Exclusive: Director Rick Famuyiwa Talks Dopeby Wilson Morales
June 18, 2015
After premiering at the 2015 Sundance Film Festival, followed by its selection to close the Directors’ Fortnight section at the 2015 Cannes Film Festival, Open Road is releasing Rick Famuyiwa’s critically acclaimed film ‘Dope’ in theaters this week.
The film stars a slew of newcomers as well as some veteran actors from Shameik Moore, Kiersey Clemons, Tony Revolori, Quincy Brown, Zoe Kravitz, Forest Whitaker (as the narrator), Anthony Quinonez, Blake Anderson, Keith Stanfield, Rick Fox, Kimberly Elise, Chanel Iman, Amin Joseph, Allen Maldonado, Ashton Moio, Roger Guenveur Smith, De’aundre Bonds, Michael Flores, A$AP Rocky, Mimi Michaels, and Tyga Graham.
Produced by Significant Productions’ Forest Whitaker and Nina Yang Bongiovi, the film is a coming of age comedy/drama for the post hip hop generation. Malcolm (Shameik Moore) is a geek, carefully surviving life in The Bottoms, a tough neighborhood in Inglewood, CA filled gangsters and drugs dealers, while juggling his senior year of college applications, interviews and the SAT. His dream is to attend Harvard. A chance invitation to a big underground party leads Malcolm and his friends into a, only in Los Angeles, gritty adventure filed with offbeat characters and bad choices. If Malcolm can persevere, he’ll go from being a geek, to being dope, to ultimately being himself.
For Famuyiwa, it’s a trip back to the big screen after directing films such as The Wood (1999), Brown Sugar (2002), and Our Family Wedding (2010). He was a co-writer on Kasi Lemmon’s Talk to Me (2007). A native of Inglewood, California, Famuyiwa has blended in what he knew growing up with the music that inspired him to write this film.
In speaking with Blackfilm.com, Famuyiwa further elaborates on the making of Dope.
Is this film a cross between The Wood and Brown Sugar?
Rick Famuyiwa: I guess so. There are elements of both of those films in here with the 90s hip hop and Inglewood being the setting, which is where I wanted to go and revisit.
Where did the love for hip hop music come from?
Rick Famuyiwa: I don’t know where it came from. I think it’s just natural for all of us. Music is just a big part of we all connect and interact with the world. For me growing up when hip hop was forming and maturing and coming into its own, I just felt I was a part of something really exciting. I was a part of it as a consumer. It stuck with me in that way in the same way other music genres like rock and roll came up for other people. For those of us who grew in the early hip hop era, that music shaped us in a way to be in a position to express ourselves.
Was it a challenge to put together this contemporary and period film?
Rick Famuyiwa: No. I wanted it to feel like a contemporary period period piece. I didn’t want to actually set it in the 90s but I thought there was a connection to this younger generation in the 90s that felt organic. I didn’t think there was a big challenge to it because I just wanted to be a part of who these characters were and I wanted to deal with the idea of not fitting in and being a geek, and obviously their obsession with the 90s became a part of how they don’t fit in. It was part of the narrative. Because it was from my point of view, it was easy to bring that in. Marrying the two wasn’t my biggest concern. It was mainly about how to make it feel relevant for today.
What was thought process of bringing in newcomers as opposed to veterans for the roles?
Rick Famuyiwa: I think because you are dealing with young actors, there really wasn’t a lot of people you can find in that realm. It’s not like there are a ton of 15 to 18 individuals that are black and latino that you would be able to say, “Hey, let’s get that kid!” It was always going to be finding fresh faces and finding new voices because there wasn’t a stable of people that you could go to in that age range. I felt that all of these kids were either rising superstars or stars in their right in film. Working with Zoe Kravitz, A$ap Rocky and Chanel Iman, and Quincy Brown, these are people who are celebrity and have achieved things outside of film that I thought brought some of that. Shameik (Moore), Tony (Revolori), and Kiersey (Clemons) represents a new generation of actors coming up. Tony has been in lot of different things. I think Shamiek and Kiersey will do a lot of great things with their careers as well.
What’s the sell to the film? Is it the characters, the music, or the story?
Rick Famuyiwa: I think it’s all of it. I didn’t want it to be one thing or the other. I intentionally wanted it to have a lot of different elements to it. I was dealing with a lot of things in terms of film genre. I was dealing with a lot of things in terms of music. I wanted it to feel as one piece. I wanted to make sure that there wasn’t one song that you went to. There are multiple songs on there that have different feelings that attracted you to the album. That was my approach. I think it’s all of it. The music and the characters, who have this sense of adventure. It’s the idea that these kids are speaking for their generation. It’s the idea that anyone who feels that they don’t fit in, does fit in.
How long did it take for the film to be put together? You sometimes go years without a project on the big screen.
Rick Famuyiwa: It’s certainly not by choice. I’m not Terrence Malick, waiting around for inspiration. AS a black man working in the business, it’s a challenge sometimes to get some of these things and these stories told when they don’t quite fit in a box or convention of what people expect of you or what you should be telling. Dope took three years from the beginning of the idea to now, which isn’t terribly long in the overall scheme of things, but there were ups and downs along the way. We had to finance the film independently because we found that a lot of people just didn’t get these kids or that the film can connect to people on a larger level, even though people like myself, Pharrell Williams and Forest Williams all believed that it could. All films are a challenge and they are a harder challenge when dealing with characters of color. We took that challenge, faced it, and luckily I have producing partners that stuck by it and were able to find a way to get it made.
What do you want to do next?
Rick Famuyiwa: I’m in the middle of directing a project for HBO called ‘Confirmation,’ starring Kerry Washington. That’s what immediately on my agenda. I’m looking forward to get my voice out there whether it’s on a small scale or on a larger scale. That’s what I’m looking to do.
