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Hi, I'm Velvet Davis. What would you say if I told you one of the hottest new film directors was from Richmond? It's true. I'll have that story coming up on Bay Area. Close up. Well, first of all, what? We Probably what you probably want to talk

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about first is this film and this experience. So let's talk about that. It's a great title number one, but I noticed in the first article I read about it. It talked about your film is one of those done by, ah, black director that moves beyond the

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usual genre of hood films. Was that your intention? Well, you know, it wasn't my intention t stray away from that or to shy away from on inner city film. It's just that's what I happened to get interested in. Um, I got interested in this book back

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in 1990 when I was in preproduction on one false move on, and it was just tied up and we were broke and had no money to get it. So once one false move became successful, then we had the opportunity to do the film. What was it

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about it that attracted you three characters I usually find myself drawn into the work that I do through the people in the stories. I like the fact that the protagonists was not conventional. He's kind of flawed. He's accessible. He's not a superhero. He's not unnecessarily that

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capable of doing what he does. And he learns to be capable over the course of the movie. And that's interesting because it makes him vulnerable. I like the kind of menagerie of characters that you find yourself going into in this world that we go into a

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1948 and I just like the ambiance of Los Angeles 1948 Central Avenue and all of that kind of color that the film gives us a chance to get into. Was there any message in, uh, devil in a blue dress that do I have it right? Titley

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said. Devil in a blue dress that are Were you just looking at it as an entertainment vehicle? Or was it saying something to you beyond the locale? Well, you know everything I do. I always look to find some premise, some theme that informs on another, maybe

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more universal plane, and this, I felt, did inform on the level of unexamined ation of the American dream. In some respects, it's about a black man who's the World War two veteran and who's working in the in an aircraft building company loses his job for reasons

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that are not really fair, and then takes this job to find this white woman who frequents these jazz nightclubs For this character who obviously has a little grease on his sleeves, right and unfortunately, gets into a situation way over his head on it changes his life

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and takes him into the rial American dream. He's trying to save his house. He's It's the first house the first piece of property is ever own in his life, and he's trying to save his house. And and then he gets acquainted with the real American dream.

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Behind the facade, with colleagues and pulleys exists and where the backroom deals were made and in somehow resurfaces at the other end with his morals and principles intact. Um, and so that's the That's the story. Underneath the all the colorful elements that I wanted to get

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into didn't sell. Washington is an actor that can pick and choose and pick and choose. So how did you get him to choose? Well, you know at the time that well, first of all, he wasn't as Bigas he is now. You know he's a little more

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difficult to get to now than he was when we got him. But he was interested in Walter Mosley's works around the same time that we were. Actually, Jonathan Demme had contacted me when I got back in town from shooting. I think I did call Laurel Avenue,

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which was an HBO. Siri's, um, two parts Siri's and one false move had done pretty well with critics. And so he wanted to produce me in a film and ask what it was and I wanted to do. And I said that I wanted to do Devil

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in a blue dress. Um, and evidently, he was interested in in a zwelling. Denzel, who was also a tri star, was interested in one of the books. I believe it was devil. So we kind of converged together, you know, and it all kind of married up,

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right? And so we, you know, joined forces and did it. If we can, we'd like to go back to the you mentioned the American dream. Your kid from this area. Uh, what about Richmond, California? Uh huh. Where did you grow up in Rich all over Richmond

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Point in Richmond, East Shore up E guesses. He short park area. Um, there was an area down on Carlson and cutting that I lived Group was born at actually where they used to be. Some projects. Um, on center street is where I actually lived most of

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my life, though, in Richmond, Um, we were in that house till my mom died in 1986. Actually, I had left in 67 when I went to college, But our family was there until my mother died in 86. So excuse me, um, when was the dream planted

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and you hear growing up in Richmond when you talked about the location and Carlson and cutting those were the projects. So how and when did dream become instill? Did you to do the kind of thing you were doing? I don't know that that happened for and,

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you know, it was it was kind of Ah, gradual process, because I was I talked with my brother about this. My brother is from Richmond to Fred Franklin, and we were talking to a local newspaper about that, and actually we could trace it back to when

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my aunt gave him a tape recorder. I think he may have been in high school and I was in junior high school and he would write thes scripts and I would do all the voices and he'd get records from the library and do sound effects. And

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we put all these performances for our friends. And usually I was imitating the voices of our friends. And so they wait for us while we went in production for a week or two weeks. And then we come out with a finished product and they gather in

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the living room and listen to this, you know, And so probably it started there, but I didn't actually get into theater per se until I was at the University California I was a history major at first and then through a Siris of kind of accidents, I

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got into theater arts over there and went from there to Joseph PAPP's Public Theater in New York and Washington Arena, Stage Lincoln Center and then back to San Francisco. And I did. Norman, is that you? In San Francisco for about 56 months, um, trying to get

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back to New York because I was broke. And then I went to Los Angeles and did some plays down there and then started doing television as an actor and around the middle of the eighties is when I started to make the transition into directing and I

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went to the American Film Institute. I know that you say that lightly, but I know other performers when they make that transition from actor to going to the American Film Institute. Usually some signal kind of thing has happened in life going on. So can you talk

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a little bit about that? Oh, yeah, you know, when I was in Actor, for the most part, most of them, my acting career took place in the seventies. Some of it was in the eighties. I did a series called The A Team in the eighties as

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a recurring character, and also, I think, all McClain's law as a regular. But the other two Siri's I did were in the seventies, and a lot of the guests are Stuff was in the seventies and actually during that time, as far as black actors were concerned.

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The only bankable black star was Richard Pryor, who was a stand up comic. The other prominent dramatic actors were people like Jim Brown and O. J. Simpson, who were athletes. Uh, Billy Dee Williams had had a bit of a run as a lead, but that kind

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of ended quickly, and Sidney Poitier's career had waned by that time. So the legitimate stars that we have now that come from a dramatic background just were non existent, 1970 some extent that was reflective of the attitude of the industry toward black people. You know, you

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didn't really have to have those skills to do what they wanted you to do that having been said, actually, I probably would have wanted to move into filmmaking anyway, because I think my values changed a little bit when I became a father and when I had

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my Children and I had a less aggressive attitude towards everything and that included the art. And so in a way, I think I got more interested in the fuller overview of the process, and wanting to do something was a little that was a little more paternal,

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taking an orchestrating a lot of talents together in the way that you do is a director rather than being so internally and kind of singularly motivated in the way that you are as an actor. There's a lot of young people that are gonna look at the

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film and look at you. And if they're from Richmond, try to look for some similarities. Can you describe the Richmond of your youth? How it might differ from what kids were having to live with today? Well, you know, in some ways the film does reflect a

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certain a certain experiences that are akin to what I grew up with because it does deal with the migration of black people, the primary migration of black people to the West Coast, which took place during the war years. And that's my story. That's when my parents

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came out from Texas. Characters in this film come from Texas, from Houston to Los Angeles, but as we know, you know, they came from toe Los Angeles. They came to Richmond and Oakland and any of those port cities to work in the war effort, and there

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was a lot of optimism, you know, after the war, it was the first time in the history of this country when black people actually felt that they could participate on a grand level in the American dream. The good jobs, good housing to some extent of relief

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from Jim Crow laws in the South. So there was a sense of optimism When we first came here, there was an innocents about these freshly arrived Southerners who were coming from places like Texas, Louisiana, Oklahoma. Um, and there was a bit of community that we all

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had probably because, you know, we did come from a similar backgrounds and there was, you know, the sense that, um, when you were a little kid, um, everybody knew you. Everybody kind of to some extent took responsibility for you. There was just a warmer sense of

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neighborhood than I think we have right now in Richmond. I know we have right now for young people who see you, though, and see your success who might not have thought of doing what you're doing behind the camera. How realistic for them Thio carry a dream

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like that. It's very really, in fact, one of the things that I would like to do. Jeff Nathan, who initially invited me from the Richmond Art Center approached me when I was here for an art show. He said that he wants to do a Richmond film

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festival. I think it's a wonderful idea. There are other people from here who are very active in the film business. Tom Burns, who produces Charles Burnett's films uh, Sleep with Anger Glass Shield Glenn Plummer, who has starred in many you Know, noteworthy films. Showgirls being the

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latest colors Uh, pastime is from Richmond from Easter Hill. You know, these are people who, along with myself, who I would love to see get together and exhibit our work here and to let people know that you know, it's it is not something that is a

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two mystical of a process for them to get involved in, that it is something very definitely that they could get involved. It's only 400 miles to L. A. You know, it's not, ah, light years away, and there are other people. I mean, my prop masters from

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Pittsburgh, California So there a lot of folks who I would like to expose this community with so that they can kind of demystify the process and see that it is something they could do. Was there was there a nurturing community that got you from Richmond? And

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what We're less than wealthy circumstances, uh, into a university system or into, ah, frame of mind where you considered these things possible for yourself Enough to try them? Sure. Well, one was my mom. She was an incredible force of, but also there at the time was

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the beginning of what I guess is now called affirmative action. It was a special opportunity scholarship program which at that time was not racially defined. It was just basically, there were whites over blacks or Latinos or Asians. Everybody who had pretty good grades but who were

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broke were able to take part in this program. And I went to Berkeley in the summers when I was in my junior and senior year of high school in preparation for a neck spirits in college there. And so I have a lot to thank for that

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program. Find any other community support. I mean, there's family. I mean, what were their institutions? Programs are or anything I mean, other kinds of took for you. Well, you know, I don't know. Coach or boys club coaches, groups or anything of that. Is it necessary to

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have that kind of environment? Sure it is. Make it happen. Sure it is. And I think all it takes is a few of those experience. Actually, I had a coach, Bill Nash, in Pop Warner football who was someone who I remember is being very important in

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my development. I had a elementary school teacher from fourth to sixth feature the features that I do all end up about their about things that work or are or or have a happy ending to them in some place. Or give hope that the end of it

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s so your story is not your personal success, but it's a success. It's possible for people come. Richman, Wait until you find out I'm a serial killer. Oh, well, listen here. If you've been that good an actor, you know, we'll probably give you an award. Cover

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it up, E. I got Yeah. Uh, they'll bring it out in my trial later. You know that well, for kids who wonder what is their director Do? Can you give me the short version? Is to what? Why? It's important to have people of various backgrounds that

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get to do what you've done. Um, I don't know if I answer, I can understand that question. What does the director do? That, uh, that really has an impact on the film that we see in a way that youngsters would understand that it's necessary to have

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people that come from all different backgrounds to do this work. It's the director's vision. Basically, you are the cohesive element in the film. You pull together all of the talents of the many people who are expert in their area. Cinematographers, production designers, wardrobe, masters and mistresses,

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all the actors. Editors. It's writers. It's basically the director who takes all that information and synthesizes it into what becomes the movie all the way from the writing, through the casting, through the production, through the shooting and post production as well. Even the composer you're still

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editing and control and shaping the sound of the film. So basically, you have to carry the vision and orchestrate all of those talents together. What do you want people to walk away from devil in a blue dress when they walk away with an impression of what

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does Carl Franklin do? What do you want him to be? Thinking, Thinking? I like to suspend their thoughts if I can and just have let him have a nice, warm, emotional feeling when they walk out of the theater. You know, I'd be happy if they did

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that, you know, and maybe tap their feet. Thio Roy Milton at the end, You know? Uh huh. Do you think it's time Thio, Spike Lee is quoted to saying, Bury the hood? No, no, I think that, unfortunately, the problem is that when you get a successful

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film like Boys in the Hood, which was a wonderful movie and then Minister Society, which I also liked, the industry gets motivated commercially to try to take advantage of that market. And so you get a lot of films that come out and are. The impetus for

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their having been made is strictly commercial, And so they're not necessarily films that have a riel reason to be made, other than just so that they can make money and it gluts the market. But there's still obviously a lot of stories to be told about people

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who live in the inner city and people who live under those circumstances. It's just that the market at this points been glutted and the same story seem to be being told over and over again. And what needs to happen is to get away from that for

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a moment and when another honest story that somehow informs about a fresh area of that experience comes to mind and it should be done. Any last words for a young hopefuls? Hey, you know, if you got I wouldn't do it if I didn't feel like I

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had an addiction. Because it's a difficult business. But if you have that addiction and when you have to do this and you really don't have any choice not quite sure yet. I'll try to dream up. See how much time I have left with That was too

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windy, too noisy. Eso we couldn't do that. So you could have brought Jennifer Beals here. Yeah. Then if I hadn't bought my husband a long, he'd have been really upset. Uh huh. Mhm. Okay, okay. Okay. Go ahead. Yeah, Control. So e really staff at once. Very

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good. Do you remember is uh huh. No, she's actually our religion. Yeah. So the purpose Lots of day Carrie two weeks today. Okay. You might want to relax a little bit. Gee, thanks. Yeah, that's Z Okay. Anytime. No, she hasn't made it there yet, so I'm

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watching them. Okay, here we go. 321