our own star, right. And I'm
Speaker 5: glad that we, you know, had that that kind of
Speaker 5: blockade because it spawned.
Speaker 7: Of the thing because he was Bobby for a long
Speaker 7: time to the point where when he got to Power,
Speaker 7: I was like, I don't know, but now he's Kane.
Speaker 5: He did a new addition and then he did the
Speaker 5: Bobby Brown. Yeah he killed it.
Speaker 6: You feel I feel the same.
Speaker 7: I guess you must have felt very strongly about Algae
Speaker 7: in that way, the actor that played Ralph Transvant, because
Speaker 7: you've circumvented him back into a couple of projects. Right,
Speaker 7: at least I know he was in Shooting Stars.
Speaker 5: Yeah. No, listen, it's always a curveball, right. I was like,
Speaker 5: I didn't see it. I didn't see Algie as Ralph
Speaker 5: tress Man because there were people that looked exactly, looked
Speaker 5: a lot more like Ralph Treasvan. I could see that,
Speaker 5: and I didn't see it. But then Jesse really believed
Speaker 5: in it, and I was like, okay. And then when
Speaker 5: he came to the park in the audition where they
Speaker 5: would sing else you can sing, and I was like,
Speaker 5: I mean, listen, I was torn all the way up
Speaker 5: until we were shooting, and then he just did it
Speaker 5: like he killed it.
Speaker 4: So even free shooting, you weren't you still weren't sure.
Speaker 5: I wasn't sure. I wasn't sure because we had let
Speaker 5: this guy go that I'm talking about if there was
Speaker 5: a Ralph Treasvan twin. But obviously Algae embodied the character.
Speaker 5: He had. He had a sensitivity, no pun uh, he had,
Speaker 5: he could dance, he could sing, and even the tone
Speaker 5: of his voice was just perfect.
Speaker 6: I need something specific from you, Chris.
Speaker 7: I'm so sorry, and as you're telling these stories about
Speaker 7: this casting, I need you to please tell the story
Speaker 7: why you casted Dustin Felder for Jimmy jam May he
Speaker 7: rest in paradise for fucking ever, like please, please, please please.
Speaker 5: Listen Dustin Felder is it was just he's He was
Speaker 5: our acting coach for the Right, and his energy was
Speaker 5: it was just grounded and real, like the exact kind
Speaker 5: of person that I the way I wanted to communicate
Speaker 5: to the boys, and I would we would have sessions
Speaker 5: where I would just be in the corner quiet, and
Speaker 5: the way he spoke to them and the way he
Speaker 5: talked to them about performance and being real if you
Speaker 5: watch them more, because these were all guys who were
Speaker 5: kind of afraid, right because not only is this material
Speaker 5: material tough, the real guys are visiting rehearsal like they did,
Speaker 5: like you know what I'm saying, And then what Dustin
Speaker 5: would do would be amazing. And we were looking for
Speaker 5: like Jimmy James, Terry Lewis, and I would look at
Speaker 5: him every day ago, man, you could be Jimmy Jail.
Speaker 5: You know what I'm saying, You could do it and
Speaker 5: we'd laugh about it. And then one day he wore
Speaker 5: for Dora and I go.
Speaker 11: It's and all the boys were like campaigning for him too,
Speaker 11: like all the all the all the guys who were
Speaker 11: you know, played New addition, they were campaigning for him too,
Speaker 11: and it was a natural fit.
Speaker 7: He's really coached some amazing black actors out of l A.
Speaker 7: Like there's a very a generation of black actors that
Speaker 7: have a lot to give to him.
Speaker 5: So I didn't even know that. That's what's up, good brother.
Speaker 3: I heard a rumor that you were Were you one
Speaker 3: of the initial actors that I guess for a long time,
Speaker 3: both Will Smith and Kevin Hart. We're going to do
Speaker 3: Uptown Saturday Night. You do not hear your name tossed
Speaker 3: in there as a director.
Speaker 5: I'm glad you're telling me because I heard about that
Speaker 5: project too. I think Will Packer was involved in it.
Speaker 5: And that's one of my favorite movies of all time. Wow,
Speaker 5: favorite movies of all time. And a couple of years
Speaker 5: a few years ago, it was going around Hollywood that
Speaker 5: that was happening. I haven't seen the script yet, but.
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, I could have worn I heard your name
Speaker 4: mentioned in it.
Speaker 5: Thank you good, because you might be in some rooms
Speaker 5: I'm not in.
Speaker 4: That's a good that I love. Lord.
Speaker 9: Speaking of script, Chris with the writer strike that's going
Speaker 9: on now, how with you as a director?
Speaker 4: How does that affect you?
Speaker 5: One?
Speaker 4: And two?
Speaker 9: How do you think it affects the future of filmmaking
Speaker 9: as a whole. Where do you think the game is
Speaker 9: right now? And where do you think is eded?
Speaker 5: I think we're having a napster moment and I think
Speaker 5: it's it's completely People can't imagine what that the that
Speaker 5: the industry would change, right, But you know writer strike,
Speaker 5: for instance, right, I still get atl was eighteen years ago.
Speaker 5: I still receive residuals from it from that, right, because
Speaker 5: the business model was Okay, we saw it in the movies,
Speaker 5: Now we see it on TV. Now, we see it
Speaker 5: in the airplane, Now we see it in Africa. That's
Speaker 5: the way TV has always worked. Now it's streaming, So
Speaker 5: streaming for us two for Director's Guild, where everybody is well,
Speaker 5: no streamer wants it to ever go anywhere else. It's
Speaker 5: a subscription model. We want this is only available here.
Speaker 5: So I think what we're looking at is going wow,
Speaker 5: like the business change, what is it? How do you
Speaker 5: figure it out? It's the wild wild West to a degree.
Speaker 5: And I think there are some streamers who've got it
Speaker 5: figured out at least the best that it can be,
Speaker 5: but it will never be what it was what it was,
Speaker 5: And I think, just like with videos, we it took
Speaker 5: a long time to go. Maybe I should stop making
Speaker 5: horseshoes because they're driving cars around and there needs to
Speaker 5: be tired. Right, It's a long way to look at
Speaker 5: how you the way content is valued. So what is that?
Speaker 5: That's just what I'm telling you is just a realization
Speaker 5: I had recently. Maybe you know, I've been so involved
Speaker 5: in so in the marketing and everything with the shooting
Speaker 5: stars and the edit right up until it came out
Speaker 5: that I wasn't even really on the page. But when
Speaker 5: I've been having some conversations, it's like I don't quite
Speaker 5: understand the answer yet or what it means, you know.
Speaker 5: So to answer quest question, the world is not my oyster,
Speaker 5: you know what I mean? I don't think the world
Speaker 5: is an oyster for anybody right now, because we don't know.
Speaker 5: The opportunities are shrinking. Right. There's a statistic in the
Speaker 5: in the DGA that of every member that makes a
Speaker 5: feature film, eighty five percent only make one. Yeah this
Speaker 5: is before any of this, right, So that tells you
Speaker 5: how difficult it is to make a feature and how
Speaker 5: slimny opportunities are. Eighty five percent of the union makes
Speaker 5: one feature film and not another one.
Speaker 9: It's almost the same on the sack side as well.
Speaker 9: On our side you have your your tom Cruisers whatever.
Speaker 9: But then the other is, you know, people struggling to
Speaker 9: get commercials or whatever.
Speaker 7: You know, that's why you got to keep your ear
Speaker 7: to the street street because if you keep it in
Speaker 7: the bubble, you're gonna think it's sweet. But nah, it's
Speaker 7: it's people are out in la ship is changing and
Speaker 7: it's you feel it.
Speaker 5: Yeah, it's tough, you know, but it's interesting, right because
Speaker 5: that's the thing. The thing about the business, even if
Speaker 5: once you're in it for a long time, for me,
Speaker 5: is that every day there's the opportunity for possibility, right,
Speaker 5: and that can that can that can keep your motivation flowing,
Speaker 5: It can keep your you wake up every morning, there's
Speaker 5: a possibility of writing that script or moving forward. But
Speaker 5: I think that what we have to look at are
Speaker 5: great examples of the business aspect of it. You know,
Speaker 5: when we look at Amir and how he does things,
Speaker 5: how we look at Tyler Perry and he does things,
Speaker 5: Lee Daniels, these guys who have Kenya Barras, these guys
Speaker 5: who have taken their talent understood how it works in
Speaker 5: business and how to play the game. And me personally,
Speaker 5: I've always been leaning more towards the artist's side, right
Speaker 5: and having reps and agents and things, and just happy
Speaker 5: to be able to be created because at some point,
Speaker 5: as a creative, you go, man, I couldn't live any
Speaker 5: other way, Like I couldn't have another job, you know
Speaker 5: what I mean, and that satisfaction of when something that
Speaker 5: you create connects to your audience. Right. But I think
Speaker 5: that because of the way that the world and the
Speaker 5: technology is moving, it's more of a there needs to
Speaker 5: be more of a focus on understanding the business, not
Speaker 5: even just from a Hollywood perspective, but from a Wall
Speaker 5: Street perspective. You know, how content is being valued, how
Speaker 5: the business battle of subscriptions are different.
Speaker 9: Yeah, all the streaming companies are kind of collapsing into
Speaker 9: one another, like with Max becoming HBO becoming Max and
Speaker 9: Time Going collapsing into Paramount, And it just reminds me
Speaker 9: a lot of what happened with major labels, Like when
Speaker 9: you said naps the moment if it does the same
Speaker 9: thing to happen with label.
Speaker 4: Well, sir, thank you, this is long overdue. The next
Speaker 4: time we're in the Landa together, I'll treat you to
Speaker 4: follies or he's in l A. He's in l A,
Speaker 4: I said, the next time.
Speaker 5: We're in l A, hop on a plane.
Speaker 9: LA don't count you know, man, I just wanted to say, Chris,
Speaker 9: I really just appreciate your work man, and I love
Speaker 9: the way just to watch how you is you a
Speaker 9: lot of the directors I follow my guy set Man
Speaker 9: who I'm sure you know see uh yeah, the y
Speaker 9: C Anthony Heman way. Just y'all brothers. Man, I'm just
Speaker 9: really proud to see y'all like you know, transition and
Speaker 9: just keep working man.
Speaker 4: And I just love what y'all do.
Speaker 5: So thank you, brother, thank you.
Speaker 4: That's what's up on.
Speaker 3: Behalf of Sick Steve and Pete Bill and find Tickeolow
Speaker 3: and like you and the great Chris Robinson.
Speaker 4: I love your work.
Speaker 3: I love your songs that you do with your brother
Speaker 3: Rich and all the vics formula.
Speaker 6: All right, that was for Dustin. I just wanted to
Speaker 6: show it on the YouTube.
Speaker 4: That's right.
Speaker 3: We are on YouTube now damn congratulates. Yes, I still
Speaker 3: don't know how that works for us. We're still on
Speaker 3: our soft launch anyway. Uh this great Chris Robinson and
Speaker 3: then we'll see you on the next go around, y'all.
Speaker 5: Peace, my brother, Thank y'all.
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