Exclusive: Harry Lennix Talks ‘The Five Heartbeats’ 25 Years Later and ‘Batman V Superman’by Wilson Morales
March 29, 2016
Twenty-five years ago today (March 29), ‘The Five Heartbeats’ was released in theaters.
Directed by Robert Townsend with a script written by Townsend and Keenen Ivory Wayans, the film starred Townsend, Michael Wright, Harry J. Lennix, Leon, Tico Wells, Diahann Carroll, John Canada Terrell, Harold Nicholas, Hawthorne James, Chuck Patterson, Troy Beyer, Roy Fegan, Carla Brothers, Paul Benjamin, Theresa Randle, and Tressa Thomas.
Set in the 60’s when so many musical groups were out, a quintet of hopeful young African American men form an amateur vocal group called The Five Heartbeats. After an initially rocky start, the group improve, turn pro, and rise to become a top flight music sensation. Along the way however, the guys learn many hard lessons about the reality of the music industry with it’s casual racism and greed while the personal weaknesses of the members threaten to destroy the integrity of the band.
Playing in just 862 theaters across the country, and after receiving mixed reviews from critics, the film didn’t do well at the box office. It grossed $8.5 million dollars, but through VHS sales, and bootleg copies, it found a new fanbase that has continued to grow over the years.
The soundtrack, with its hit songs ‘Nights Like This,’ ‘Nothing But Love’ and ‘A Heart Is a House for Love’ was also a contributor to the film’s popularity.
For Harry Lennix, this was his first major film role. He played Terrence “Dresser” Williams, the group’s bass singer and one of the founding members of The Heartbeats. Lennix would then appear in other well-known films such as Get on the Bus, Love & Basketball, The Matrix Reloaded, The Matrix Revolutions, Barbershop 2: Back in Business, Ray, Man of Steel, and most recently, Spike Lee’s Chi-Raq.
Currently the Chicago native is reprising his role from Man of Steel as United States Secretary Of Defense Swanwick in Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice. He’s also on TV playing Harold Cooper on NBC’s The Blacklist, currently in its third season.
Blackfilm.com spoke exclusively with Lennix about his role in ‘The Five Heartbeats’ and working with Zack Snyder again on the superhero film.
The Five Heartbeats was your first big film role. How did this come about for you?
Harry Lennix: I was actually a substitute teacher in Chicago on a full-time basis at that time. I went down and did a quick meet and greet with Robert during a lunch period from school. I had admired Hollywood Shuffle and all that. I believe it was January or February of that year, must of have been 1990, I went to LA for the first time to do what they call pilot season. While I was there, living on my friend’s couch, I got a call with an offer, that said that I had been offered one of the roles in the Five Heartbeats as one of the Heartbeats. I was shocked and that was the first time I was ever in a role of that size and that’s how it came to be. I was a substitute teacher and I had it all worked out.
Did you have to have any sort of musical skills to be in the role?
Harry Lennix: No, not really. I happened to have musical talent because I was a music teacher, but I didn’t teach music in the movie. Then of course, I think the most talented of us, in terms of singing and dance, was actually Tico (Wells). Leon could sing. The rest of us were just faking our way through it. That’s as simply as I can put it. We faked it, but that’s what we were supposed to do. We’re actors.
This movie is loosely based on The Dells and you got to perform with them as the movie was coming out. How much did you know about the Motown music of that era and specifically about them?
Harry Lennix: I knew a certain amount about the Dells. I’m from Chicago and I knew one of them was also Muslim. At that time, I was a Muslim and so I admired their music, but I think in all honesty, we were sort of based on a lot of different groups. I think The Dells were the closest in terms of the types of people that we were, the type of physical type and so forth, but I think you could also find a lot of evolutions to The Tops and The Temptations and the rest of them. We were friendly with The Dells, so we cottoned to them.
1991 happened to be a special year, because a lot of black films came out that year directed by black filmmakers. A lot of people were getting their start, becoming noticed in Hollywood. What did that movie do for you when you saw the reception it got from African Americans?
Harry Lennix: We were greatly overlooked, I think. We didn’t make a big splash at the box office at all. Just to be honest about it, we were very disappointed in the reception that we got from the audience. People that actually bothered to go and see it loved it, there’s no question about that; but there wasn’t some sort of big ripple that we made, because we were overshadowed by some of those other films. It was a time when Boyz n the Hood type movies were coming out and New Jack City with Wesley Snipes was released a few weeks earlier.
So those films did better at the box office, but we somehow over the course of years developed a kind of afterlife which was greater than our lives. It was a kind of redemption, so to speak. It came about as a function of people getting it on videotape, now on DVD, and it’s always on television. It’s ubiquitous. There’s many things. I think its second life in some ways far outstrips what its original reception was.
25 years later, you’re still in the business.You’re on a TV show, you’re in the number one film this week, congratulations. Were you even surprised that they asked you to come back to reprise your role in Batman V Superman?
Harry Lennix: No, not really. I wasn’t surprised. I had a good rapport with Zack Snyder. With Henry, I was part of his screen test so I was there from the beginning. With these movies, with these tent pole movies that they do in trilogies in some way,. it’s standard procedure. If you haven’t burned a bridge to be invited and I was proud to have been brought back.
This time we don’t see General Swanwick in uniform and why is that? Is he a civilian at this point?
Harry Lennix: I’m now the Secretary of Defense. I’m in charge of all the military operations and I am also now cabinet member, so I’m sure that that’s a promotion.
Is this the first time you’ve been back to reprise a role?
Harry Lennix: No, I reprised my role The Matrix 2 and 3. I was in 2, so I got to come back in 3.
In coming back you get to see Henry, Zack and Lawrence (Fishburne) and you’re meeting some of the other cast members. It’s funny, the other night I watched State of Play. I said to myself, “I forgot Henry’s in there with Ben (Affleck).”
Harry Lennix: Yeah, with Ben and also with Russel Crowe, who was in Man of Steel, so yeah.
Does it get easier when half the cast is somebody who’s worked with you in the past?
Harry Lennix: Oh, absolutely! When you can build up a rapport, a shorthand with actors that you know and you know how they work in, it makes it easier, so you don’t have to go through all the discomfort of meeting somebody for the first time. It’s a lot more comfortable and you can really get down to the business of who those characters are. The more lived in it seems the rapport that you have, as characters, in addition to as actors is stronger, and so it makes for a better day and a better experience I think.
For Batman vs. Superman, did you go back and read the Frank Miller comic book for this?
Harry Lennix: I didn’t. I was vaguely familiar with it. I heard of it. I made the announcement at Comic Con that Batman vs. Superman was going to be happening, but I just knew that this is going to have to be more fleshed out, in so that is in dealing with the source material so to speak because it didn’t affect my character necessarily. Nor is Swanwick aware who Batman is really. There’s bits of Gotham that I’m dealing with on a global level. My concern really is with The Man of Steel, with Superman and then make sure that he’s not off doing things he shouldn’t be doing. The destruction that comes across as a result of him going into Africa and saving his lady causes trouble, as if it was a diplomatic issue. I didn’t find any great need to go and delve too deeply into The Dark Knight or anything of that nature.
Are there any scenes that you may have shot that we didn’t get to see that will probably be on the Blu-ray that Zack releases later on?
Harry Lennix: I hope so, obviously when you have a movie that has that many characters in it, that is that complex, there’s going to be stuff that was shot that never will be seen. I did more work than was in the film, but that’s true of every actor that’s in the movie. You have to boot some stuff and you’re just grateful for the stuff that remains as I am.
Are you totally into the comic books now? As you mentioned now, you were able to make the BvS announcement over at Comic Con? Are you’re sucked into this world right now? Do you want to let it go? Do you want to continue it? Do you see yourself in more of these films?
Harry Lennix: I’d love to be in more films. I’m not a huge comic book aficionado. I never was even as a child. I liked a lot of action stuff. I liked the Batman television series with Adam West and I liked the Superman television series with George Reeves. I always enjoyed greatly, I remember waiting with bated breath for Christopher Reeves to come out and see it. I never really read the accompanying comic books. It was just never my thing per say.
You have a good knack of playing an authority figures, which is what you’re doing on The Blacklist. How much fun are you having in the third season at this point?
Harry Lennix: We’re in our third season now, going into a hopeful fourth. I like playing authority figures. It’s something that I don’t get to do in my real life, so anything that is kind of a departure from my real life is something that I kind of get a kick out of going. I think I play other characters, then that, but the most visible things, some of those visible projects have me as authority figures. I’m producing my own films now and you get to play characters that are not that; that are a little more regular so to speak, prosaic, kind of regular guys who have trouble, little more disturbed, little less complicated, little more pulled together. I get to do that also in smaller films. I like all of it. I think if the work is good, if the subject matter is interesting, I’m interested in it and I will do it. Of course, being in something that keeps you visible like Batman vs. Superman or The Blacklist, who’s going to turn that down? I enjoy working with these people. I enjoy the kind of back and forth that you get with top-notch actors and top-notch directors. What’s not to like?
What will we see you in next?
Harry Lennix: I don’t know. Obviously, going into Blacklist, that’s an ongoing series. We return to air on April 7th. I did Chi-Raq last year. That came out already. I hope to be in the next installment of Batman Superman should that come to pass. I’m contributing to my own films and so forth. I have two films that are coming out. One is called Henry the Fourth, or H4, it’s Shakespeare, it’s the first black Shakespeare film done ever. Then the second one is called Revival!, which is the Gospel of John set to gospel music and take some of the most well-known traditional gospel music and puts it into a narrative story, Jesus’s ministry and life. In that I play Pontious Pilate, who’s also an authority figure. That’s really what my next iteration of life is going to be, is trying to produce films and direct and write content. I’m trying to develop that aspect of my career, because I think it extends a career and I would be interested in that.
