Speaker 1: Hey, what's up everybody. I'm Jamel Hill and welcome to
Speaker 1: politics and I heard podcast and unbothered production. Time to
Speaker 1: get spolitical? All right? This week is officially the last
Speaker 1: week of Black History Month, and I thought what better
Speaker 1: way to end the month than to go out with
Speaker 1: a little current Black history. Now. History was made this
Speaker 1: week when Howard University's men's swimming and diving team won
Speaker 1: the Northeast Conference championship for the second time in three
Speaker 1: years now. When the Bison won the title back in
Speaker 1: twenty twenty three, it marked the first time in thirty
Speaker 1: four years that Howard had won a swimming and diving title.
Speaker 1: Howard's achievement is especially significant because right now Howard is
Speaker 1: the only HBCU left with a Division one swimming and
Speaker 1: diving team. Howard being the last one standing, or rather
Speaker 1: swimming is really counter to the history of competitive swimming
Speaker 1: at historically black colleges and university As recently as the
Speaker 1: nineteen eighties, over twenty HBCUs offered swimming as a varsity sport.
Speaker 1: Notable figures such as Andrew Young and Samuel L. Jackson
Speaker 1: both swim competitively when they attended Howard and Moorehouse respectively. Unfortunately,
Speaker 1: over time, the number of HBCUs offered swimming as a
Speaker 1: varsity sport dwindled because of resources, facilities, and interests. But
Speaker 1: like a lot of things in this country, some of
Speaker 1: that lack of interest can be attributed to Tadai racism. Now,
Speaker 1: I learned to swim growing up because my mother is
Speaker 1: a lifeguard and she swam when she was growing up.
Speaker 1: But that wasn't the case for a lot of black
Speaker 1: kids who are now my age, or grew up in
Speaker 1: my mother's generation or kids.
Speaker 2: Now.
Speaker 1: If you study the history of race in this country,
Speaker 1: you will find one of the most common vehicles of segregation,
Speaker 1: white supremacy, and racial violence was the public swimming pool.
Speaker 1: In the nineteen thirties, the Works Progress Administration was a
Speaker 1: program created under former President Franklin D. Roosevelt, and it
Speaker 1: was part of his transformative New Deal. The WPA was
Speaker 1: an infrastructure program that put thousands of Americans to work
Speaker 1: to lift the country out of the depression by having
Speaker 1: them build road, schools, and public pools. Up until that point,
Speaker 1: pools had largely been considered something for the elite and
Speaker 1: the wealthy, but under the WPA, over eight hundred new
Speaker 1: pools were built, and another three hundred were renovated. And
Speaker 1: these were elaborate pools. I mean some had sand, immaculate landscaping,
Speaker 1: and they were huge. The working class was finally going
Speaker 1: to be able to enjoy cooling off in style on
Speaker 1: a hot summer day. Well, not everybody, because this was
Speaker 1: not a time where America was great for black people.
Speaker 1: We were largely ostracized from the Great American pool Party.
Speaker 1: While some pools were built in black areas for black
Speaker 1: residents to use, most were built for the comfort and
Speaker 1: convenience of white people. In the North and the South,
Speaker 1: there were whites only pools and segregated pools. White people
Speaker 1: made it clear they did not want to swim with us,
Speaker 1: As the Daily Shows D. S. Sloan explains, it was
Speaker 1: because of knees and well ignorance and white supremacy, but also.
Speaker 3: Needs cities didn't build pools and black neighborhoods, and white
Speaker 3: people didn't want us in their neighborhood pool. Parshally, we
Speaker 3: were concerned about black men intermingling with white women in
Speaker 3: such a sexual atmosphere. I mean, I know it might.
Speaker 3: It's so ridiculous to think of a public pool as
Speaker 3: a sexual atmosphere. But this was the nineteen twenty they
Speaker 3: were seeing knees for the first time. I'm talking the top,
Speaker 3: the bottom, that little knuckle part in the middle, the
Speaker 3: whole circle.
Speaker 1: Woo have you seen these? Stupid but true? And speaking
Speaker 1: of stupid but true, the other reason white people didn't
Speaker 1: want black people at the pools is because they believed
Speaker 1: black people were unsanitary and unclean. Now, there's so many
Speaker 1: jokes to be made there, but I'm gonna just let
Speaker 1: y'all have fun with that one. Do your best. At
Speaker 1: some pools, black people could use the pools on certain days,
Speaker 1: and white supremacists also often use violence to let black
Speaker 1: people know they were not welcome. In Pittsburgh, in nineteen
Speaker 1: thirty five, a black nine year old was badly beaten
Speaker 1: by a group of white kids. When the nine year
Speaker 1: old's mother reported the incident to police, the police officer
Speaker 1: told her quote, why can't you people use the Washington
Speaker 1: Boulevard pool?
Speaker 2: I'm leaving you people? What do you mean do you people?
Speaker 1: What do you mean you people? Saint Louis's first race
Speaker 1: riot was over a pool. In nineteen forty nine, White
Speaker 1: people violently attacked about forty black youth who showed up
Speaker 1: at the integrated pool fairground park. The white people attacked
Speaker 1: them with bats, bricks, pipes, and knives. The incident required
Speaker 1: four hundred police and twelve hours to calm things down.
Speaker 1: Saint Louis, though, chose to resegregate its pools after that,
Speaker 1: and it saved that way until segregation was legally undone
Speaker 1: with the nineteen fifty four Brown Versus Board of Education
Speaker 1: Supreme Court decision and the nineteen sixty four Civil Rights Act.
Speaker 1: But rather than comply with the decision or I don't know,
Speaker 1: simply learn not to be racist, a lot of cities
Speaker 1: and community instead chose to simply shut down their public pools.
Speaker 1: As it was, there wasn't a whole lot of public
Speaker 1: pools that were built in black communities, and in those communities,
Speaker 1: particularly the larger cities where there were whites and blacks,
Speaker 1: once white flight took hold, a lot of these by
Speaker 1: default black communities didn't have a pool. So black people
Speaker 1: not only had to deal with not having access to
Speaker 1: a pool, they also had to deal with the PTSD
Speaker 1: of being racially traumatized or simply wanting to swim. The
Speaker 1: lasting effect of that is this sixty four percent of
Speaker 1: black kids can't swim. According to the Centers for Disease
Speaker 1: Control and Prevention, five to nineteen year olds who are
Speaker 1: black are five times more likely to drown in a
Speaker 1: swimming pool compared to their white peers, and black children
Speaker 1: ages eleven and twelve were ten times more likely to drown.
Speaker 1: Now this also has translated to overall interest in swimming.
Speaker 1: Less than two percent of swimmers at the NCAA level
Speaker 1: are black, which brings me back to Howard, considering how
Speaker 1: it was dangerous at one point for us to even
Speaker 1: try to swim. It makes their most recent national championship
Speaker 1: that much more special. Despite the obstacles and threats to
Speaker 1: our community constantly has faced in swimming or otherwise, it
Speaker 1: seems we can always rely on one thing, our resilience.
Speaker 1: I'm Jamelle Hill, and I approved this message all right.
Speaker 1: The Oscars are this weekend, and I am pleased to
Speaker 1: be joined today by someone who is up for not one,
Speaker 1: but two Oscars, one for Best Picture and another for
Speaker 1: Best Adapted Screenplay for his arresting film Nickel Boys, which
Speaker 1: is based on Colson Whitehead's novel. And this is not
Speaker 1: the first time I Guess has been nominated for an
Speaker 1: Oscar In twenty nineteen, he was also nominated for his
Speaker 1: documentary Hell County, This Morning, This Evening. He has had
Speaker 1: a truly fascinating journey into film. Who was once a
Speaker 1: Georgetown basketball player with NBA dreams, and after his basketball
Speaker 1: career didn't pan out, he became inspired to follow his
Speaker 1: creative vision. Coming up next on Politics photographer and director
Speaker 1: Ramel Ross. So, Ramel, I'm going to start by asking
Speaker 1: you a question I ask every guest that appears on politics,
Speaker 1: and that is name an athlete or a sports moment
Speaker 1: that made you love sports?
Speaker 2: Wow?
Speaker 4: What a question? Well, an athlete? I unfortunately I don't
Speaker 4: have a unique answer. It's Michael Jordan, like he's always been,
Speaker 4: you know, that idol and that icon. But a sports
Speaker 4: moment for me, I like that better because that's like,
Speaker 4: really really really personal, I think, And it might have
Speaker 4: been when I was playing basketball in Upper Marlboro, Maryland,
Speaker 4: with I was like my friend group, you know, four
Speaker 4: or five friends and I like kids that we didn't
Speaker 4: get along with, and like were the type of like
Speaker 4: friend groups that would fight. And I somehow think we
Speaker 4: figured out that we would fight by playing basketball and
Speaker 4: it starts to rain and it's black top and we're
Speaker 4: all like fifth and sixth grade, and it's it's like
Speaker 4: as memorable as like watching the finals with like, you know, Jordan,
Speaker 4: and I don't think Jordan ever played the Knicks or
Speaker 4: the suns or something where like every point mattered and
Speaker 4: everyone's drenched and no one has a real relationship to
Speaker 4: like their skills because it's wet and like it's it's
Speaker 4: getting dark, and I remember, uh, you know, I think
Speaker 4: the moment's so meaningful.
Speaker 2: I don't even know if I don't remember if we
Speaker 2: want or not.
Speaker 1: That was gonna be my next question.
Speaker 2: Yeah, who won?
Speaker 4: Yeah, I just remember how epic it was and being
Speaker 4: like wow, like this is a place where or the
Speaker 4: epic happens, like you can participate in the epic before
Speaker 4: you have the language.
Speaker 2: Of the epic.
Speaker 1: Now, was there a point where you recognized in your
Speaker 1: athletic upbringing that your skill set was a little more advanced,
Speaker 1: that you potentially had something that would last beyond say
Speaker 1: high school or you know, the sort of the traditional
Speaker 1: stoppage time for most youth that are involved.
Speaker 4: In sports, in that my sports would translate to something else.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that you might be able to get a college
Speaker 1: scholarship or maybe even be a professional, Like, was there
Speaker 1: a moment when you registered, like I think I'm a
Speaker 1: little bit above what the normal level expectation.
Speaker 2: Is for this. No, because I never was.
Speaker 4: So I was a really late bloomer and I got
Speaker 4: into basketball seriously probably when I was a freshman in
Speaker 4: high school. And so I was always good at things
Speaker 4: and like tried really hard and played well, and it's
Speaker 4: like the best on my team then. And he looked
Speaker 4: at me and he was like, you know, you've got it,
Speaker 4: and I'm like, what do you mean, Like, what's it?
Speaker 4: He's like, I played with Grant and Hill at Tough Lakes,
Speaker 4: Like I played Division two basketball. If you like, did
Speaker 4: this college workout, I think you could go to the NBA.
Speaker 4: And I was like all right, and I did it,
Speaker 4: and within a year I made varsity and then I
Speaker 4: did one more year and I was top one hundred
Speaker 4: players in the country. It was like really fast. And
Speaker 4: I think that translates to the idea of hard work,
Speaker 4: or the idea of having a plan, or the idea
Speaker 4: of discipline, because it was like shocking. If you work
Speaker 4: consciously hard, the progress you have.
Speaker 1: And now with that, I mean, I don't know what
Speaker 1: your dream may have been before, you know, basketball kind
Speaker 1: of really entered the picture. But like at some point
Speaker 1: I assume that you entertained like, hey, I really want
Speaker 1: to be like a professional. So what was it like
Speaker 1: to what was that process like for you to realize
Speaker 1: that that was a goal that could be doable for.
Speaker 4: You futurely looking at that and saying, well, it seems
Speaker 4: like I'm always getting better, you know, and is it
Speaker 4: possible to continue to get better to play with, you know,
Speaker 4: those who are playing at the highest level. And I'm
Speaker 4: lucky to play basketball in the Northern Virginia sort of
Speaker 4: DC area, and so the talent is just off the charts.
Speaker 2: So you can measure yourself almost at all times.
Speaker 4: You can go to a gym, you can go play
Speaker 4: in the league, and you can play against pro players
Speaker 4: they're there, or college players, and there's nothing more interesting
Speaker 4: than testing yourself against some one who is at the
Speaker 4: place that you'd like to be and after getting over
Speaker 4: the nerves, being like, wow, I'm not too far away,
Speaker 4: you know.
Speaker 1: Now, Even then, despite your interest in sports, So but
Speaker 1: did you have interest in like photography, which I know,
Speaker 1: became like a huge component of your career or filmmaking.
Speaker 1: Like were there were their creative desires even then that
Speaker 1: you you wanted to fulfill.
Speaker 4: Yeah, there were, there were, and they got sidelined because
Speaker 4: I became obsessed with sports, Like I drew a lot
Speaker 4: as a kid, like I had really you know, super
Speaker 4: middle class parents, very supportive, like they allowed my sister
Speaker 4: and how to do anything and supported us. So we
Speaker 4: tried the piano, we did karate, you know, like my
Speaker 4: sister did ballet, and I was attached to drawing and
Speaker 4: when I think about it, probably not element to your
Speaker 4: school like poetry and writing. But then once I found sports,
Speaker 4: and once I yeah, I kind of just didn't, Like
Speaker 4: I stopped almost reading completely because you know, I just
Speaker 4: watch tapes, like I would just watch basketball games and
Speaker 4: like you would study the game and I would be practicing.
Speaker 4: I remember my dad told me once, which is like
Speaker 4: it's scarring now that I think about it. He was like,
Speaker 4: you know, if you're not working out, you know that
Speaker 4: there's someone that is.
Speaker 2: And I was just like, what do you mean?
Speaker 4: You know, like there's and then so every time you're
Speaker 4: sitting down, you're like, there's someone else who's practicing and
Speaker 4: they're getting better and that just I just only played basketball,
Speaker 4: which is why I think I excelled so fast.
Speaker 2: But it was like extreme.
Speaker 1: Now Georgetown, where you you played collegeball, they that wasn't
Speaker 1: because you dealt with an injury in high school. I mean,
Speaker 1: were they on the radar before the injury or how
Speaker 1: did that materialize?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 4: Like I got good so fast that I became on
Speaker 4: like on all the you know, major D one school's radars.
Speaker 4: But they all wanted to see me play my senior
Speaker 4: year before they offered me a scholarship. But Georgetown, because
Speaker 4: I was a local kid and I wanted to go
Speaker 4: there because of Iverson, they offered me before my senior year.
Speaker 4: I just took it because what's better being close to
Speaker 4: home play at Iverson shadow I was a point guard.
Speaker 4: And then that summer I got injured, and to George
Speaker 4: Stown's credit, you know, the first thing that my parents
Speaker 4: and I thought was like, oh, they're going to take
Speaker 4: the scholarship away, and they could because they have the power.
Speaker 4: And they were like, oh no, of course they're still coming,
Speaker 4: like will help you get better in hell? And you know,
Speaker 4: literally they said if basketball, if you don't end up,
Speaker 4: you know, being an amazing basketball player or taking us
Speaker 4: to the championship like we hope you do, or you'll
Speaker 4: get a great education and you'll be shuttled off into
Speaker 4: the world. And it's like, I didn't know that those
Speaker 4: things happened. You know that schools cared about individuals and yeah,
Speaker 4: and their team, their players.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that is a bit of a foreign concept. Wait
Speaker 1: a minute, you'll still you're caring about my personal development. Yeah,
Speaker 1: just what I can do for you in the basketball court.
Speaker 1: But even you know, getting an opportunity to go to Georgetown,
Speaker 1: which is a fantastic school. And by the way, count
Speaker 1: me among those black people who, because obviously grew up
Speaker 1: watching the John Thompson here, I totally thought Georgetown was
Speaker 1: an HBCU. Se No, Georgetown was like, oh, this is
Speaker 1: like a whole elite university that is like, I mean,
Speaker 1: basketball was something they were obviously very good.
Speaker 2: I did not know this smell. It was one of
Speaker 2: the most embarrassing realizations of my life. Too.
Speaker 4: I didn't know either. I committed already, I had already
Speaker 4: committed up hot up.
Speaker 1: You before you committed, you thought George was a HB Yeah, I.
Speaker 4: Mean Georgetown was like going off to your scholarship. I was like,
Speaker 4: can I sign yesterday? Like I'd love to sign yesterday.
Speaker 4: I know that's not possible, but we can do it now.
Speaker 4: It was really funny. I was with my cousin Danika,
Speaker 4: and she made her promise not to say this publicly,
Speaker 4: but now that you have the same sort of misstep,
Speaker 4: and I don't.
Speaker 1: We're in the trust tree. Yes.
Speaker 4: And my uncle Kenyatta were like in a van outside
Speaker 4: my cousin's house in Upper Marlborough and something. Somebody said
Speaker 4: something and I was like, you know, HBCU and.
Speaker 2: She was like and I was like, wait, what do
Speaker 2: you mean.
Speaker 4: She's like it's not I'm like, but I mean you've
Speaker 4: seen the team, and she's like romel, like, I don't
Speaker 4: know if you're going to make it at Georgetown, if
Speaker 4: you if you're if you, yeah, it's like really embarrassing.
Speaker 1: Listen. It was the same with University of Miami during
Speaker 1: the height of like the Hurricanes. I didn't I thought
Speaker 1: it was a black school. Yeah yeah, this is a
Speaker 1: rich private school.
Speaker 2: Like yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1: But you know your experience of going there, because I
Speaker 1: think you were on the teams with like Jeff Green
Speaker 1: was one of your teammates. Yeah, and it was somebody
Speaker 1: else whose name. I mean, I know you had a
Speaker 1: lot of other teammates.
Speaker 4: Specific came in, like I came in two thousand with
Speaker 4: Mike Sweetney, Mike Sweetney. Yeah, and like Reuben Boomsha boomsha,
Speaker 4: Kevin braswell, like the Wan Dixon era in Maryland was on.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: So what was what was it like to, you know,
Speaker 1: be able to play for Georgetown like a school you
Speaker 1: obviously were very emotionally connected to.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it was.
Speaker 4: Incredible and I I savored every moment of it. So
Speaker 4: it's easy to look back and be like and not
Speaker 4: have regrets, you know, like I did my best and
Speaker 4: I took advantage of the education and the community. But man,
Speaker 4: like to walk into that to the Kenner and I
Speaker 4: was at Kinner League, I'm sorry to walk into what
Speaker 4: was the name of the arena, the arena, it's like
Speaker 4: McDonough arena. To walk into McDonough arena and like to
Speaker 4: see Patrick Ewing's jersey, Alondo Mornings jersey, and to.
Speaker 2: Like have them come and play with us.
Speaker 4: I mean, we're kind of the center of at least
Speaker 4: at that time of basketball in the city, you know,
Speaker 4: because of the Kenner League, all the pros would come
Speaker 4: play with us in the summertime, and so we have
Speaker 4: all the Wizards coming in, like the Legacy and the
Speaker 4: it's just so incredible, like so incredible, and like you
Speaker 4: wear Georgetown jersey and then like people come in and
Speaker 4: they look at you as if you're one of them,
Speaker 4: and obviously you're not, but like you're part of a family.
Speaker 4: It's like really like very proud to have played with them.
Speaker 1: And you were coached by JT three, right, John Thompson
Speaker 1: the third What was your relationship like with him?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 4: He was, Yeah, I think one of the best coaches
Speaker 4: I've had. I have never had a coach that had
Speaker 4: been so sort of human, you know, like very approachable,
Speaker 4: like very i want to even say, low key and
Speaker 4: soft spoken, but seemed to have like a very strong vision,
Speaker 4: high expectations, and I think had a lot of the
Speaker 4: father figure traits that that John Thompson, Big John had. Yeah,
Speaker 4: I'll never forget, Like my mom passed away when I
Speaker 4: was in Georgetown, and I'll never forget, you know, three
Speaker 4: days after it happened, just being home and like just
Speaker 4: getting a knock on my door. It's just being John Thompson,
Speaker 4: you know, it's just like coming to hang out. And
Speaker 4: it was just like really surprising, you know, because family,
Speaker 4: although my family had always come to all the games,
Speaker 4: you don't see the coaches outside of that small community,
Speaker 4: like not very often do the teams go to their
Speaker 4: houses at least as we had the community at Georgetown.
Speaker 4: That's like the kind of guy was. And that's an
Speaker 4: extreme example. I imagine a coach would go visit. But
Speaker 4: that stuff is really meaningful, you know, And that's he
Speaker 4: cared a lot about individuals.
Speaker 1: Most people who are just even casually familiar with athletics
Speaker 1: understands that it takes a lot of discipline, a lot
Speaker 1: of discipline, a lot of hard work, those kind of things.
Speaker 1: In what ways would you say your background in sports
Speaker 1: kind of prepared you for what you're doing now?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I love thinking about these things.
Speaker 4: I think that there's I just can't I feel like
Speaker 4: now in culture, athletes are really having access to the
Speaker 4: arts and like it's really okay to be you.
Speaker 2: Know, EMO and a basketball player.
Speaker 4: You know, like it's okay to like Metallica and then
Speaker 4: also you know, be really into sports and where a Jersey.
Speaker 4: But when I was growing up it was the opposite. Like,
Speaker 4: you know, basketball culture was something you go into and
Speaker 4: it subsumes you, and if you don't, you know, very
Speaker 4: few people could be like as Rob Men or Bill
Speaker 4: Walton on their team without everyone just being like, you know,
Speaker 4: shoving you off to the side. But I love the
Speaker 4: way that sports taught me that you do things now
Speaker 4: that you won't see a payoff for until later, and
Speaker 4: you don't know when it's going to show up, you know,
Speaker 4: like investing in like a stock or something like, you
Speaker 4: have your expect to get these gains in a month
Speaker 4: or in two months, but when you're practicing something like
Speaker 4: you can't say in one month, I'm going to be
Speaker 4: able to do this move in a game seamlessly, unconsciously
Speaker 4: and integrated into my skill set do the thing I
Speaker 4: need to do. It just shows up one day, and
Speaker 4: that not being able to predict when it does allows
Speaker 4: one to like commit to the task at hand and
Speaker 4: not worry too much about when it is, just knowing
Speaker 4: that it will. And that to me is what filmmaking
Speaker 4: is and what photography is. Looking at art the way
Speaker 4: that other people's work integrates itself into the way in
Speaker 4: which you think about your own work and your own self,
Speaker 4: and then it shows up sometimes when you don't know it.
Speaker 2: Also, like the way that I used a camera.
Speaker 4: I've been making images for a really long time in
Speaker 4: the specific community, and now I have a muscle memory
Speaker 4: of framing and making images that is very similar to
Speaker 4: a jump shot. Like if you give me a camera,
Speaker 4: I make images that look like my images because I've
Speaker 4: done it so much. And I don't know when that clicked,
Speaker 4: but I knew it would because of sports.
Speaker 1: Now, George Stown, you majored in fine arts, was it?
Speaker 2: No?
Speaker 1: No?
Speaker 4: I majored double majored in English and sociology. Then I
Speaker 4: got a minor in this thing called the inter arts,
Speaker 4: which are strange because it's just as like one improp
Speaker 4: Class one painting, Class one photography, so kind of hotchposh.
Speaker 1: How much thought had you given to what your life
Speaker 1: might look like without basketball?
Speaker 4: None? I was like lost completely, but not even a
Speaker 4: butt actually lost. I knew, I think, And I came
Speaker 4: to this conclusion while chat with someone about these things
Speaker 4: because it's not something.
Speaker 2: That I think about in language.
Speaker 4: You know, you kind of have feelings about the stuff,
Speaker 4: and you can sit in the feelings, but to articulate
Speaker 4: it's different. Because I lost my mother and basketball about
Speaker 4: the same time, photography and English language came into my
Speaker 4: life in a way that.
Speaker 2: I took it very seriously.
Speaker 4: So it's about identity formation and knowledge production, and that
Speaker 4: was happening at that time, which paid dividends into towards
Speaker 4: the art that I'm making now. But at that moment,
Speaker 4: it was just a space that I felt safe and
Speaker 4: I felt control over my thoughts.
Speaker 2: And my destiny.
Speaker 4: You know, if I think I'm going to go to
Speaker 4: the NBA, everything's telling me I am my scholarships, you know,
Speaker 4: you know, nominating McDonald's all American. You lose your future.
Speaker 4: You don't know what to do, but then you also
Speaker 4: lose your mom. You're like, I have no idea what
Speaker 4: the future looked like, and so settling into the craft
Speaker 4: it filled those voids, and so I didn't have to
Speaker 4: think about my future because I had something that I
Speaker 4: could practice.
Speaker 1: So at what point did you realize that, Hey, I
Speaker 1: think this is something I want to pursue, pursuing the arts,
Speaker 1: pursuing filmmaking, photography, Like, at what point did you realize, like,
Speaker 1: this is the direction I needed to go.
Speaker 4: I was obsessed with photography so much so that I
Speaker 4: was getting in trouble. When I lived in Northern Ireland
Speaker 4: and played professional basketball for a year, worked for this
Speaker 4: organization called Piece Players International that was using divide, using
Speaker 4: basketball to bridge social divides with Casoclus and Protestants. So
Speaker 4: I was a regional photographer and sometimes I spend more
Speaker 4: time taking photographs for them than I would doing the
Speaker 4: real work, which was not good of course, And the
Speaker 4: organization got an sp that year and there was an
Speaker 4: ESPN photographer that came don't remember his name. They looked
Speaker 4: at my photographs and he was like, oh, you've got
Speaker 4: a good eye.
Speaker 2: And I was like, what's a good eye? I don't
Speaker 2: even know.
Speaker 4: Yeah, so like look it up and you know, chat
Speaker 4: with him one or two times while he's photographing for ESPN,
Speaker 4: and he, you know, indirectly convinced me that I could
Speaker 4: make photograph like people like people would like my images
Speaker 4: or something. And at that point I was like, I
Speaker 4: want to be a photographer and got back and immediately
Speaker 4: just super obsessed, started teaching photography and elementary schools and.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that was it right now at that point, like
Speaker 1: at what point did you start to consider filmmaking as
Speaker 1: like this is going to be sort of I don't
Speaker 1: on is it the word I'm looking for, but an
Speaker 1: extension of what I've already done.
Speaker 4: That wasn't until I was in Alabama and I had
Speaker 4: photographed three years in Hell County.
Speaker 1: And I was making just when you were working on
Speaker 1: your documentary.
Speaker 2: This is right before.
Speaker 4: So I moved here and I was living in DC
Speaker 4: from like two thousand and seven to two thousand and nine,
Speaker 4: teaching photography, making images. Couldn't afford to live there, moved
Speaker 4: to Alabama, start teaching photography there, start coaching basketball, and
Speaker 4: I'm like obsessed with photography. I'm like studying it, you know,
Speaker 4: digging into the history, and I'm taking images, which is
Speaker 4: so interesting. I'm taking images and all of them look
Speaker 4: like someone else's, right, but they're really beautiful, you know,
Speaker 4: but they're like I know that there's that I'm not
Speaker 4: in them. I'm channeling what I like to call universal
Speaker 4: standards of beauty, and so I'm trying to figure out
Speaker 4: why my images don't look like my own, you know,
Speaker 4: in the same way that every person has a different
Speaker 4: jump shot, you try to shoot like someone else you
Speaker 4: will never be successful. You have to find the way
Speaker 4: that the ball in your body mechanics work with space
Speaker 4: and time and the ball like you have to find you.
Speaker 4: And after three years, I like figured something out with
Speaker 4: photography where I was really in dialogue with my own
Speaker 4: image making process and the history and blackness, and like,
Speaker 4: I'm like, oh, I understand how to make images. And
Speaker 4: about that time, I'm like, I wonder what that looks
Speaker 4: like in film, Like what does that specificity, what does
Speaker 4: that reflexivity look like in the moving image?
Speaker 2: And that's when I started Hell County Now.
Speaker 1: To go immediately to then begin working on a documentary
Speaker 1: about the place where you were living. What sort of
Speaker 1: gave you the idea that you wanted to focus in
Speaker 1: on Alabama, on Hell County in particular.
Speaker 4: Yeah, So I'd moved there and I didn't know that
Speaker 4: I was moving to one of the most historic counties
Speaker 4: for fine art photography like this sky Walker Evans and
Speaker 4: this guy wheream Christian Berry had been photographing there. They
Speaker 4: kind of produced what most people know as rural poverty visually,
Speaker 4: and they were working for I don't think when christ
Speaker 4: Marry was Thelice Walker Evans was hired by the Farm
Speaker 4: Security Administration to photograph as Dorth theer Lange and all
Speaker 4: these other historical photographers. And I go to this place
Speaker 4: that is essentially the most photograph region or the most
Speaker 4: known reason for rural poverty, and all of the folks
Speaker 4: that are imaged are white. And I'm like, Okay, that's interesting.
Speaker 4: Why are there not images of people of color? And
Speaker 4: then I look at the way in which people of
Speaker 4: color have been photographed in the region. I'm like, Okay,
Speaker 4: these people of color have obviously been photographed by white
Speaker 4: people because there's a distance there, there's an objectification, and
Speaker 4: it's not even necessarily explicit, you know, there's just something
Speaker 4: I noticed that's not in our community. And so I'm like, well,
Speaker 4: what's it look like for a person like myself, who
Speaker 4: considers the South to be a sort of culture sack
Speaker 4: for Black American identity to come to the South from
Speaker 4: the North with all these notions of this is how
Speaker 4: you help it? You know, you guys are a little
Speaker 4: bit behind New York, you know, like, what's it look
Speaker 4: like for me to look at the South as it's
Speaker 4: my conceptual home that kind of became my working mantra
Speaker 4: in a way or my working constitution, and with that,
Speaker 4: I wonder what cinema's participation in the language of blackness
Speaker 4: as it relates to said those ideas.
Speaker 1: Now, that project was nominated for an oscar correct, So
Speaker 1: you know, even though a lot of creatives they don't
Speaker 1: necessarily do creative work for validation. But what did it
Speaker 1: feel like, I know now, like for you to have
Speaker 1: like this, this, you know, first project that you've done,
Speaker 1: you know, at that scale, to be received in that way.
Speaker 2: It's crazy.
Speaker 4: You know. One thing that's funny is I was on
Speaker 4: The Daily Show with Trevoroa and this is right after
Speaker 4: we get nominated, and he's like, you got nominated in
Speaker 4: your first one, like what's the next? And I'm like,
Speaker 4: I'm done, never making another one. And then you make
Speaker 4: Nickel Boys, and then of course Nicol Boys gets nominated
Speaker 4: and I'm like, I'm seriously done, Like why would I
Speaker 4: ever make a third? Just kidding, No, it's you know,
Speaker 4: it's incredible for one's ego, I think, But I think
Speaker 4: what it taught me, If that's the way to answer
Speaker 4: the question, is that people people don't know what they want.
Speaker 4: People think they know what they want. People's tastes are
Speaker 4: led by people who are making things, and essentially it pays,
Speaker 4: it pays, it pays off, maybe to the maximum if
Speaker 4: you dig into like subjectivity and into yourself, and people
Speaker 4: will come to it, like people want to like new things.
Speaker 4: Because the film is, especially in twenty seventeen, like it
Speaker 4: is not it's not supposed to be nominated for an oscar,
Speaker 4: you know, Like the film was anti consumption, Like I
Speaker 4: built it as a response to image making of people
Speaker 4: of color, Like it was supposed to be this grappling
Speaker 4: between what you expect and what you're gidding and the
Speaker 4: image is in your own head and you're responding to
Speaker 4: it with your own imagination. You're completing the film, like
Speaker 4: all these big ideas. But then it was accepted because
Speaker 4: I think at that time people of color and not
Speaker 4: people of color, were a little bit tired of the
Speaker 4: way in which films narrativize lives and the way in
Speaker 4: which images of people of color sometimes feel a bit reductive.
Speaker 4: And that's validating and encouraging.
Speaker 1: Well, we could have done this entire podcast on Nickel
Speaker 1: Boys alone. I wanted it last night, so it's very
Speaker 1: fresh in top of my Yes, seven million questions without
Speaker 1: giving it away. But we're going to take a quick
Speaker 1: break and we'll be right back with more from you,
Speaker 1: and we are going to get into a deep discussion
Speaker 1: of Nickel Boys, which is nominated for an Oscar or
Speaker 1: a couple of Hobscars this year, all right back in
Speaker 1: the Moway. So, as I mentioned before the break, I
Speaker 1: have so much I want to talk to you as
Speaker 1: it relates to Nickel Boys, which is based off Coldon
Speaker 1: Whitehead's book, which was a Polite Surprise winning book. And
Speaker 1: I remember hearing about the book and it was always
Speaker 1: on my to read lists at some point and I
Speaker 1: never got around to it. And so when I first
Speaker 1: heard about Nickel Boys, I was like, oh, this is
Speaker 1: an opportunity. Even though I have to say I always
Speaker 1: go into it when something's based off a book, I
Speaker 1: always went to it with a preconceived bias like this
Speaker 1: ain't gonna be as good, blah blah blah, you know whatever.
Speaker 1: And I think the best films made about books are
Speaker 1: the films that actually make you want to read a book.
Speaker 1: And that's how I felt after watching Nickel Boys. It
Speaker 1: made me want to read the book because I have
Speaker 1: to say, just purely from an esthetic standpoint, and this
Speaker 1: is not really my lane. It's one of the most
Speaker 1: beautiful movies I've ever seen, like just the way it
Speaker 1: was shot, the images, and so your photography background like
Speaker 1: really showed up in this. Is that even if and
Speaker 1: it's a very quiet movie, you know, like it's just
Speaker 1: it's quiet and powerful, like kind of all at once.
Speaker 1: And of course, like most people, I was very struck
Speaker 1: by the perspective in which you chose to do the movie,
Speaker 1: which was a first person lens and you know, just
Speaker 1: talk to me about like that that's a brave decision
Speaker 1: to make for this kind of for this kind of work,
Speaker 1: Like what what gave you the courage to present this
Speaker 1: film this way?
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 4: I think there's a bunch of factors, and I could
Speaker 4: talk forever about all of them, but I'll try to
Speaker 4: summarize it into one is that this is like second
Speaker 4: career for me, Like a lot of people, I think,
Speaker 4: and this is hot take, maybe not a hot take.
Speaker 4: I think make films, worried about making the next one,
Speaker 4: you know, like I want to do this for a living,
Speaker 4: and you know, this is going to give me an
Speaker 4: opportunity to do this, Like I'm not thinking about another film.
Speaker 4: I'm only trying to make the most powerful thing once,
Speaker 4: you know. And I think with that, I think, yeah,
Speaker 4: I don't have failure. Failure doesn't occur to me because
Speaker 4: I've already had like the most extreme failure, which is
Speaker 4: like losing basketball, like to me, my body giving out,
Speaker 4: and like, I don't know, like it couldn't get worse,
Speaker 4: Like what's worse than that, you know, making a film
Speaker 4: and someone not liking it. I don't I'm sorry you
Speaker 4: don't like it. You know, I'm sure I'm going to
Speaker 4: like it, you know. And I think with that, and
Speaker 4: with yeah, it's allowed me to be a free thinking
Speaker 4: sort of art maker in which it's less about reception
Speaker 4: and more about intention. That's the first thing. And I
Speaker 4: think the second thing is I've been working on the
Speaker 4: ideas that are in this film for fifteen years, because
Speaker 4: they started with my photography, and then they you know,
Speaker 4: the three years of making images and then finding the thing,
Speaker 4: then then making a photo series that I thought was
Speaker 4: really meaningful, then making Hell County, This Morning, This Evening,
Speaker 4: which is essentially a first person film without my hands
Speaker 4: in it. So this is kind of the next iteration
Speaker 4: of my art practice, so I relatively know what I'm doing,
Speaker 4: so I have the like I have the practice I've
Speaker 4: been practicing for a long time. It was just about
Speaker 4: resources and collaborators.
Speaker 1: Well, it didn't feel like you were doing something bubld.
Speaker 1: That's what it sounds like, you're.
Speaker 2: Saying, exactly.
Speaker 4: Okay, Yeah, but I know that it is, but only
Speaker 4: in the sort of studio commercial system, because in the
Speaker 4: art world, no one would be like, this is bold.
Speaker 4: They would be like, oh, interesting, peace like it means this,
Speaker 4: it means this. But for commercial films too forefront black
Speaker 4: subjectivity to use the camera in this way, to like
Speaker 4: not have traditional narrative markers that explore emotion and empathy
Speaker 4: and expected ways, you know, which is like showing the
Speaker 4: violence and or you know, making the devastating part of
Speaker 4: one of the characters lives at the end of the film,
Speaker 4: an entire scene that goes on for a long time.
Speaker 4: That's just the language of studios. So so yeah, it
Speaker 4: wasn't It wasn't that much of a leip.
Speaker 1: I guess, as somebody who is getting more intimately acquainted
Speaker 1: with how things work in Hollywood through my own projects,
Speaker 1: I couldn't help but think as the after I'd finished
Speaker 1: Nickel Boys, I how did this get made? The number
Speaker 1: one thing that came to mind, especially we see we
Speaker 1: see sort of what is being prioritized, like a lot
Speaker 1: of nostalgia, a lot of remakes, that kind of thing.
Speaker 1: I was like, and while this is based off a book,
Speaker 1: I'm like, I don't know who green lit this, but
Speaker 1: like just share what what you can about that process,
Speaker 1: because this is the type of movie I easily see
Speaker 1: you go into a pitch meeting and they're like, yeah.
Speaker 4: No, you know, yeah, well Jamel, you know, I introduce
Speaker 4: you to the people. Yeah, you know, one of them
Speaker 4: sitting over there right across you know, yeah, I mean yeah, Edward.
Speaker 4: Edward works with MGM and Orian And you know, I
Speaker 4: can only say that it was you know, Plan B,
Speaker 4: which is Brad Pitt, Jeremy Kleiner and Dde Gardner, Alana
Speaker 4: Mayo at Oriyan, Jocelyn Barnes at Louvertore and David Levine
Speaker 4: at Anonymous Content, like those were the brain trust, like
Speaker 4: the you know plann. We owned the rights and they
Speaker 4: actually came to me because they saw Hell County this morning,
Speaker 4: this evening and Dede Gardner, who was like a kind
Speaker 4: of adapted screenplay.
Speaker 2: Whisperer for directors was.
Speaker 4: Like, this book is really really, really fascinating, and like,
Speaker 4: because of these elements, I think it needs it in
Speaker 4: the form, needs to be equal to the content and
Speaker 4: in hell count of this morning, this evening, that's a
Speaker 4: huge concept of the film. So she was like, I
Speaker 4: didn't think anyone could do it aside from Ramel. I mean,
Speaker 4: I didn't know she thought that highly of it until
Speaker 4: kind of after and thought that highly of me. She
Speaker 4: approached me and said they loved the film, Colson loved
Speaker 4: how kind of this morning, this evening?
Speaker 2: What do you think about this book?
Speaker 4: And then I proceeded to ask my co writing partner
Speaker 4: Jocelyn Barnes, and we kind of went forward, but they
Speaker 4: didn't flinch at the idea, which is crazy in hindsight.
Speaker 1: It is because again that was my immediate thought, Like
Speaker 1: I wonder what this process was, this was like. But
Speaker 1: what was really fascinating is as I was doing research
Speaker 1: for this interview is seeing that Closon Whitehead did not
Speaker 1: provide any feedback of this at all, Like he really
Speaker 1: removed himself from this process. So how did you receive
Speaker 1: that part that he didn't seem to want anything to
Speaker 1: do with the filmmaking part of it, not in a
Speaker 1: negative way, but he wanted to clearly create some distance.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 4: Well, I thought that he would at first, you know,
Speaker 4: want to participate. And when I sent him an email
Speaker 4: thanking him for the opportunity, I assumed there would be
Speaker 4: a conversation that would start. But he like wrote back
Speaker 4: like good luck, you know, like you got it. I
Speaker 4: look forward to seeing the movie. And I went back
Speaker 4: to the email. He actually said I sent him the
Speaker 4: script too. I won't read the script, I'll just watch
Speaker 4: the movie. But I realized after talking with Barry Jenkins,
Speaker 4: who made Moonline and some other things, some other great films,
Speaker 4: that he did the same with him, and so he
Speaker 4: is a distance, a distant collaborator with his own work,
Speaker 4: which I appreciate and I imagine was free freeing for
Speaker 4: Barry as well.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I was just saying, did that make you a
Speaker 1: little nervous at all? Because by the time he sees it,
Speaker 1: if he didn't like it, I know, right, Yeah, Well,
Speaker 1: I don't know what to tell you.
Speaker 4: Well, you know, like a question, it's a good question,
Speaker 4: but it like Jocelyn Barnes my code writer and I
Speaker 4: we had to think immediately, like who we owe what
Speaker 4: to I think if if Colson's novel wasn't based on
Speaker 4: the Doser School for Boys. Well, there's this book by
Speaker 4: doctor Aaron Kimberley called We Carry Their Bones, which was
Speaker 4: a sort of nonfiction account of her as the lead
Speaker 4: forensic investigator and kind of exumer of the entire story.
Speaker 4: Essentially she works for a University of South Florida. It
Speaker 4: was like her crew that went and dug up the
Speaker 4: bodies and like you know, put together the documents that
Speaker 4: the government would then use to really solidify almost like
Speaker 4: scientifically what happened. It's based on a real story like
Speaker 4: this is these are like facts and devast it's devastatingly true.
Speaker 4: So Jocelyn and I have to ask, like do we
Speaker 4: owe Calson or do we owe the Doser School boys?
Speaker 4: You know, like what's what? And of course we owe Calson.
Speaker 4: Like he's given us the opportunity to use his ip
Speaker 4: the mythology that he built around Elwood and Turner the
Speaker 4: Nickel Boys is why most people know about the story.
Speaker 4: Like he needed to elevate it to literature for us
Speaker 4: to get it to hopefully elevate it to cinema. But yeah,
Speaker 4: it was we figured we owed most to Dozier and
Speaker 4: then second to Caulson, respectively.
Speaker 2: Calson.
Speaker 1: If you listen, no, that makes sense because for those
Speaker 1: who are listening and watching who are not familiar, you
Speaker 1: know this is based off it's a reformatory school where
Speaker 1: they were clearly abusing black boys. They had their own
Speaker 1: system of like apart time and segregation within this reformatory school.
Speaker 1: And your film takes us of sort of inside the
Speaker 1: emotional the physical toll that these boys are going through.
Speaker 1: But the way you do it, I think if somebody
Speaker 1: just said, okay, this is what the story is about,
Speaker 1: people would automatically assume like, oh, this is gonna be
Speaker 1: black trauma from start to finish. Yeah yeah, but it's
Speaker 1: not that, you know. And what I loved about it too,
Speaker 1: is that I thought the imagination of violence was actually
Speaker 1: more powerful than showing these boys getting brutalized the way
Speaker 1: that they were. And I would love to for you
Speaker 1: to share why you made that such an intentional choice
Speaker 1: that you didn't want to just show these boys being beating.
Speaker 1: You wanted the audience to think about this violence differently yeah,
Speaker 1: and the.
Speaker 4: Way that you're asking it to me now, in this
Speaker 4: specific sort of thread of conversation, it's making me realize
Speaker 4: something about that in that I also think it's more
Speaker 4: powerful to not show it, which is why Jocelyn and
Speaker 4: I did it. And the reason that is is because
Speaker 4: black people in general are over indexed visually with violence
Speaker 4: onto our bodies, right like it's in culture's imagination. There
Speaker 4: was a time in which it was really important that
Speaker 4: we show the things that we have, the Rodney King
Speaker 4: footage that we have, the movies in which we're seeing graphically,
Speaker 4: because people didn't believe it, and people actually didn't know
Speaker 4: the extent to which it was true. But at some
Speaker 4: point it becomes a sort of it happens to them,
Speaker 4: not us, or that's all that happens to them, and
Speaker 4: so they become a sum of that or inextricably connected
Speaker 4: to it. I think we kind of all know these
Speaker 4: things intuitively. But I think what's interesting is that for
Speaker 4: people who are traumatized, they're like Mark, like, they don't
Speaker 4: need to they don't need to go through the trauma
Speaker 4: to have the trauma be produced in their brain because
Speaker 4: they've experienced it in their past and so you know,
Speaker 4: someone who was in the war and hears all the
Speaker 4: sound and sees all the things. If they're in a
Speaker 4: city in the fourth of July, it is popping off
Speaker 4: like they're going.
Speaker 2: Back and it's really scary for them.
Speaker 4: But it seems to me the way that you asked
Speaker 4: a question that actually culture is like that as it
Speaker 4: relates to black imagery, in that it seems like culture
Speaker 4: is traumatized with the over index large culture at large,
Speaker 4: American culture at large, black, white, every single color. But
Speaker 4: it's interesting to think of those images as being trauma
Speaker 4: and not just being images that are content.
Speaker 1: You know, Yeah, I mean, that's that's why I didn't
Speaker 1: I didn't read a single review about this movie before
Speaker 1: I saw it. I knew about that again the existence
Speaker 1: of the book, and I knew the general plot line,
Speaker 1: and so when I started the movie, I was thinking,
Speaker 1: I was like, I just hope, like I'm not halfway
Speaker 1: through this movie, and I wanted to sort of piro
Speaker 1: wet off a building. I was totally thinking that. I
Speaker 1: was like, please, don't let this be another another round
Speaker 1: of fresh trauma. And so when it got to the
Speaker 1: point of where you know, you're showing what happens in
Speaker 1: the White House, if you will, the place where they
Speaker 1: took the boys that needed to be disciplined. It was
Speaker 1: far more thoughtful and scary the way that you did it.
Speaker 1: Being able to hear the young man trembling and shaking,
Speaker 1: and him hearing the sounds and the other like that
Speaker 1: was way. That was what That was the perfect note
Speaker 1: from me, as opposed to like just showing some random
Speaker 1: acts of violence. I don't think I would have gotten
Speaker 1: it the same way.
Speaker 4: It's also I think that's the human experience of those things,
Speaker 4: you know. And if we're going to take point of
Speaker 4: view seriously, and I like to say, like make the
Speaker 4: camera an organ, then people aren't viewing that they're actually
Speaker 4: in the other room. And it's actually true to the
Speaker 4: way in which the film and the camera exists.
Speaker 2: So it kind of just makes practical sense as well.
Speaker 1: Did you ever think of doing this movie a different
Speaker 1: way or did you always know how you wanted to do?
Speaker 2: Man? I really I credit my co writing partner.
Speaker 4: Like I remember finishing the book and like, you know,
Speaker 4: thinking a bit, and you know, the first thought after
Speaker 4: a while I was reading it was point of view,
Speaker 4: And I call Jocelyn and I tell her what I'm thinking,
Speaker 4: and she's always supportive. So she wasn't like, man, you
Speaker 4: can't do that, or Bory, that's crazy. She was just like, oh, that's.
Speaker 2: Interesting, and we we just went with it. But what
Speaker 2: if she didn't.
Speaker 4: I never had another thought, but I wonder, like, what
Speaker 4: other versions it would have been?
Speaker 2: Yeah, no idea.
Speaker 1: Why did you because this seemed to be a theme
Speaker 1: and a message in the film without being in avert message.
Speaker 1: But why did you think it was important to sort
Speaker 1: of showcase vulnerability in black Boys?
Speaker 2: Yeah? Man, that's like.
Speaker 4: Such a good question that I think just emerging naturally
Speaker 4: through the way in which I like to use the camera,
Speaker 4: because I think that you know, I remember after shooting
Speaker 4: hel County this morning, this evening, and I remember Jocelyn
Speaker 4: being in the edit with me, like, you know, consulting
Speaker 4: when I was making cuts, and I.
Speaker 2: Remember her asking me, are you gay?
Speaker 4: You know, just like straight up, you know, and she
Speaker 4: she identifies as queer, like she has she has a
Speaker 4: a female partner, And obviously she's not saying it in
Speaker 4: any sort of like eighties use of day age, just
Speaker 4: like just yeah, because like the way that you know,
Speaker 4: I really like the camera like caresses the skin and
Speaker 4: its proximity, and the way in which it kind of
Speaker 4: aestheticizes quote unquote black bodies in a way that's not objectifying,
Speaker 4: but it's like tender and loving and romantic, but it's
Speaker 4: not necessarily sexually romantic, you know. But that's that's the
Speaker 4: way in which like the way in which I photograph,
Speaker 4: especially with the moving image, it is very intimate. And
Speaker 4: that's the way that I see people, and that's the
Speaker 4: way that I see men, and that you know, is
Speaker 4: built into the language of the film and even you know,
Speaker 4: in the writing process, the images that I was writing,
Speaker 4: uh for each the way that each we're going to
Speaker 4: look at each other. And we actually had to dial
Speaker 4: some back. And I've never seen this because some of
Speaker 4: them were too Like I remember I made an image
Speaker 4: of like Turner like tracing Elwood's leg all the way
Speaker 4: to the scar and then like tracing the scar with
Speaker 4: his finger. And I think it's a beautiful image, right,
Speaker 4: And that's what you would do to a friend. That's
Speaker 4: what I would do to it, like my father, you know,
Speaker 4: like if he had a scar keyloid or something. And
Speaker 4: that's something that's in black families. And in nuclear families,
Speaker 4: but in the context of this film, that would mislead
Speaker 4: the audience, so we kind of had to take that out.
Speaker 4: But you see the intimacy in the way in which
Speaker 4: they talk at each other and the way that they
Speaker 4: look at each other. And I think that every person,
Speaker 4: every black Mail, I would say, speaking at large for everyone,
Speaker 4: were also trying not to has those relationships that are
Speaker 4: romantic but platonic, where it's like, Man, I love you
Speaker 4: like you've been there for me, you see me, I
Speaker 4: see you, and maybe you never say that. But this
Speaker 4: was an opportunity through Colson's characters, because it's already there,
Speaker 4: to kind of lean into it with the camera and
Speaker 4: with their gaze at each other and with their proximity.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I picked up on that, you know, as their
Speaker 1: their friendship developed, is that this was this was an
Speaker 1: intimate friendship, and it was presenting black male friendship in
Speaker 1: a very different way than what we've seen, but in
Speaker 1: a way that you know, I certainly granted, I'm a woman,
Speaker 1: so I'm speaking from this standpoint, but I didn't think
Speaker 1: in a way that would hesitate to use the word undermine,
Speaker 1: but in a way that would sort of undermine sort
Speaker 1: of black masculinity, because that's always the charge. It's like, oh,
Speaker 1: they just want to you know, destroy black masculinity. No,
Speaker 1: it's actually to me like it's showcasing a level of
Speaker 1: vulnerability where they're giving each other permission all the time
Speaker 1: to be themselves and to be their most intimate selves
Speaker 1: again without this being about a romance. And so like
Speaker 1: I thought you nailed that very well, you know, definitely.
Speaker 4: It's also like at a moment and a place in
Speaker 4: which is needed most, right, Like this isn't just typical
Speaker 4: high school and two boys just like hanging out in
Speaker 4: the locker room.
Speaker 2: This is like a place in.
Speaker 1: Dream circumstances where they need this because no one else
Speaker 1: is showing them this level of affection, you know.
Speaker 2: Frankly.
Speaker 1: So with that being said, how do you hope black
Speaker 1: boys and men feel after seeing nickel boys?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 4: I hope that they I want to say, feel seen,
Speaker 4: or I hope maybe that they can allow themselves to
Speaker 4: be seen and they can see people without you know,
Speaker 4: the no Homo thing or without the no Diddy or whatever,
Speaker 4: yeah whatever, or.
Speaker 1: Guys like we're over there. Yeah, it's like you're over
Speaker 1: a certain age, like you should not still be saying
Speaker 1: about please.
Speaker 4: It's so unnecessary, but like it just shows the way
Speaker 4: in which people are still protective over that other people
Speaker 4: view their sexuality or their gender identity, which I'm unsure
Speaker 4: if is still culturally oppressive or if it's just individually
Speaker 4: held onto you know, who can really tell. Yeah, I
Speaker 4: hope that there's just another example of ways to be
Speaker 4: in relationships with people that are open and and you're present.
Speaker 1: Because this film has been nominated, what is it a
Speaker 1: Best Picture of Adapted Screenplay. Yeah, yeah, correct, very incredible honors,
Speaker 1: you know, to be to be nominated so second time
Speaker 1: out right as a you know Oscar Award nomination. How
Speaker 1: does this feel compared to when you were nominated for
Speaker 1: a Hale County.
Speaker 4: I mean, the Hell County one was unbelievable. I think
Speaker 4: the best part about the Hell County ones and no
Speaker 4: one saw it coming, you know, like when we got nominated,
Speaker 4: everyone was like like how did they do that? And
Speaker 4: we were like Ryan Warner, He's like this guy snatic
Speaker 4: who was like just like really smart and was like,
Speaker 4: this film is powerful. And I think if we have
Speaker 4: a small campaign, because it's all about a campaign like
Speaker 4: these films don't get to where they are without a
Speaker 4: lot of support from the studios and a lot of
Speaker 4: support from the publics and the critics. This time around,
Speaker 4: it's most incredible, honestly, which seems like it's a cop
Speaker 4: out to say the right thing, but it's just true
Speaker 4: that the story of the Doser Boys is like now
Speaker 4: part of the Academy and it's part of cinema history,
Speaker 4: because man, if this film's and this film was all intent,
Speaker 4: like the whole process, the writing process, the pitching process,
Speaker 4: it was all like, man, it would be like, it'd
Speaker 4: be great if they let us do this. This is
Speaker 4: so meaningful, This is so meaningful. It doesn't matter how
Speaker 4: it's received. Obviously we want it received well, we think
Speaker 4: we're communicating something specific, But man, like, how cool is
Speaker 4: it to have someone go into a theater and on
Speaker 4: the same screen that they'll they'll watch Interstellar, same screen
Speaker 4: that they watch Poor Things, or the same screen they're
Speaker 4: watching Wicked, they see black subjectivity and black point of view.
Speaker 4: You cannot watch the film without being inside the head
Speaker 4: and eyes of a person of color.
Speaker 2: That doesn't exist.
Speaker 4: That's never happened before, and that is like a cultural
Speaker 4: gesture that personally is just like meaningful. You know, a
Speaker 4: kid watches the thing, watches the film and they're looking
Speaker 4: down on Elwood's body as he ties a string around
Speaker 4: his finger, like that's you, that's us, that's every person,
Speaker 4: all people are equal, whatever, And so the denomination was
Speaker 4: like just cool. You know, it's just like we it
Speaker 4: got elevated to a space that we could never have imagined.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 1: So will it be a letdown if you do another
Speaker 1: movie and it's not nominated?
Speaker 4: No, definitely, definitely. I mean week long depression. You know,
Speaker 4: I can't believe I didn't go three for three?
Speaker 2: Whoe is me? What a hard life? You got?
Speaker 1: It? Like bad a thousands. See, look at the standard
Speaker 1: that you wound up, you wound up setting. Now, as
Speaker 1: you said this before earlier in this podcast, about how
Speaker 1: now you see many more athletes that are now in
Speaker 1: the creative space and now feeling comfortable, you know, kind
Speaker 1: of being in that space as someone who had to
Speaker 1: make you made this transition in quite successfully, Like what
Speaker 1: would be some of your advice or things you wish
Speaker 1: you knew when you were trying to make that tradition
Speaker 1: transition that could be helpful to other athletes who want
Speaker 1: to kind of follow a similar path that you have followed.
Speaker 4: And honestly, I feel like I made all the right decisions,
Speaker 4: or more so, the universe conspired in my favor, you know,
Speaker 4: because I largely think that most people work hard, most
Speaker 4: people care, and like things happen that are out of
Speaker 4: one's control that like set people off, set them in
Speaker 4: certain ways, and like, you know, more is out of
Speaker 4: control than we realize, you know, until something goes astray,
Speaker 4: and then you're like, oh, yeah, my tire could have
Speaker 4: run flat at any point in time and I could
Speaker 4: have crashed into a car. Probably a bad example, but
Speaker 4: I think, yeah, I think that if I was for
Speaker 4: my younger self, I probably would have tried to be
Speaker 4: myself earlier. I think I waited until I lost my
Speaker 4: mom in basketball.
Speaker 2: To really.
Speaker 4: Say I don't care about what people think, and like,
Speaker 4: if I wanted to read while people were hanging, I
Speaker 4: would just read all day. If I wanted to like
Speaker 4: say something that was on my mind, I would say
Speaker 4: it instead of like holding it back because I didn't
Speaker 4: think people would think what I'm saying is cool. I
Speaker 4: like really bought into basketball culture my first couple of
Speaker 4: years especially going to Georgetown. They had a really big
Speaker 4: tradition and all the athletes coming from around the country
Speaker 4: were also steeped in that tradition.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 4: I like wore chain my first year, you know, and
Speaker 4: like super baggy clothes.
Speaker 2: When I was in high.
Speaker 4: School, I was listening to Sublime and wearing Abercrombie, you know,
Speaker 4: and then when I went to Georgetown, I was like
Speaker 4: boo boo, you know, I got my my TEMs.
Speaker 2: Now would be fresh, you know, like those types of things.
Speaker 4: So I would probably encourage those if they're interested, to
Speaker 4: just like continue to find who they are and to
Speaker 4: not worry about what people think.
Speaker 2: What sounds tripe, but it's true.
Speaker 1: This question just popped into my mind just hearing you
Speaker 1: kind of discuss it in that way. Is like, do
Speaker 1: you think sports, maybe not every sport, but just the
Speaker 1: function and the machinery of sports, that it robs athletes
Speaker 1: of their identity?
Speaker 2: Hmm. I love that question.
Speaker 4: Never thought about it before, because it's hard to say
Speaker 4: whether or not something is I would say in the past, Yes,
Speaker 4: I think it's hard to say whether or not something
Speaker 4: is taking something from someone when it's always giving them
Speaker 4: something too, you know, because it's also giving you so
Speaker 4: much about yourself that maybe doesn't have a traditional place
Speaker 4: to be expressed that it just falls into the language
Speaker 4: of sports. But like what it does for confidence, what
Speaker 4: it does for teamwork, what it does for just genuine,
Speaker 4: genuine understanding of what one's physical limits are, what one's
Speaker 4: capable of.
Speaker 2: I think.
Speaker 4: There's dividends in anything that someone wants to do. It's
Speaker 4: just a way of learning about oneself at its minimum,
Speaker 4: you know, and most people aren't pushed. Most people, I believe,
Speaker 4: aren't pushed. I think most people exist and they are
Speaker 4: challenged in like utilitarian ways. But like to push yourself
Speaker 4: past what you thought you would do only because you
Speaker 4: never thought that there was something beyond what you thought
Speaker 4: was a limit is like human development. Like that is
Speaker 4: a powerful thing. But I think as sports culture has
Speaker 4: existed previously, I would say that it cut off ways
Speaker 4: of expressing oneself, probably in the same way that being
Speaker 4: a college athlete, especially at a Division one big school level,
Speaker 4: I think is an honor of privilege. It also limits
Speaker 4: the classes you can take right like I couldn't. I
Speaker 4: couldn't take any courses that were from three pm to
Speaker 4: the end of the day. So what am I going
Speaker 4: to study? There's only certain things that I can study.
Speaker 4: But it's also given me the identity of a basketball
Speaker 4: player and all those other things. So it's twofold. It's
Speaker 4: like giving it's it's robbing me of those other courses,
Speaker 4: those other academic pursuits, but it's given me so much
Speaker 4: as an athlete for both.
Speaker 1: Yeah, are you amazed or how amazed are you that
Speaker 1: Jeff Green is still playing?
Speaker 4: Yo, Uncle Jeff they called him, We called him Uncle
Speaker 4: Jeff when he was on the team, and now he's
Speaker 4: actually uncle actually uncle Jeff.
Speaker 1: Actually somebody he's the uncle of the league.
Speaker 4: But the thing is is, like it's not surprising because
Speaker 4: when he came and played with us, like you know,
Speaker 4: Alonso or Pat or the Kemba would come and like
Speaker 4: train with him, and he was like beating them and
Speaker 4: like doing things where you're like, he, how is this
Speaker 4: dude eighteen years old?
Speaker 2: He made no sense. He made no sense, you know
Speaker 2: what I mean?
Speaker 4: Where the person is just clearly more talented, more physically,
Speaker 4: he has prowess, Like so he had that like Lebron,
Speaker 4: you know, grown madness to him.
Speaker 2: He could probably what if Jeff place forever?
Speaker 1: It's I'm like, I remember him vividly in college and
Speaker 1: it's like that dude is still pleasing.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, you know.
Speaker 1: It's pretty remarkable. You know, people talk about Lebron beating
Speaker 1: father Time. I was like Jeff Green did too. Man,
Speaker 1: he did a lumped father Time up a couple of times.
Speaker 1: So I usually end the podcast with what I call
Speaker 1: a messy question.
Speaker 2: All right, So those weren't messy questions.
Speaker 1: It comes to the messy question. This is the one
Speaker 1: design to get you that headline that surely you probably
Speaker 1: need right before the askers to do it. Who is
Speaker 1: the greatest Hoya? Is it Patrick Ewing or is it Alan? I?
Speaker 4: Oh, so you're making me choose between those two? I
Speaker 4: am so I was gonna say Junkyard dog. You know
Speaker 4: what I'm saying, Like, I'm just kidding that out right, right, man,
Speaker 4: that's a really good question because I don't believe in best,
Speaker 4: but I know the spirit of what you're asking, right
Speaker 4: it is.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's not necessarily even though I was surprised he
Speaker 1: said this, like Magic Johnson said Kobe was the greatest Laker,
Speaker 1: right yeah, And so you know, to that end, it
Speaker 1: is like who is the greatest hoya is it? Is
Speaker 1: it ewing?
Speaker 2: You know I'm going to say and I know I
Speaker 2: know at junior too, and this is this I apologize.
Speaker 4: I apologize, you know. You know I'm going to take
Speaker 4: a really the scope of what we can consider to
Speaker 4: be why one is better than the other. If we're
Speaker 4: gonna say that, I'm gonna say a on Irison because
Speaker 4: I think his story.
Speaker 2: Being arrested in high school. You know, his size, I.
Speaker 4: Think his you know, his relationship to black culture, like
Speaker 4: the hoods, the sagging pants, the carrying like he he
Speaker 4: has a fullness in as it relates to basketball that
Speaker 4: I think very few athletes in general have to their sports.
Speaker 4: He actually changed culture sort of multiple times and became
Speaker 4: an icon from everything from like underdogs to just trying
Speaker 4: to stay true to your community. And so I'll say, AI,
Speaker 4: but I love Pat and he's a genius and a
Speaker 4: phenom and contributed to basketball in ways that difficult to express.
Speaker 1: I gotta go there now. You said before about how
Speaker 1: those guys used to come back and you all will
Speaker 1: hoop against him. So did you get to play against
Speaker 1: Pat you all the time.
Speaker 2: All the time? Yeah, yeah, yeah, Yeah. What was that like?
Speaker 4: I mean he was just blocking everyone's shots, you know.
Speaker 4: I mean the kimbe was was the most interesting because
Speaker 4: I think he was the most sneaky, you know. Alonzo
Speaker 4: was just like a physical beast. Pat was like really agile.
Speaker 4: As I remember, the best or the most interesting moment
Speaker 4: of playing against pros was Jordan came and played with
Speaker 4: us with Randy Moss, right right, real surprise to everyone.
Speaker 1: Okay, so what happened?
Speaker 4: So this is when Craig Eestick was coaching, and he
Speaker 4: had he was like, all right, guys, someone's coming to
Speaker 4: the gym today.
Speaker 2: I don't want you guys to take any pictures. Just
Speaker 2: act like everything's normal.
Speaker 4: And pros are always coming by, so we're like, all right, whatever,
Speaker 4: and then like the door's open, Phil Collins walks in and.
Speaker 2: We're like, hell is Phil Collin's doing him?
Speaker 4: And Michael Jordan walks in with the glow obviously you know,
Speaker 4: everyone's like blinded their eyes. And then Randy Moss walks in,
Speaker 4: and Jordan was coming out retirement playing for the Wizard,
Speaker 4: so he wanted to come get a run in. And
Speaker 4: I think maybe because Randy Moss was just part of
Speaker 4: the brand or his friend he came to and I
Speaker 4: don't think anyone has ever told this story. I'll say
Speaker 4: it really quick. Randy Moss got a still and drop
Speaker 4: step dunked on Reuben Boomsay Boomshe with the most unbelievable
Speaker 4: athleticism and resounding bang. All I remember is turning around
Speaker 4: because everyone's running this way. I just remember Randy Moss
Speaker 4: like getting the ball and like looking at him like
Speaker 4: drop stepping and the rim being right here and his
Speaker 4: arms just.
Speaker 2: Being parallel with it.
Speaker 4: Boom and Rooms was a Boomsha was a shot blocker,
Speaker 4: and he was shameless to seven foot one too. He's
Speaker 4: from Camroon, Like he doesn't care about getting dunked on.
Speaker 4: He's going for the block, and it was just like
Speaker 4: so beautiful. And Randy Moss like six to two or something,
Speaker 4: six three or.
Speaker 1: Maybe like six four bunnies. I would have never.
Speaker 4: Yeah, those bunnies. Have you seen videos of him and
Speaker 4: Jay will though, Yeah, yeah, yeah out of.
Speaker 1: West Virginia and they yeah, I mean everybody said that
Speaker 1: really very easily been a professional basketball player. That's what
Speaker 1: I'm just like, well, what that was? When Jordan was
Speaker 1: with the Wizards, That's when I affectionately call him his
Speaker 1: power forward.
Speaker 2: Days because he was.
Speaker 4: A little different before and he's just like he just
Speaker 4: doesn't continue to rise, you know, and then have to
Speaker 4: just do the do it.
Speaker 1: But a little bit below the rim I used to
Speaker 1: seeing him play. Oh, that must have been that must
Speaker 1: have been great.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean definitely a memory to keep, a memory
Speaker 4: to keep.
Speaker 1: Or mel I want to thank you so much for
Speaker 1: joining me here on the podcast of good Luck with
Speaker 1: the nominations. For all those out there listening and watching,
Speaker 1: make sure you go see Nickel Boys. You can get
Speaker 1: on Amazon by the way, Yeah, yep, it is on
Speaker 1: Amazon stream last night, so yes, you can go check
Speaker 1: it out. But it's it's really a beautiful, majestic film.
Speaker 1: That might be a way to describe it, but it's
Speaker 1: a great Yeah, it's a great film. And U now
Speaker 1: I look forward to reading the book and because you
Speaker 1: really the way that you presented it, it would be
Speaker 1: it just makes you more curious, is about like wow,
Speaker 1: I wonder what the whole you know, kind of story
Speaker 1: behind this is or like what these you know? You
Speaker 1: just you just wanted a little more. And I always
Speaker 1: prefer to leave a movie like actually wanting more as
Speaker 1: a past of the opposite feelings.
Speaker 4: So what's great because the book is full, it like
Speaker 4: fills on all the details.
Speaker 1: And you know, yeah, I figured as much. I was like,
Speaker 1: that's why I was like, oh, it really made me
Speaker 1: curious about the book. But beautifully shot. So good luck
Speaker 1: with everything.
Speaker 2: Thank you very much for having me.
Speaker 1: One more segment to go, and you guys know what
Speaker 1: that means. I got questions to answer up next, your
Speaker 1: viewer slash listener questions, and I have plenty of answers
Speaker 1: coming up next on the final segment of Spolatives. Normally,
Speaker 1: as you guys know, I wrap every episode of Politics
Speaker 1: by taking a question from you all about something that's
Speaker 1: been on your mind. But today I decided to use
Speaker 1: this time to address something that is on my mind
Speaker 1: given some very recent events. In the last week, my
Speaker 1: good friend, my sister joy and reid Or was fired
Speaker 1: by MSNBC. A lot of you are big fans of
Speaker 1: the Readout as am I. That was her nightly news
Speaker 1: program that was ONSNBC, and she no longer will have
Speaker 1: that program. And we look across the landscape of news media,
Speaker 1: especially nightly news, you will see that there are a
Speaker 1: lot of faces of color that are now absent, and
Speaker 1: especially when it comes to black women. I believe now
Speaker 1: the only black women in primetime in nightly news are
Speaker 1: Laura Coats and Abby Phillips at CNN. Now the reason
Speaker 1: why Joy's dismissal it sparked a lot of outrage, certainly
Speaker 1: a lot of fear, but I think particularly in the
Speaker 1: journalism community, it let us know something that we've always known,
Speaker 1: is that, especially in this time, in this climate, that
Speaker 1: black journalists, black media is especially vulnerable because of who
Speaker 1: is in office now. As you know, Joanne Reid has
Speaker 1: been a very staunch critic of Donald Trump, as have I,
Speaker 1: as have others, not just black folks, but other folks
Speaker 1: in particular. You look at Jim Acosta also let go
Speaker 1: by seeing n he was another one who is a
Speaker 1: primary critic of Trump. And so it's hard not to
Speaker 1: see these decisions being made and look at it from
Speaker 1: a sixty four thousand view, which is are these moves
Speaker 1: being made to appease the person who is occupying the
Speaker 1: White House or are these simply a result of how
Speaker 1: the television businesses can go, which is very fickle. My
Speaker 1: read on it is this, and I didn't use the
Speaker 1: word read on purpose, though I guess it can serve
Speaker 1: a little bit as a double Endtonda is that joy
Speaker 1: Ann Reid has been a strong voice. She's been a
Speaker 1: tremendous voice. She's one of the smartest people on television,
Speaker 1: and for her to not have a show at this
Speaker 1: critical time, I think we're all worse off for that.
Speaker 1: And as we go forward and as we're charting what
Speaker 1: this age of media looks like, one thing we know
Speaker 1: for sure is that the media is not at its
Speaker 1: strongest when strong voices are eliminated. A reminder that in
Speaker 1: order for a democracy to thrive, you need a free press,
Speaker 1: and unfortunately, because of corporate journalism, is getting harder and
Speaker 1: harder for authentic voices like Joys to be able to
Speaker 1: be platformed, to be supported, and not just supported by
Speaker 1: the masses, because a lot of people supported Joyne Read
Speaker 1: in terms of her audience, but supported by the people
Speaker 1: that actually sign your paycheck. So wishing my homie Joyanne
Speaker 1: Read all the best. I'm sure her next step will
Speaker 1: be even bigger and bolder than the one that she's leaving,
Speaker 1: and I hope you all out there support her in
Speaker 1: whatever her next move is. Now, as I said, a
Speaker 1: bit earlier. Usually this time is reserved for questions from
Speaker 1: you all that will still continue. So if you have
Speaker 1: a question for me, you can hit me up on
Speaker 1: social media or email. I'm at Jamail Hill across all
Speaker 1: social media platforms, Twitter, Instagram, Fan based, Blue Sky, and threads,
Speaker 1: please use the hashtags politics. You also have the option
Speaker 1: of emailing me as Politics twenty twenty four at gmail
Speaker 1: dot com. You can send me a video of your question,
Speaker 1: but please make sure it is thirty seconds or less.
Speaker 1: Don't forget to follow and subscribe to Spolitics on iHeart
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Speaker 1: s po l I tics. A new episode of Spolitics
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Speaker 1: your podcasts. This is politics where sports and politics don't
Speaker 1: just mix, they matter. Politics is the production of iHeart
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