UWFF 2015: Tyrese Hopes His Short Film ‘Shame’ Attracts Big Hollywood AttentionPosted by Wilson Morales
September 25, 2015
Playing at the 19th Annual Urbanworld Film Festival on Saturday, September 26 will be singer-actor and Festival Ambassador Tyrese Gibson’s 24-minute short film called ‘Shame’ featuring himself and Oscar and Grammy Award winner Jennifer Hudson. Directed by Paul Hunter (Bulletproof Monk), the short was produced by Denzel Washington.
Tyrese’s next record “Black Rose” (out on July 17) will be his last as he’s decided to focus more on acting and other things.
The musical Shame features Tyrese as “up-and-coming musician Lionel Jacobs in 1968, on tour and with the means to climb the top of the charts. He’s got all the right moves and things to say, but a mean streak and nasty substance abusive personality.” Married to his background singer Bobbi Ann (Hudson), Jacobs tries to pursue his career dreams while battling drugs and alcohol on one hand and fighting to take care of his wife and children on the other.
Tyrese and Jennifer also worked on Kasi Lemmons’ Black Nativity.
Blackfilm.com caught up with Tyrese at the festival as he spoke what he hopes the short will do for his career.
Can you talk about bringing ‘Shame’ to Urbanworld?
Tyrese: I’m humbled by this gesture. I am humbled by this opportunity. I feel that the Urbanworld Film Festival is like the BET Awards for film festivals. Why have gifts and talents and ideas if it’s not going to be highlighted. The ‘Shame’ song has changed my world. The album ‘Black Rose’ is number one in 15 countries. It’s number one in the Top 200, number one in R & B charts for two weeks. It went away for three weeks and then it ended up being number one again, which has never happened ever in my career. There is a lot of levels of success and energy around the music and I feel that God has set me up. It’s like a tsunami of energy that’s leaning towards this short film. It’s 24 minutes in running time, starring myself and Jennifer Hudson. It’s produced by Denzel Washington and directed by Paul Hunter.
As many movies that I have done, I’m still not on a lot of people’s radars. I’m not on that list – Martin Scorsese, Quentin Tarantino, Paul Haggis, Steve McQueen, Lee Daniels. There’s some particular filmmakers like Steven Spielberg, Clint Eastwood who do these big, dark and dramatic pictures and I’m not on their radar. I’m not one of those people that will sit on the pity potty and complain. I wanted to fix it, and so I wrote something and this is with the goal of changing these perceptions. Over 6 billon dollars in the box office hasn’t got me on the radar of the filmmakers that I want to work with. When people see this short film and hopefully we land an Oscar, a nomination and all of the above, I believe that the best way to predict the future is to create it. We will see what happens.
“Shame” is also the name of the single that’s featured on the Black Rose LP, which will released through his own label, Voltron Recordz.. You can pre-order the album #BlackRose here – https://smarturl.it/TyreseBlackRose
