"A Piece Of The Action" Movie Review | The Main Ingredient With Chris Ellis Podcast - Ep.4

What if the classic films of the 1970s hold the key to understanding Hollywood's evolving narrative techniques? Join us, Chris Ellis, and Bay Area filmmaker Pharoah Powell, as we embark on an enlightening journey through Black cinema classics in the latest episode of The Main Ingredient. We kick things off with a deep look at the 1977 gem "A Piece of the Action," starring the legendary Sidney Poitier and Bill Cosby. Our discussion doesn't just stop at the film itself; we draw intriguing parallels to modern masterpieces like "Fresh" and "No Country for Old Men." We even imagine the untapped potential of a 2002 remake featuring Eddie Murphy and Martin Lawrence, produced by none other than Will Smith.

But it’s not all nostalgia and hypotheticals. Pharoah and I also tackle the storytelling techniques that defined 1970s cinema. From convenient plot devices to the quirks of casting adults as teenagers, we dissect the nuances that shaped these narratives. We reflect on the evolution of audience expectations and the importance of continuity in crafting believable stories. Our conversation offers a critical lens on how these elements impact the authenticity and engagement of film characters, using examples from classics like "Imperial Courts" and "Dangerous Minds."

As we wrap up, we delve into the economic realities influencing the film industry today. We discuss the trend of casting black English actors over their American counterparts for cost efficiency and the challenges faced by independent Black filmmakers in the streaming era. Our episode culminates in a celebration of Black cinema legends, acknowledging their cultural significance and lasting impact despite any controversies. This episode is a heartfelt homage to the rich legacy of Black cinema and a must-listen for anyone passionate about film, culture, and the ever-changing landscape of Hollywood.

Chapters

• 0:00 Black Cinema Classics and Remake Potential
• 10:28 Storytelling Techniques in Filmmaking
• 18:30 Detective Burke's Backstory Dilemma
• 26:55 Casting Real Teens in Movies
• 34:18 Economics and Filmmaking Realities
• 43:15 Generational Conflict in Film Industry
• 53:42 Challenges of Art vs. Commerce
• 1:02:09 Life Skills Through Real Life Stories
• 1:12:32 The Flaws of Detective Burke
• 1:19:16 Reflecting on a Piece of Action
• 1:27:11 Black Cinema Legends Celebration and Impact

Transcript

Chris: 0:00

We gon' get to that. That was some bullshit.

Pharoah: 0:02

That's why a whole era of people grew up thinking that the mafia got these powers, Like the New York mafia's after you and you living under assumed name in. Idaho.

Chris: 0:13

They're just gonna find you. It's like what's up y'all? I'm your host, chris Ellis, and this is the Main Ingredient. With Chris Ellis, today we're discussing a classic and I'm discussing it with a Bay Area filmmaker. He's accomplished, he's established, he got his own business cracking my boy, Farrell Powell. How you doing, bro? Hey, I'm doing great. Thanks for having me. It's all good man. I appreciate it, man. You know we we hadn't seen each other since one of our colleagues film debuted in Berkeley.

Chris: 1:04

Yes, yes, at Berkeley, and that came out packed house that came out well and I think you were a part of you were in the film.

Pharoah: 1:11

Yeah, I was in it and helped her produce it.

Chris: 1:14

You was actually in the film, yeah yeah, it feels like you was Y'all slide my mug up in there every now and then, but I felt like were you part of the, not just the cast, but did you help shoot it?

Pharoah: 1:26

No, I helped her produce, I helped her put everything. The scheduling.

Chris: 1:28

Okay, I felt like you was a part of the film.

Pharoah: 1:30

Scheduling and everything like that. Yeah, Okay, okay, that's what's up.

Chris: 1:33

That's what's up. Okay, so today we're discussing a piece of the action, and you picked that film. Yes, indeed.

Pharoah: 1:45

So won't you go ahead and tell us first why you picked that film? I picked that film because blaxploitation the 70s that's just my thing, okay okay, you know saying that but? But films like a piece of the action uptown saturday night, let's do it again. Tap, definitely tapped into that genre, but on a higher level. Yeah, yeah, yeah the storytelling.

Pharoah: 2:07

The protect because it's literally start two of the biggest, biggest black stars of all time and they were mega stars at that time bill cosby and uh sydney poignet yeah yeah, they were, yeah, they were huge yeah so just like you know it's like, for instance, a lot of people when they come to hood movies, a lot of people Boys in the Hood or Menace to Society is their favorite. Yeah, but my favorite is Fresh.

Chris: 2:34

Okay, I love Fresh Because it was a hood movie, but it was a complicated story. I love Fresh. So you think, like me, you know what I'm saying, you know what I what I'm saying. So I like hood movies, but I I won't. A higher level. Yeah, you like the complexities. Yeah, the stories and the characters. I'm the same, exact I want.

Pharoah: 2:50

I want you to make a hood movie, but I want it to be artistic.

Chris: 2:52

I'm the same exact way I remember some years ago I watched no country for old men, okay and I was telling my partners about it. They thought I was losing my mind. I said y'all just gotta watch the movie.

Pharoah: 3:03

No, that's one of the best movies ever made.

Chris: 3:05

It's a dope movie, and that's where my mind is always at when it comes to movies. I'm looking at scripts, characters, screenplay, and I'm really looking at also the environment where they shot it. So like I take all that, in account. The production value, man, because as a filmmaker, that matters to us. You know what I'm saying. So we're doing. Piece of action uh was directed by sydney portier, uh written by charles uh blackwell and music was done by legendary curtis mayfield man that's major one of the one of the all-time, so you literally had some of the rawest dudes of all time oh my god.

Pharoah: 3:44

Together on one project, yeah, yeah that's.

Chris: 3:47

That's major. So it was like I said it was started, starring sydney portier as manny uh durell, bill cosby as dave anderson, james earl jones. The legend as joshua burke.

Pharoah: 3:58

Once again, some of the rawest detective joshua burke.

Chris: 4:01

Uh, denise nicolas is, uh, lila french. Hope clark is sarah thomas. Detective Joshua Burke. Denise Nicola says Lila French. Hope Clark is Sarah Thomas. Tracy Reed is Nikki McLean. Tito's Vandis is Bruno. You know the Italian thug? I guess he's Italian. But a quick side note, which I didn't know till I started researching on this Will Smith wanted to do a remake of this movie in 2002, starring eddie murphy and martin lawrence. Yes, I was like wow, and I and I'm I'm thinking 2002, oh, they had just came off all that success of life. Yes, this movie, if he'd have remade it at that time, would have been huge, bro. I don't know what didn't happen to not make that happen, but if you can imagine him coming off the success of life, those two will smith as the producer will smith and overbrook entertainment, his production company, putting this out a remake.

Pharoah: 4:54

It would have been a smash you know, and martin had already showed in life that he could play, because you know when, in these various films, because you know there's three in the series, even though they're not it's a trilogy. They're not. They play different characters, even though the wife repeats in two of the movies.

Pharoah: 5:11

She sure does, but so they're not necessarily a trilogy because they're different characters, but they're considered a trilogy. Yeah, but somebody has to be the funny guy and some one guy has to play it more straight, correct, and Martin has showed in life that he could play the straight guy to Eddie Murphy's comedy. Yeah, so, yeah, so it would have been dope.

Chris: 5:36

No it would have been dope.

Pharoah: 5:37

They should still do it. Let me tell it.

Chris: 5:40

I think that it can still get done now. I think that it's a tragedy that it didn't get done at that time Because, like I said, the success of Life that movie would have been huge if they had done a remake.

Pharoah: 5:52

At that time, me and my partners always argue about top 10 black movies ever, and I always throw Life in there.

Chris: 6:01

Yeah, Life is amazing.

Pharoah: 6:02

And if you and your friends argue about that. Don't be semantics, like I had. One can't tell me. The color purple can't count, because spielberg directed. Oh yeah like let's not stop playing. Yeah, a black movie is a black movie, black movie is a black and we. It's one of those things. I can't necessarily define it, but I know it when I see it. Yeah, yeah I agree.

Chris: 6:25

I think we're having that discussion now amongst uh movie critics and filmmakers, like what is considered a black movie, because I'm coming to america's a black movie correct. But some people consider anything with a black leading actor in it a black movie, even though it might be produced by a white company, written by a white, you know, writer and stuff.

Pharoah: 6:46

So it's weird with me director. So I say in that case then fantastic four or toy story is black movies, correct, because tim story is the director correct.

Chris: 6:56

So it's kind of weird how we judge what's considered a black movie. It's hard to define it's hard to define. We know it when we see it. You know it when you see it. You know. You knew when you saw. You knew when you saw beverly hills cop this is a black movie eddie murphy and he acting black yeah, talking shit. You already knew what it was right. You already knew what it was just something like coming to america.

Pharoah: 7:19

That's one of the blackest movies ever. Oh, of course, but I think, uh, john landis directed it. Yes, you know, yeah, yeah, color purple spielberg, purple is spielberg yeah those are black movies and stop that if you say different and they're in there and they're just classics.

Chris: 7:35

Yeah, it's like they're timeless.

Pharoah: 7:36

There's their classics like you can throw them on now. Like the family gather, you can throw them on now. We're gonna all sit there watch it as if we ain't seen it.

Chris: 7:44

89 times Forever. Yeah. So the movie starts off in Chicago of August 1975. And Bill Cosby is breaking into a consumer credit corporation. He breaks in, he takes the money. He we don't, we don't, we don't address this now. He he jumps 12 stories bill was a raw man back there into a truck.

Chris: 8:11

He, he jumped perfectly in the 12 stories. No wind, no chicago wind blows him to the left or to the right, which would kill him. He jumps perfectly straight down into a truck, 12 stories to land without hurting himself, get out of the back of the truck and drives off smoothly. The only reason why can we address that?

Pharoah: 8:33

I'm gonna get all these while we give bill that? Two reasons. One, I know bill was an athlete he ran track in college, that's true. And two, I see tom cruise doing all kinds of wild things on Mission Impossible. That's a good point and I know some of you might be like well, hey. Tom Cruise been an action star. Bill was a comedian. No, we ain't going to go there. We just go, we going to give Bill his flowers, even though 12 stories, bro.

Chris: 9:00

When they showed the establishing shot of how high he was, I said oh hell, no, do you know how high 12 stories is? And he put his arms out and he kind of looked like he timed it and he said whoop. And I said oh my God, he's going to kill himself.

Pharoah: 9:17

We're going to let Bill and his stunt man have that.

Chris: 9:22

Bill could have. It could have been 17 mattresses in that truck. He would have still hurt himself jumping 12 stories bill cosby.

Pharoah: 9:30

Bill cosby was so raw in the 70s that he defied physics that's. That's just how raw that man was okay, okay.

Chris: 9:40

So now, uh, the movie jumps into July 1976, where Manny and his crew are watching some mob guys drive off from a building and they follow the mob guys to a home and they stage a fake raid on the home and the mob guys try to get rid of all the evidence because they think the FBI or police are coming in to take all you know to catch him red handed. So here's another pet peeve I got in this movie the the mob. One of the mob guys takes the money and hands it to the black, the old black maid, as she's walking out, right, thinking it's going gonna be a raid. Find out, it's not a raid. They got played. How the hell did that line up that perfectly? He caught her as she was walking out. He was like hey, hey, you getting ready to leave, take this money with you. You know how perfect everything would have to be for that to happen she was a slickster too, she was, so I'm gonna assume that she manipulated.

Pharoah: 10:50

Once again, they define physics and logic, but it works Logic more than anything. But in essence, to that getting ahead of ourselves, the part that pissed me off is when they found her.

Chris: 11:02

Yeah, see, we're gonna get to that. We're gonna get to that. That gave it's like. Don't get to that.

Pharoah: 11:06

That was some bullshit that's why a whole era of people grew up thinking that the mafia got these powers like the new york mafia is after you, you living under assumed name in idaho and they're just gonna find you.

Chris: 11:19

It's like copenhagen.

Pharoah: 11:21

They found her in copenhagenagen, denmark and these, you know, the hit men that they would send would just be unstoppable and stuff, and so we grew up oh, the mob here. We grew up believing that but as an adult watching it now, I'm like where in the world them dudes would have found this little small mob crew would have found a black lady.

Chris: 11:44

First of all she was. They thought she was an old lady, so they only knew her with the old lady. Look in the wig and all that stuff you found the younger version of her in a whole nother country on a different continent on a different come on like yeah, those are the things it's like okay, okay, I get, it's 1977. Yeah, and they're trying to make this murder case I mean not murder case, but crime mystery story happen.

Pharoah: 12:11

So they're adding in some stuff.

Chris: 12:13

But it's just like these are coincidences that just would not happen in real life.

Pharoah: 12:18

What do they call it? Plot armor?

Chris: 12:20

Yeah, it's like it just would not happen this way, so that was one of my pet peeves.

Pharoah: 12:26

Now, mind you, but this is a lesson for me as a filmmaker that sometimes because you know when we write scripts this and that you ever been stuck on something like that don't make sense. Yes, To the point where you almost abandon the project. You can't make it make sense. Yeah, don't be afraid to have convenient coincidences to move your story forward.

Chris: 12:48

No, you're right. You're right sometimes if, when you can't figure it out, you just gotta make the coincidence happen. Yeah, and it might not make no sense to nobody, but you had to move the story along, which they did in this movie. They kind of had to make it happen like that because I'm like he was running Namavia do had the money and he was going into a room as he saw her. What are the chances that he gives her the money and that worked?

Pharoah: 13:13

so perfectly with the heist. But also and also, if you can't figure out how to wrap up the story, don't be afraid to end on the cliffhanger. That's a good point. No, because I was watching that new tyler perry joint last night. It came on at midnight okay and uh, it was on amazon and basically when the end came I was kind of like and then I, and I was like you know what. He couldn't figure out how to wrap it up couldn't't figure it out. So it's just.

Chris: 13:45

Yeah, and those things do happen. I just and like I said, it's 19th I'll grade on a curve when it comes to these old time classics, because people wasn't really breaking down in detailed scripts like that.

Pharoah: 14:00

You didn't have Cisco and Ebert yet.

Chris: 14:04

It's continuity issues in the 70s movies, so I give him a pass on certain things. But it's just like so many things had to come into play perfectly in this movie for this to actually be a movie.

Pharoah: 14:16

Well see, the thing is, Nate did have an advantage. That's not to take away from Nate Legend, but you know, like right now, if a movie drop, I can go on, literally I can go on youtube and find 10 people sawing it apart you know, you know, you got cinema scenes, you got all that. So people, people, the modern audience is more critical. Yes, so some of them, what do you say?

Chris: 14:42

suspend disbelief wouldn't work in the films that we're working on now, people would be like, oh, you took me out the movie when they did that.

Pharoah: 14:50

You know what I did when they did that? I was whereas we watched movies to the stage that we'd be like, oh, wow, you know, so preposterous, yeah, yeah, but we were less critical there.

Chris: 15:03

But the one thing I know I love about being a filmmaker and watching these films and reviewing them is that it does make me pay so much more attention to detail, so it sharpens my pen when I write. Yes, I make sure I'm paying attention to continuity and everything, and I think if I wasn't in filmmaking, I wouldn't care about that type of stuff. Right, you'd just be entertained.

Chris: 15:26

It's just entertainment. But as a filmmaker I pay attention to that stuff, I care about that stuff. I don't even need a continuity expert on set, because I'm that person. I'm paying attention to everything. I dwell on that stuff. I pay attention to everything by actors. Hey man, remember Jason's lyric? Yeah, I remember Jason's lyric.

Pharoah: 15:44

So at the end of Jason's lyric, when they pull up, eddie Griffin's character comes over and says man, josh killed whoopty whoop, whoopty whoop. This and that. And I was saying how did he know all that? He was outside.

Chris: 15:55

He was outside and I thought about it.

Pharoah: 16:05

They didn't want to use narration, this and that and that was yeah, that was a way to bring the story together. Yeah, and I found myself doing that, having to do that, having the character say, hey, man, did you know? And say, just in case anybody's watching, and they, if I lost them? This guy could casually explain to someone else, but he's really explaining it to the audience. But in the 70s, though they weren't afraid to use narration.

Chris: 16:34

No, they wasn't. They tell us now, don't use narration.

Pharoah: 16:37

If you use narration then the story isn't weak, but some of them raw movies in the 70s all had some form of narration, of course, and you're sitting there like, okay, even Goodfellas, Even Goodfellas, goodfellas had a ton of narration. And that was in the 90s they say don't use narration. That's a sign that your story is weak.

Chris: 16:57

I've heard that before that it means that you're being lazy. Men's Society had menace.

Pharoah: 17:06

Men's Society and Goodfellas are two of the best movies I've ever seen in my life and they both have narration, but they tell us.

Chris: 17:11

I'm not. I don't subscribe to it. I subscribe to if it needs it, put it in there. Don't be afraid, don't be afraid, but, granted, don't put it in all your movies. But don't be afraid to if it moves the story along and tells a better part of tells the story in a better way. Yeah, you know, I'm saying because a film like menace society and goodfellas. They needed that and it really worked that narration out their movies trash.

Chris: 17:37

Yeah, like it could be the same exact movie. Take out the narration, trash the narration moved those movies along and gave the audience the understanding that they needed. Uh, on the entertainment value, because as directors we kind of know what's going on because we make movies, but that you, your regular moviegoer, you got to explain shit to them yeah, because I've shown movies to people and be like what you think. I honestly didn't know what was going on when.

Pharoah: 18:03

They don't understand. I'm like, okay, they can't read my mind.

Chris: 18:08

They don't be understanding.

Pharoah: 18:09

Let me go back and add a little something.

Chris: 18:11

That's what the narration is for to make it easier for them to digest, to understand, to break it down mentally to where they can say oh okay, I understand where they were trying to go with this. You know what I'm saying. So it's now in the movie is September 1976. Um, and it's a man leaving the bank with a briefcase full of money. Dave Bill Cosby's character is in a. It looks like he's in a city workers uniform. On the street. He somehow, with all hundreds of thousands of people walking around Chicago streets, he's able to knock the guy out with the briefcase, knock him down into the underground and rob him like that Turn that.

Pharoah: 18:55

Bill Cosby boy.

Chris: 18:57

He was a bad man in the 1970s. Bill Cosby. So that means in the very beginning of this movie we saw bill cosby do two crimes and manny do one, and it just everything just lined up too perfect. That's the only. That's really the only thing I got to say. It's not. I guess some of the stuff could happen with criminals, but it was like there was no hiccups, everything went super perfect the vast criminals of all time, though super perfect. So oh yeah, it was just too perfect.

Pharoah: 19:26

These was the avengers of criminals yeah, but it's just hard to, it's it's hard to but even worse than the criminals, the fact that some kind of way, james earl jones james earl jones wouldn't have been a regular, he'd have been batman. You have figured to figure this out the way he did and that's what I'm.

Chris: 19:45

We get into the next scene, the next scene. Dave is out at the club and he gets a letter from the bartender, from detective burke, saying that I know what you did and if you, you know you need to meet at this place. Blah blah, blah blah. And manny is kicking it with his girl at the house and the doorman brings him a letter saying the same thing you guys need to meet up at this hotel room. Blah, blah, blah blah. Another nitpick I got is they never explained how detective burke knew they?

Pharoah: 20:16

did all these? Just the great, just the greatest detective ever yeah, it's just like there's sherlock holmes. There's batman and there was detective. Yeah, and it's just how it was there I didn't.

Chris: 20:28

I could get past all the coincidences that made this movie work. I can't, as for the life of me as a filmmaker, figure out why they didn't explain how detective burke knew about all these crimes and who did them in a city with five million people in it he just was wily as they, as they describe you got gds and vice lords killing each other, but you know about all these crimes, these two dudes are doing well.

Pharoah: 20:56

He was an older detective. He wasn't older, he was getting ready to retire, so he was wiser. He was wise. Like I said, there's sher holmes, this batman, and then there was him.

Chris: 21:06

Yeah I just when I was watching this man, it just kind of my, my, I started getting a headache over trying to figure this out. Disbelief it was just like so. Here's the thing I felt like they had enough time and resources even the 70s to explain how he knew they were doing this stuff. I feel like they could have explained it.

Pharoah: 21:28

Here's the black note of that right Like growing up in the Black House, though everybody's seen these movies, right?

Chris: 21:34

Yes.

Pharoah: 21:35

Everybody saw the trilogy right. Yes, uptown Saturday Night, and let's Do it Again are the ones that people really watch more, and they don't necessarily watch a piece of the action as much because a piece of the action took more time to develop the backstory, even though they didn't really develop Detective Burke's backstory. Showing Manny and showing all them in these crimes, showing them kicking with they ladies and this and that people say it's slower.

Pharoah: 22:08

Because, unfortunately sometimes with our particular community, if ain't nobody getting hit upside the head immediately, if it don't come in with a bang and it takes any time for pacing or development of characters, people will's slow. It's this and that, right. So I think maybe due to pacing and timing, they had already took so much time on bills and sydney's backstories that they just just detective burke has superpowers. Yeah, just, we just jump right in.

Chris: 22:42

I just did not like that part of the story.

Pharoah: 22:45

My favorite Hood movie was Fresh. I also love Paid and Full. But people will say it was slow, it kind of dragged. No, they were developing the story?

Chris: 22:55

Yeah, developing the characters.

Pharoah: 22:56

So I'm assuming that maybe they sacrificed some of Detective Burke's backstory in order to move the movie along, to not lose the audience they definitely spent.

Chris: 23:12

This is how I feel about as a filmmaker and as a grown person watching this now. I definitely feel like they spent too much time on the kids and they could have dedicated some of their time to Detective Burke's backstory, because when they started dealing with the kids and they could have dedicated some of that time to Detective. Burke's backstory, because when they started dealing with the kids there were some long ass scenes with those kids, bro yeah, and they were kind of dragging out. They had random people talking that wasn't supposed to be talking.

Pharoah: 23:40

Kids are what was happening, though.

Chris: 23:41

Yeah, they was like yeah, jack, all them kids. What was happening though? Yeah, jack, you know all in. Yeah, jackson, slide time turkeys and stuff they could have cut all that out.

Pharoah: 23:51

Yeah, and could have developed the story. Yeah, but kids was. I mean, you know, yeah uh, carwise during that time period, cooley high, yeah uh, maybe, uh, you had the young, uh, young blood. You had a few other movies during that time.

Pharoah: 24:02

So I was talking about me kids with what was happening a couple of kids went on to actually do some things like uh, you see, shirley ralph, young Blood you had a few other movies during that time, so I was talking about me kids, with what was happening, a couple of kids went on to actually do some things like you see, shirley Ralph in there and stuff like that. Ernest Thomas, yeah, so it was. I always like seeing that, seeing them in the movies, the people that in the movies, before they.

Chris: 24:21

Yeah, because that was her first film. That was her first film.

Pharoah: 24:25

And I think it's going to work out for her, this acting career. Yeah, yeah, yeah yeah.

Chris: 24:30

So the fellas go to this hotel room that Detective Burke makes them go to. He doesn't show up. He calls them on the phone. They figure out they're being played. They become kind of allies. So he tells them to come to another meeting at a restaurant where they meet up with lila french, mrs french, and she tells them that they she gotten, she has a letter from one of them saying they're going to dedicate resources and time to get 30 jobs for 30 kids. For 30 kids, uh, that from some youth center that she works at.

Chris: 25:10

And the fellas are kind of like, what the hell like? So burke calls them again while they're sitting down having a lunch with, uh, mrs french, and tells them you in or you out. If you out, I'm gonna call the police, you're going to jail. They both say we're in, uh, but at that point they become vigilant on finding out who detective burke is they're gonna turn these tables because they're gonna turn the table because, like bill cosby said, there ain't no way I can get up at 9 am for the next three weeks.

Chris: 25:38

That's not when she said 9 am. It was like 9 am.

Pharoah: 25:44

They was like they ain't never heard of 9 am and I understand, because there was a time in my life that if I was up early like that, then that meant I was just getting in at that time, right? Oh, now I'm up and up and at my my 9 am, I'm at my desk already I remember.

Chris: 26:02

I remember a quote from uh louis armstrong where he said he's never heard of 4 pm. He don't know what the fuck 4 pm is because you know them jazz dude they go all night long. They didn't home at 4 am yeah, yeah, 4 pm they sleeping yeah like so them old school jazz dudes in the 40s and 50s, yeah, all night long.

Pharoah: 26:22

Yeah, they wasn't, they wasn't up at 4 pm, 5, 6 o'clock, they're getting up, just getting up having a shot, or worse, and getting ready to do it again man louis arnstrom said I don't know what the hell 4 pm is.

Chris: 26:33

I don't know what y'all talking? Unfortunately, I do 9 am too so dave and manny meet up with the kids and the kids is in there, being loud, belligerent smoking, drinking, playing around and stuff. I'm talking with the kids and the kids is in there, being loud belligerent smoking, drinking, playing around and stuff.

Pharoah: 26:47

I'm talking about the bad dudes bears those steroids.

Chris: 26:50

Oh my God, let's get into that. I love this movie so much, but it's too many flaws in it where I can't just go gloss over it. 1977, shirley Ralph supposed to be a teenager, in this she's 21 years old in reality yeah, ernest lee thomas roger.

Pharoah: 27:12

What's happening is 28 years old yeah, but two years later he was still playing a teenager, so we're gonna let him cook maybe you can explain to me why was hollywood?

Chris: 27:25

why couldn't hollywood find teenage actors back then? Because a lot of movies was like this A lot of those teenagers in the 70s was really grown ass people. They just look very young. So why do you think that Hollywood just didn't get teenage actors?

Pharoah: 27:38

Well one, we all looked older back then, and I?

Chris: 27:43

mean look at.

Pharoah: 27:43

Lionel Richie. Lionel Richie, 10 years ago, looked younger than he did when he was with the Commodores. That's true, so it was hard to tell.

Chris: 27:52

Shout out to Lana Richie.

Pharoah: 27:53

But I think, just like now, it's just a sincere lack of effort. Like, for instance, there's a movie it wasn't on Amazon a few years ago. It's called Imperial Courts. Saw that, I did see it and I actually enjoyed the movie. But a friend of mine said you got the Watts Playhouse, you got all these in Aggie, south Central. They didn't have to go get a cat from England.

Chris: 28:20

Yes, it was the dude from England, the player dude it was.

Pharoah: 28:24

It was there they Hollywood. It was the dude from England. The player dude it was. It was there in Hollywood. It was like Hollywood and I started thinking of it. And then later on, when Snowfall came, even though it just nailed the part, I think he should have got all the awards. In the back of my mind, I was always like you couldn't find a 19 or 20 year old in South Central that could have also played this part, even though but when you say critique like that, it's like you criticizing him, but no, he actually nailed that thing, nailed it Right.

Pharoah: 28:55

But I fail to believe that you had to go halfway across the world and, just like in this case, there was teenagers in Chicago.

Chris: 29:04

That they could have used? Who could have playedago that they could have?

Pharoah: 29:05

used who could have played. They actually could have used because, in fact, most of the young people in there even though I don't know the other ones ages were obviously full-grown adults you can.

Chris: 29:13

You can clearly see that these are adults. Yeah, playing kids. So yeah, that's that's, that's that's the thing, but it's the thing that I noticed, like in thes, the teenagers looked like adults. So I'm like what From?

Pharoah: 29:28

the way they dressed everything.

Chris: 29:30

It was almost like let's just get some adults that look young, throw them in some weird looking clothes that teenagers wear, have them doing silly shit. Like they had the kids in the class falling on the floor and just doing dumb shit and it's like we'll call them teenagers. Falling on the floor and just doing dumb shit, and it's like we'll call them teenagers. And it's kind of weird because it's even in dangerous minds Michelle Pfeiffer and them. There's a dude I want to say. He got killed, enrique Amani or whatever, whatever his name was. It was like an older Hispanic dude in the class. That dude was the same age as Michelle Pfeiffer in the movie, but he was playing a teenager. It's like why didn't you just go get a teenager? Why are you guys getting full grown adults to play teenagers? They got wrinkles in their face.

Pharoah: 30:13

Maybe it was a sag. Maybe it was a sag. Was that a sag issue. Yeah, you know like hey, we can't have this. You know, I don't know, because they went to extremes. You either had a Gary Coleman type dude or a D from what's Happening.

Chris: 30:29

Manuel Lewis.

Pharoah: 30:31

Kids, or I was 20-somethings playing kids there was no. I guess if you were 14 or 15, you just didn't have no.

Chris: 30:40

You shit out of luck.

Pharoah: 30:42

Yeah, unless you were like a midget or something.

Chris: 30:45

Yeah, yeah, yeah, but yeah no, you shit out of luck, unless you were like a midget or something.

Pharoah: 30:48

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, but yeah, no, shirley Ralph was definitely.

Chris: 30:52

She was 21. I didn't realize she was that young?

Pharoah: 30:53

Yeah, I mean, I know she had to be young, because 20 years later she still looked youthful. Oh, she looks great now she's 65 now. She obviously was no parts of a teenager.

Chris: 31:05

No, no, she was a fully developed woman. She had a young girl's voice. She played it to the T. Speaking of Shirley Ralph, shirley Ralph is an accomplished actress, but she's a theatrically trained actress. So the only issue I had with her and Shirley, look, I got love for you. But I got to say this when she speaks, she projects, she projects and it sounds like she's acting. That's the only thing I got to say about in this particular movie, about Shirley Ralph's character is like she speaks so eloquently and so perfectly, with every word. It's like nobody in that situation with them. Badass kids, they wouldn't have been speaking like that.

Pharoah: 31:50

But two things, though, is that, for those of y'all that might not realize, when you come from a theater background, in order for people in the back of the theater to hear you, you have to speak in a style of speaking that's called projecting, but that's not a realistic way of talking. So it's noticeable if you into that. But another thing is that even now, when she's comfortable, she has a caribbean accent yes, because she's from the caribbean, so maybe just like a lot of the british actors, to get rid of their back home accent.

Pharoah: 32:21

They enunciate perfectly, that's true, and they speak in a manner that sometimes you'd be like. In fact that was the thing with john boyoga that was his name and watts playing in imperial. He didn't sound like any cat.

Chris: 32:34

I knew from watts right that's like the people that's from that area. They know yeah, the real from the fake.

Pharoah: 32:41

Yeah, they know the real from the fake you know, saying that maybe that might have been the case with her. Is that trying to overcome her Caribbean accent? Yeah, she was using her American. Well, if she learned, she probably would have had perfect dictation. Yeah, it's like my daughter's a newscaster Me and her talking voice and her hi, I'm Shalika Powell and I'm here to bring you the news.

Chris: 33:02

Her news voice is hilarious.

Pharoah: 33:03

It's totally different. But they're trained. It's called a mid-regional. It's a mid-regional dialect, it's an actual accent and that's why, if you turn on the news here in the Bay, you turn on the news in San Antonio, texas. You turn on the news in Philadelphia and all the anchors have the same tones and inflections. It's considered a universal American accent.

Pharoah: 33:31

And they all like. If you go to journalism school, you will learn. If you're going to do broadcast journalism, you all learn this voice. And to see my daughter in her normal I know her normal speaking voice, yeah, yeah, how she normal speaking, and then see her on the news in her news voice. It's never not funny to me Because it's nowhere near how she talks.

Chris: 33:54

Right, I get it, and at one point.

Pharoah: 33:57

She was a news anchor in Nebraska.

Chris: 34:00

Wow, that's a whole different ballgame right there.

Pharoah: 34:03

And I can't even imitate the news accent I can imagine. I was like, well, the people would be so shocked. At the moment they say cut. And she's like oh, I ain't on the air. Hey man, what's happening with you? Yeah, when she get to talking for real, Go right back.

Chris: 34:18

Yeah, I feel like there's a lot of well getting back to the Imperial Courts guy and even with Snowfall, with Damson, a lot of the English actors, the black English actors that are getting hired to do jobs that could have been given to Americans. A lot of it comes down to it's just a lot cheaper.

Pharoah: 34:40

They're willing to go cheaper, much cheaper.

Chris: 34:41

You can pay him $1,000 a day. You can pay somebody from England $400 a day that can have the same exact accent Straight economics. It's economics, but in Damson's case.

Pharoah: 34:51

They brought in WC.

Chris: 34:53

That's true.

Pharoah: 34:54

Yeah, you know, like Dialect coach, I guess he had to American-like, but somebody was like he don't sound like he from the hood. Yeah, yeah, he had to, so they bring in South Central legend Dub C to Westside Connection.

Chris: 35:04

We have to remember too. People from other countries have been watching us talking movies for a hundred years. They can mimic us perfectly. We don't watch movies from England.

Pharoah: 35:15

I can't do an Irish guy.

Chris: 35:16

Yeah.

Pharoah: 35:16

I can't do none of that stuff. But an Irish guy has seen me and he's seen boys. He's seen them a thousand times, so he could probably do me way better than I can do him and that's what people need to understand. They've been watching our movies, but why bring him into me?

Chris: 35:31

you let me do me, let me do me. Yeah, it's honestly, it's an economic thing, it's a lot cheaper and also they're not coming over here with with that ego, you gotta remember, as an american actor has an ego, especially. They've been in stuff before. Oh yeah, you can't, I'm not gonna play no supporting actor, I was just a lead and blah, blah, blah you ain't gonna talk to me any time, yeah, you don't talk to me, no time away.

Pharoah: 35:54

I just asked that you want something to drink.

Chris: 35:56

Yeah, still though my cousin's cuba good and junior. You can't talk to me like that, but you that's another thing though, For instance, right now, Netflix.

Pharoah: 36:06

Netflix, five or six years ago used to have some independent Black films on there, right, yes. Now you can't find any independent Black films, and the closest thing you can find to independent Black films are all Nigerian films. And somebody told me that the licensing deals that they would give me or you there's certain standard deals. I didn't know that. Like the minimum two-year licensing deal is like $150,000.

Pharoah: 36:32

So if they, were to take one of our films, that's what they would give us. But then they would also charge back Like they want to deliver it in 26 languages, stuff like that, and we would have to Lower.

Chris: 36:43

That would be our responsibility to give it to them in that many languages.

Pharoah: 36:47

Yeah, you know, and so, and, if you ever had to close caption a film or something like that, you know what I'm saying. Regular closed caption is, you know, it's relatively cheap, yeah, but to have this dubbed in Mandarin, have this dubbed in. French, but the Nigerian films. Apparently they're licensing them for 20 or 30,000. So, based on pure economics, if we're bringing an independent film that not necessarily has any star power, just a cool story, it'd be a hundred thousand dollars cheaper to bring in the nigerian dude under the same circumstances.

Pharoah: 37:31

And then the other thing is that they've kind of figured, because a lot of people don't realize this. When netflix figures out that you're black, everything on your suggested, even if there's only one black character in the movie, that's what you will see, the image for all this.

Pharoah: 37:45

So when the Netflix algorithm figures out that you're black, it's just going to show you black movies and their thought process is oh, black people are not going to watch, so they look. So if they think me and you are going to watch this Nigerian film simply because it has black people in it and it's cheaper than, say, a dude from Detroit's film, then that's what they're going to go with. So the Africans and the and the gentlemen from the UK, plain and simply, they're cheaper than us.

Chris: 38:19

That's crazy.

Pharoah: 38:21

There's certain things that me and you not going to go for, that they not tripping on. There might be certain things a little microaggression or something like that we might be like, hey, hold on man, hey man, this is racist. And then you know how it is in this industry If you call out somebody doing you wrong, people will act like you're difficult.

Chris: 38:42

Yeah, yeah, yeah, a la Monique, what happened with?

Pharoah: 38:45

Monique, exactly so. If they can bring in some two dudes that look like us, who ain't going to never trip and is five times cheaper, yeah, it's economics, it's economics.

Chris: 38:59

And I understand as a filmmaker, economics does matter because you do have a budget and you try to stick to the budget. Yeah, and sometimes you don't have a choice. If you use your own money, you're just going to run out of money Sometimes you ain't got a choice but to stick to the budget.

Pharoah: 39:10

Yeah, and budget is everything in this game. It is Like for instance, to me, one of the rawest dudes to ever pick up a camera was Hype Williams.

Pharoah: 39:18

Yes, and Hype Williams he got a chance to do Belly and he went dramatically over budget, yes, and still didn't get Some people watch Belly. Critical, and I'll be like you can't really critique Belly because if you really listen to Hype, there were so many things that wanted to be added in, like Nas was supposed to go beat. There were supposed to be parts in Africa with Nas. There were supposed to be no African shots at all. The interaction between DMX and the minister was really way more pronounced. There was way more and it showed how DMX was supposed to go from I'm just getting close to him to kill him to actually being a true convert. Right, but the minister knew all along like maybe 30, 40% of the movie got cut.

Chris: 40:10

Yeah, and I believe that, as a filmmaker, I know that's how it happens. And basically they never really gave Hype another chance at doing a movie and clearly they never really gave Hype another chance at doing a movie and clearly they didn't even shoot the scenes and have a director's cut. Nobody's never saw none of those scenes you're talking about.

Pharoah: 40:26

They just in the script.

Chris: 40:27

They just in the script, but nobody never got shot.

Pharoah: 40:29

But if those things would have been shot. It would have been so much more of an epic film it would have Back in the days when I was a kid, there was a movie called Heaven's Gate. Yes, and Heaven's Gate actually bankrupted the studio. Oh, and I actually saw a version of it. It was about an hour and a half right, and it was a completely idiotic movie and they invested so much money and it flopped so badly that the studio literally went out of business.

Pharoah: 40:56

Well, as an adult. They restored the full, actual cinematic version.

Pharoah: 41:03

Like I said, the version I saw was an hour and a half. The full movie was actually three hours. Oh jeez, so they cut 50% of the movie. Yeah, so there was plot lines that didn't make any sense. There was characters that appeared and never saw again, but then the full story was like oh, this is almost a masterpiece, but somebody at the studio said we over budget, nobody's going to sit in the theater for three hours and watch this. And so they massacred it, and it flopped, and that's how I view Belly that if only he could have shot the full vision. But what amazes me, though, is that he never got another chance to do another one Same thing with Matty Rich.

Chris: 41:41

Matty Rich, I remember Matty Rich.

Pharoah: 41:44

Like all these Wildcats, and that's the kind of curse Like right now we're independent, but we both know that if we ever get a shot at the big money we really might only got one shot.

Chris: 41:57

You got one shot and you better make it work, you better, you better. Something better happen with this one shot Because you don't get a second one. Matter of fact, speaking of Hype Williams, it's like I don't remember Hype. I remember his career damn near being over after Belly, like. I don't remember him doing a lot of music videos and none of that stuff, right right, which was weird because he had done so.

Pharoah: 42:21

Hundreds of music videos leading up to belly and music videos is such a limited genre for him to be so raw. That told me that he was really a visionary.

Chris: 42:27

Yeah he was more. I always put him this this was always. I know he was a great a film director and music director, but I always seen him more as a cinematographer because he saw the vision. Yeah, things looked a certain way. Everything looked a certain way. So I always saw him that way, because I always said that if I did a film and I wanted to make it more artistic, that's who I would go for as my actual DP. I would get Hyde Williams to be my DP.

Pharoah: 42:53

And speaking of cinematographers, I was just looking at this, this person right here, ernest Dickerson. Ernest Dickerson, he was Spike Lee's. He made Spike movies look so good that somebody finally said, well, dog, what you got. And that movie became Juice, juice, right, which?

Chris: 43:09

gave the birth of. Yes, indeed. So let's get back to the piece of the action. So Manny's girlfriend Nikki, her parents pop up out of nowhere, uh, which is kind of shady, you know. They pop up at manny's house, uh, and they have an issue with manny sleeping with their daughter nikki, because they're not married. It's the 70s, it's the 70s, and also manny looks like he's like mid 40s. They look like she mid 20s there's like a huge age difference.

Chris: 43:40

Man, he was getting to the bag, though. Man, he was getting to the bag and nikki saw. You know, I got the sugar daddy right here. I'm about to shackle up with him, and nikki wasn't tripping but her, but him and pops was about.

Pharoah: 43:52

They went to school together, right?

Chris: 43:54

so that I think that's what kind of other than them not being married. I think that's that also kind of might have what pissed off the mama to like you are older dude smashing my baby.

Pharoah: 44:04

You got to make a respectable.

Chris: 44:06

Yeah, you got to put a ring on her finger. We understand what's going on, but put a ring on her finger. So the mom was big tripping, big tripping, you know, and they were church people because I think the dad was a pastor. So they came there with the, the aunt, uh wilona from uh good times, who?

Pharoah: 44:23

was acting in a big camp calloway's daughter right and that was that era for for context, for the youngsters. That was an era where the pops would come to you, where your intentions to my intentions.

Chris: 44:35

You had to go to pops to get to the girl. Yeah, back then, like you wasn't just, you couldn't pull up at home you couldn't pull up and say, hey, I'm outside no, you had to park the car.

Pharoah: 44:45

Pops come to the door first, then you gotta sit there. She's dressed, she's upstairs dressed, but pops gotta have a few moments with you before he didn't already told her sit in your room for 15 minutes? I talked to this. Yeah, I need to see what's happening with you.

Chris: 45:00

That's how stuff used to be. So we get to a scene where Barbara, who was Shirley Ralph, she goes off on the teacher, mrs Thomas, and this goes back to Shirley Ralph, the overacting. This scene was about five minutes of dialogue and she was going off on mrs thomas, but I made to the point of whoo, she made her cry.

Chris: 45:27

She made mrs thomas cry, said she needed she had a vibrator at home like this is the 70s. You can't be talking about vibrators. You can't be a student telling the teacher go home to your vibrator.

Pharoah: 45:36

In the 70s that was crazy, and let me qualify that if you ever see a five minutes of dialogue in one of my movies it was filler a distribution company must have said we need this movie to be 80 minutes and I looked up and it was 72. Yeah, all right, that of dialogue. Somebody about to give a monologue?

Chris: 46:00

That's a lot. That scene was about five minutes and then it ended with Mrs Thomas running out crying. She went to the cafeteria, then Manny went behind her and was trying to calm her down and saying everything's going to be okay. And at this point she was literally begging Manny to help her because she couldn't handle them. Kids, especially Barbara. Barbara was Off the hinges. Barbara was a spark plug to a whole bunch of shit in that class.

Pharoah: 46:28

A lot of it was completely like all right, I see why you've been having problems in life. You're just angry.

Chris: 46:35

You're just an angry young girl Because she wasn't a woman. Yet she's still a kid supposedly, so you're just an angry young woman. And they never really touched on what Barbara's issue was, why Barbara was so angry.

Pharoah: 46:48

That's another bad thing the guided missile aimed at the school every day.

Chris: 46:52

But they never, especially in that particular scene where she really lit into Miss Thomas. It's like why y'all didn't explain why Barbara was like, explain it, Maybe her dad beats her at home, Maybe she getting raped by her uncle or something like that.

Pharoah: 47:05

What's making her so angry? Because she's a beautiful woman. I don't even remember a scene where they even alluded to what could be, because sometimes in some of these type of movies there'll be some allusion to what's going on hey, you going home this, and that I can catch hell at home in the streets. You know, there's usually some type of and there wasn't any context to our anger.

Chris: 47:27

That was the good thing that they did in the movie another movie from the 80s, the Breakfast Club All the kids had issues at home, but they explained all their issues, so you understood why they were the way they were. We never understood why barbara was the way she was. She was so angry and fired up about everything and she was borderline, almost cartoonish.

Chris: 47:49

It was like extra, it was super extra. It's just like, especially that that particular scene where, like I said, it's like five minutes of dialogue where she just going off you just some giant time, ass, teacher, you don't care about us niggas. Now that was another reason why I gotta go back to her theatrical training. It's like the way she was saying nigga was like that's not how black people say nigga. Everything she was saying was so pronounced, it was just like. This is not a theater, ma'am.

Pharoah: 48:22

A theater track. Caribbean-born actress.

Chris: 48:26

You are not in the theater, ma'am, you do not have to talk. The teacher was like two feet in front of her. She was like she was going, but we got to make sure that the back rows can hear you got to make sure everybody else can hear. I feel like at that time, sydney portier, he should have dialed her down a little bit.

Pharoah: 48:42

Just think that might have been down there. Don't say that like she might have been so far out there that they finally was like you know what? Roll with it. You're going crazy at the end and as a director sometimes I've had people just sitting there murdering lines, not getting it, obviously unprepared, and finally used to be like.

Chris: 49:02

You know what we're going to work with it. Look at life.

Pharoah: 49:06

You okay with that. You're like, you know what it is what it is.

Chris: 49:10

We got to move on to the next scene.

Pharoah: 49:12

We're still here two hours from now, it's not going to get any better.

Chris: 49:14

We've been wasting the whole day you trying to do this one scene correctly.

Pharoah: 49:17

That's the bad of being an independent director. Sometimes in your mind you have to say I'll just make sure that the performances in the next scene are just so much better.

Chris: 49:28

Because you got to balance it out, to outshine this bullshit, because I just feel like this was probably what happened. I feel like that scene and the dialogue was so long it's a one take, jake, like we got one shot to do all this shit. We can't keep doing this all day. Five minutes of dialogue.

Pharoah: 49:46

We can't keep doing this all day and shout out to my man, tyler so so then, when people be like, oh, he filmed eight episodes of this in a week or this in two, three days, that is one take.

Chris: 50:00

Yeah, Tyler, keep it moving.

Pharoah: 50:02

He did that one movie where he was in it and everybody was clowning the wigs. They had the Ball Brother Meshia Brooks and some type of laptop wig. Tyler even had this wig on himself. He was paying the district attorney or something.

Chris: 50:15

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, and they was like oh, we filmed that movie. They filmed the movie in four days. It was a Netflix film.

Pharoah: 50:22

Yeah, they did a Netflix. And I'm sitting there like and to some people how on earth can you film a whole feature film in four days?

Chris: 50:31

And I'm like man, it was a-.

Pharoah: 50:32

One take Jake.

Chris: 50:33

Yeah, it was a lot of One shot, let's rip, let it rip. And we'll cover any mistakes with B-Roll, but we not stopping, we going scene for scene for scene.

Pharoah: 50:42

And any mistakes, B-Roll going to cover it and then he had a series on BET Plus called Bruh and they filmed the whole and they said the same thing. They did the whole season. His season was 20 episodes and they did it in four days. Oh Jesus, and I'm sitting there like okay.

Chris: 51:05

They was just giving cats the scenario and turn on the camera and we just improv. Probably, yeah, no script and we just go yeah, no script. It's like Tyler Perry became the 90s version of Master P in music. He did that in movies. Yeah, because Master P was putting out 30 albums a month. At one point in time, 28 of them was garbage.

Pharoah: 51:21

I heard at one time he was signing cats taking the picture of the album cover and they hadn't even hit the studio yet. They'll have us pose, we, the Antioch brothers take the picture of that. Then we go into the studio and we just here go, the beat, you freestyle, I freestyle somebody sing a hook. And tonight there's the album.

Chris: 51:45

That's crazy. Tyler's kind of doing that, though, if you think about it.

Pharoah: 51:51

That's the knock I be having sometimes. I don't have no knock on him because that's just his style.

Chris: 51:56

That's his style, he's unapologetic with it.

Pharoah: 51:58

He'll say this is how I get out. Yeah, so I don't need him to make a Star Trek film, I don't need him to do Independence Day, because he's quite clearly said this is and the mortal words are too short if this is what sells, I'm going to stick with it. But I do get mad sometimes when people knock his actors.

Pharoah: 52:17

They be like oh, they can't really act, and I be like, no, they actually are really nailing it because most likely, especially on his series, they're improv-ing that, they're improv-ing that and they're shooting three, four hour-long episodes in a day. They're not memorizing all that dialogue, they are winging this and when you realize that they improv-ing and they just getting into character, and they just going. They're actually talented yeah.

Chris: 52:44

And a lot of times people got to understand. That's another thing about being filmmakers we understand. It's like sometimes the actors are doing a very good job and the script is just weak.

Pharoah: 52:53

Yeah, they don't have nothing to work with.

Chris: 52:54

What? What you want them to do? You know what I'm saying Make wine out of shit. Sometimes the scripts are horrible and you can have an accomplished actor that just can't deliver because the lines don't make no damn sense to the actor.

Pharoah: 53:11

I had a cat ask me to help him produce a film and he gave me a nine page script and I said what the hell. And he's like yeah, and literally it was scene header Billy and Sam talk and then scene 10,.

Chris: 53:29

Billy is and I'm like where's the dog? Where's the dog?

Pharoah: 53:33

He's like, oh, maybe he's going to come. He's just man, we're just going to let him do what he do.

Chris: 53:37

See, that's that bullshit man. That's why everybody can't be a filmmaker.

Pharoah: 53:41

Now good luck to that person. But I ended up saying I said I can't. I understand what you're trying to do. You're trying to wing it together, but I actually look at myself as an artist, so I need some structure to create something.

Chris: 54:01

And you obviously look this as a hustle. Yeah, so we're not going to. Good luck to you. That's the issue. It's not a big issue, that's, but that is the issue I have with a lot of people. That's putting stuff on tubi. I don't have no problem with independent filmmakers getting their money on tubi, but it's a lot of trash on tubi because they're not looking at the art as an art form. They're just recording a bunch of niggas doing dumb shit, selling dope. I just got out of jail. Strippers just got out of jail.

Pharoah: 54:23

I meet up with the homies at the strip club. Man, what am I going to do with my life? I need to hit this one last lick to get out the game or I'm trying to get out the game. Thank you.

Chris: 54:33

I'm tired of seeing them.

Pharoah: 54:35

movies A couple of little different plot points. Now I'm back at the strip club. This and that.

Chris: 54:40

Yeah, you always end up back at the strip club, you know.

Pharoah: 54:42

So it's these particular things and it's almost like it's a formula, and as long as it's like 70 minutes long and ta-da it works we out there. So you know, sometimes I can chill and just watch them, but sometimes I'll be like you ever been watching a movie and you start saying what's going to happen next.

Chris: 55:04

Yeah, I already know what's going to happen. This whoop-de-whoop I say that to my wife all the time. I'm like I already knew what the movie was about when I've seen the first five minutes of the movie. The whole movie was about.

Pharoah: 55:17

On one hand, as a person that's been doing this for a while, having to be is a beautiful thing. It is Because it's increased the income exponentially.

Chris: 55:26

It is.

Pharoah: 55:27

But, the other hand, when you do lower the bar for entry into certain genres because, you know, because, like right now, I shoot with a Black Magic.

Chris: 55:37

Okay.

Pharoah: 55:38

The six camera Good camera and it cost me $2,700. The very first movie we did was called Town Biz. Okay, and the camera cost $23,000. Jeez and my Black Magic, you would use that camera as a doorstop while you know what I'm saying, because that's how far, but then, on the other hand, technology.

Pharoah: 55:59

When we first started to have a $27,000 camera wasn't accessible. So even if you had good ideas, if you had talent as a filmmaker, you just didn't have the equipment to get into the game because you didn't have the money. And now anybody could go to B&H and even if you got at least a 500 credit score, you could even finance one. That's true. So now everybody can have. Like right now somebody could get on B&H or one of them type of websites. And this is Thursday. So by Monday at the latest you'll have all your lights, cameras and everything.

Chris: 56:33

Oh yeah for sure.

Pharoah: 56:34

And next thing, you know, you out there winging together a movie Tubi.

Chris: 56:40

They don't know how to write no script, they don't know how to develop no characters, they just shooting shit. It's saturating the art form. It bothers me a little bit because I don't want the audiences to eventually get used to what they see on Tubi. So if me, an artistic filmmaker, makes an actual good film, it's going to be trash to them because they're used to the bullshit on Tubi. That's my only issue.

Pharoah: 57:06

It's like Anybody that y'all doubted when you was eight, if you got the choice between going to Ruth, chris or McDonald's, you're going to choose McDonald's, every single time, every single time.

Chris: 57:23

So that's that's my issue.

Pharoah: 57:25

I don't and then they put this in the box because, like I was, I was, I was off camera. How, uh? I had submitted a film about some college women overcoming some obstacles to a particular production company and they were like we like it, we're gonna fund you, but you need to make it more ratchet. And I'm sitting there like I can. I gotta make these accomplished these accomplished sisters ratchet.

Pharoah: 57:52

That's not even what the movie is about. But as far as they, this company was concerned, they knew I had the track record to deliver, so that's why they were willing to. They want to get films in the black genre and they knew that if they funded me they were going to get a finished product. Yeah, yeah, you know, because a lot of people drop the ball, no matter how much fun, then they get it never quite to get done. But they knew it was going to get done. But I guess me as a black filmmaker, they needed it to be, even if it was taking place in the heart of the university. They needed some, some, some, some ghetto to it.

Chris: 58:28

Man. You know, I'm saying because they figured that's, that's what would attract, but here's the one I got plenty of ghetto films.

Pharoah: 58:35

I'm thinking I'm linking up with them and getting a little bit bigger budget and everything that I can go past that. Yeah, you can get past it, but they like no, you're black. You got to give us some type of. We got to have some type of ghetto. And I'm sitting there like that's crazy. So we're going to have the head of the BSU at Stanford talk about what's happening.

Chris: 58:59

That's crazy, but that's the box. So we get to a point in the movie where Manny and Dave break into the youth center to get some names of the board members because they're assuming that whoever is blackmailing them had to be a board member because they care about the youth center so much During this break and they have a conversation about the kids and actually call the kids little gorillas.

Chris: 59:25

I can't do you so I can't do no more days with little gorillas. I'm like damn for people that don't understand. People say what the hell they felt in the 70s. Right, they felt like calling some black kids gorillas. They called them gor gorillas. There was no woke, no woke culture, no.

Pharoah: 59:41

No castle culture.

Chris: 59:43

You might have got called the worst stuff you've ever been called by somebody in your own family. Right, it didn't even have to be a stranger, it could be somebody in your family calling you everything but the devil.

Pharoah: 59:54

We was called porch monkeys. Oh my God, we was porch monkeys, oh my god, we was porch monkeys. Monkeys because we would sit. You know, we'd always be sitting outside and be like man if I pull up these porch monkeys now could you imagine in 2024 calling your black students porch monkeys?

Chris: 1:00:13

oh my god, viral in a heartbeat oh man.

Pharoah: 1:00:18

But you know, in fact I, we used to have football coaches that would say the wildest stuff to us. Football coaches didn't give a fuck yeah, wildest. And you couldn't even go home and complain Because it'd be like, whatever that man tell you you listen to him.

Chris: 1:00:35

He is the leader of men.

Pharoah: 1:00:37

Now the football coach say hey, you're dogging it, I need a little extra.

Chris: 1:00:42

Oh, he made me feel bad about myself, yeah, and he go tell his single mom that she come back up to the school with that bullshit.

Pharoah: 1:00:51

Hey in front of the school board In front of everybody. They're going to be calling for his job.

Chris: 1:00:56

She wants him fired because he told her son that he wasn't working hard enough.

Pharoah: 1:01:01

Man, the coaches I had when I was a kid man. I'm surprised that somebody ain't went back and sued them. Oh my God, yeah, I keep waiting for them to be on the news, like in 1981, he made, he crushed they self-esteem. But I would probably come up there and be like, hey, they made my skin so thick. It ain't a lot of shit you can say to piss me off.

Chris: 1:01:26

No, you know, that's. The thing that we can always take from the 70s and 80s is that times are so rough and so real that it harden your skin to where you can survive in any environment.

Pharoah: 1:01:38

Nothing can hurt you, yeah, nothing.

Chris: 1:01:40

And if you're from oakland and you lost as many partners I lost, you know, I lost my own son like, yeah, can't nobody hurt me at this point. Whatever life got to throw at me, come on, I'm taking it all. It is what. It is what it is. Let's get. Let's get to the spot.

Pharoah: 1:01:55

I'm about all that I'm up against. I can deal with anything I can deal with anything death, diabetes, divorce.

Chris: 1:02:01

I can deal with it all. Yeah, keep it coming you can't break.

Pharoah: 1:02:05

You can't break me, especially not verbally.

Chris: 1:02:07

You can't break me at all. So we get to a point to where manny offers the kids a hundred dollars a week if they learn how to uh do a good interview to get a job. And he's's talking to them about having better self pride and self-esteem about themselves. And the kids ain't really taking it serious. They playing around, they doing mock interviews and they kind of just joking and not taking the stuff serious. One of the classmates named Willie. He brings them up to tell us to do a mock interview and Willie starts telling what's really going on in his home, about his little brother Timothy, who seems to be mentally challenged or whatever and stuff. And Willie tells a story about how his mom says you're the oldest, it's four siblings, you're the oldest, I need you to go out there and work because the mother doesn't have a job. So you can tell during this mock interview in the classroom he's not telling a story, he's telling what's going on in his life he's living it Because he started crying.

Chris: 1:03:07

Everybody in the classroom started crying because they started to realize oh no, he's not playing, he's actually telling you how he's living. Please, can I, please have this job? My mama says I'm the man of the house, I'm responsible for all these people in the house. Yeah, which has always been my issue in the black family, when I hear single moms tell five-year-old boys you, the man of the house, because your daddy ain't here, no more. You don't tell no boy, no shit like that. He, five years old, he going to grow up with all this damn pressure to take care of your grown ass. You don't tell no boy, no shit like that. He, five years old, he gonna grow up with all this damn pressure to take care of your grown ass.

Pharoah: 1:03:42

You're the adult Gotta jump off the. You know and that's. But that was that era, though. That man and cats really was dropping out of school. In the 70s they trained to get jobs. The oldest girl was literally cooked all the meals, did all the laundry, you know, did everything did all work you know saying and so it makes you start thinking like what the hell is a crazy thing.

Chris: 1:04:06

Yeah, if you had three daughters, you had six kids and the oldest, the oldest three, was girls. They did all the chores. What the hell did the mama do? Because god damn the girls doing all the cooking and cleaning. I mean, I look at my own, I look my own family.

Pharoah: 1:04:18

The oldest auntie and the oldest uncle literally raised everybody.

Chris: 1:04:23

Yeah, you know what I'm saying, and that happens.

Pharoah: 1:04:25

They don't even really have. Like my youngest aunties and my oldest auntie never really even had a sisterly relationship. That was basically mama. Right right, you know what I'm saying. She whooped them, cooked everything like that and big bro, he was dead, he wasn't even sitting, like my father was the oldest, over eight gotcha, and he was already working at 14, 15, bringing in the check to pay the rent. Then he had to go to the military and this and that, and he had to send a certain amount of money home.

Pharoah: 1:04:53

So he was him and, like him and my youngest aunt is, this was 20-year age difference. Oh wow, and so they never was really siblings.

Chris: 1:05:02

Yeah, yeah. They never lived together, grew up together, he was dad, yeah, he was dad.

Pharoah: 1:05:06

Yeah, you know what I'm saying.

Chris: 1:05:07

And I know a lot of people like that where they're oldest siblings. They might be the baby of six or seven and the oldest sibling was more like a father figure because the age gap was so huge.

Pharoah: 1:05:22

In fact, I saw an interview with what's the boy's name, goody.

Chris: 1:05:25

Omar Goody.

Pharoah: 1:05:25

Okay, and he was saying it was 10 years between him and Cuba. It is he said they was living in hotels. They was doing so bad. So it was Cuba's responsibility to basically make sure he was still alive when mom came home. So Cuba had the whooping disciplining.

Chris: 1:05:39

That's crazy.

Pharoah: 1:05:40

Him and Cuba. They were in their 30s, he was in his 30s and Cuba was in his 40s before they started interacting like brothers. Like brothers right Because they grew up with. He said they wasn't close because he grew up whooping.

Chris: 1:05:55

Cuba handed out the discipline to Omar Because there was no man present yeah, and so he's like that.

Pharoah: 1:06:01

He said I was in my 30s, before me and him one day kicked it and we that's when we was kind of like on the same level. We became brothers, yeah yeah, yeah, yeah, for kids you know saying, but growing up and into adulthood he wasn't my big brother, he was the dad of the house, that's crazy.

Chris: 1:06:21

We get to a point to where Dave and Mrs French go out on a date and Detective Burke is following them and he's watching them and stuff. She basically she basically likes Dave, but Dave kind of is using her to get information about who's blackmailing him and stuff like that. He's using her to get more information about these board members, cause he knows for a fact somebody on that board or in the past on the board is responsible for what's going on with them and it's it's. It's weird because they have her kind of like, kind of airheaded a little bit. She don't understand that she's getting played. She seemed like such a smart lady the whole entire movie but when it comes to Dave, she clearly does not see what he's trying to do to her.

Pharoah: 1:07:14

She was a classic beauty, beautiful.

Chris: 1:07:17

Beautiful. I think she ended up playing on Heat of the Night and some other stuff.

Pharoah: 1:07:24

If I'm not mistaken that same lady played, mrs Church. Her husband was the dude who played the dancer structure on the Five Heartbeats. Really he was a famous dancer back in the Nicholas Brothers, like in the 40s way back in the Nicholas brothers, the Nicholas brothers, like in the 40s.

Chris: 1:07:40

Like way back in the day, right? Why did not know that it was even?

Pharoah: 1:07:44

at one point married to Dorothy Dandridge. Wow, wow, that's deep.

Chris: 1:07:51

That's deep.

Pharoah: 1:07:51

Harold Nicholas.

Chris: 1:07:52

Harold Nicholas. Okay, so we get to the next scene where Manny takes the class on a field trip to teach him about common courtesy. They start to understand and realize what he's trying to teach them is life skills, more life skills. The light bulb comes, the light bulb Right, so he has what he has.

Chris: 1:08:12

One of the one of the students go up and rudely ask the doorman or customer service person about a job in the building and the customer service person kind of pushes him off like get out of here. And blah, blah, blah. Then he had another classmate go up in a suit and being very polite and courteous and asking the same question, and that customer service person in the building is treating them with the same amount of respect and courtesy. To teach them that if you be kind to people and act accordingly, it will come back the same way. If you go up there ghetto, well, I need this job, Show me where it's at. They're going to give you that energy back. So this experiment kind of showed the kids like oh, he kind of knows what he's talking about and maybe we should start listening. I feel like after that field trip the light bulb came on on all the kids.

Pharoah: 1:09:06

See, because I went to high school in the 80s and we had actually had a home economics.

Chris: 1:09:11

I remember that. You know what I'm saying.

Pharoah: 1:09:12

I remember that and that's what many of us learned how to write a check. Yep, yes, sir, this day, walk on the outside. It was more than just home economics, it was etiquette. I remember some of my girl cousins actually went to etiquette classes, where you learn what fork to use, how you're supposed to sit at a table Etiquette classes. Many of us unfortunately didn't learn these things at home so they put us in classes to give us some hope of surviving in society.

Chris: 1:09:48

Yeah, because you're gonna be around different people, different backgrounds, and you stand out when you don't know which salad fork is the actual salad fork, or you eating spaghetti the wrong way, you slopping it up like a pig like people look at you a certain way.

Chris: 1:10:03

You don't know how to eat food the correct way, right, but but it's not really. That's why I've never blamed nothing on my parents. They only taught me what they were taught. So you know, coming from our our era, we could never. It's not fair for us to blame our parents, because look who our grandparents were they didn't even know a lot.

Pharoah: 1:10:23

You know, I'll get my toys, I'll go to the restaurant, hey lady. Hey, somebody said excuse me, ma'am, oh.

Pharoah: 1:10:31

Oh, excuse me, ma'am, yes we're like oh, she heard me the first time, yeah but, she wasn't going to, she wasn't going to respond to you yelling hey lady, hey lady, right, correct, excuse me, ma'am. Excuse me, sir. I didn't literally learn that I was 20-something, it makes a difference. Had to be like oh wow, I've been in restaurants for years. Yeah, it makes a difference. Probably looking like the biggest jackass, looking crazy and I'm not a jackass, but probably was looking like one, but I didn't know how to carry myself looking crazy.

Chris: 1:11:03

Um, so dave, miss french, nikki and manny go out on a date and something happens. That night miss french finally gives up the yammies and it was weird because he walked her to her door, she said good night, gave him a kiss, she went inside and closed the door. He, dave, just stood there at the door. He knew that was that is him. He knew that night he was going down so he stood there about 30 seconds, 40 seconds. She opened that door, opened a little wider and without saying any words.

Pharoah: 1:11:38

That's like come on in now art doesn't imitate life, though, because in real life, you'd have been still standing on the other side, still standing on there, one of one of her, one of her neighbors, would have been like stalker, yeah, like hey, can I help you?

Chris: 1:11:52

yeah, what you standing there for? But he stood there with a smile on his face, kind of knowing that she was gonna open that door that's the smooth operators. Oh, he was smooth, he was smooth, he was super smooth.

Pharoah: 1:12:04

So you gotta send that text now like, hey, I'm still out here.

Chris: 1:12:08

Yes, it's a different, it's a different ball game. So, uh, mrs mrs french finally tells dave about detective burke in a weird way, like she explains her mentor mentor was and who her husband is, and then he kind of puts two and two together because he's a smart guy, and they figure out that Detective Burke is the detective who's been blackmailing this whole time. Now let's get to this whole blackmailing thing. You want to blackmail me and my criminal partner to go teach some kids instead of you teaching the goddamn kids. Why the fuck you didn't go to the youth center? Why you want me to dedicate all my time to these, to these badass kids I assumed it was penance, like y'all got away with.

Pharoah: 1:12:53

Y'all got away with heavy, heavy dirt for so long you're gonna pay some dues to society I mean I guess that would.

Chris: 1:13:02

But I'm glad that at some point in time in the movie mrs french checked detective burke and said your wife wouldn't have done it that way because he said, well, that's what she would have done. She was like no, she wouldn't. She would not have done it that way, she wouldn't have blackmailed people into helping these kids. Like what you did was wrong, bro. Like you can't blackmail people, I hear your intentions?

Chris: 1:13:25

Yeah we get your intentions, yeah, but you blackmailed somebody to make two people who clearly did not want to be with these kids the little gorillas. They clearly want to have nothing to do with these kids. You made them do it with the threat of going to prison. Your wife would not have done that, sir yeah, it wasn't noble at all.

Chris: 1:13:45

It was not a noble thing for you to do and he just stood there like he didn't, never even apologize. He's like, it's like, dude, at least apologize and say I fucked up, I did it the wrong way. That never came out of his mouth, which lets you know the detective burke was one of those. I stand on business.

Chris: 1:14:01

This is what I did, and this is what it's gonna be like this is what I did it's two left shoes, but hey so the black lady who helped in the first uh robbery of the, the mob people, she, she gets caught by bruno in denmark, copenhagen. They find this black woman in a whole nother country, fly her back.

Pharoah: 1:14:32

With no internet, with no internet it's 1977 and, I'm assuming, under a different name under a whole different name.

Chris: 1:14:40

They find her, bring her back, use her as bait to find manny which is the dude who ripped him off. So somehow she knows about the youth center. She knows who manny's girlfriend is and none of this shit made sense divine coincidence it's like how would she know where manny is volunteering his work at?

Pharoah: 1:15:06

how did they know that she went on his instagram?

Chris: 1:15:09

she went. I guess she went on his 1977 instagram first one with it. How would they know who manny's girlfriend is? She don't even come to the youth center. She had never been to the youth center. You wouldn't even know what that woman looks like we're just gonna let them cook so it was so many.

Chris: 1:15:24

It's like those things like I want to love this movie so much. It's a perfect classic but it's hard to make. It was too many flaws and it's just like if they would have just tuned up the screen right just a little bit and explain some stuff hey, just like their soap operas.

Pharoah: 1:15:41

They want to write somebody off and replace them. They have a car wreck and then the scars that come out it's a new person and it's uh oh, they had plastic surgery.

Chris: 1:15:51

Oh my god, we just sometimes, sometimes you just gotta let them cook so bruno, who was the mafia boss, says he wants his 475 000, which is a lot of damn money. 1970 might be like a couple of million now. Yeah, easily, easily. So bruno says I want my 475 000. They had already kidnapped manny's girlfriend, nikki uh, and they was holding the black lady ransom.

Chris: 1:16:16

They eventually meet up after dave and manny rob uh another place and get some money it was kind of weird man, because it's like they robbed a management company and got two-thirds of the money. Then they go to a monastery to get some ledger, some paperwork showing the illegal companies that Bruno was dealing in. That could pretty much put him in prison. So they get all this stuff together, put it in a suitcase to go get Nikki, who they have. They go there, they make the exchange, they have this long, another long dialogue drawn out scene. We got a filler With Bruno and Manny where Manny's explaining what's going on and Bruno explaining I don't care, we about to kill you pretty much. And he kept calling him boy. And he kept calling him boy.

Chris: 1:17:11

And at one point in time Manny calls Bruno a titty sucker and it pissed him off. Guns came out. He was like I don't want to know what you're saying, titty sucker. And it pissed him all. Guns came out. He was like I don't want to know what you're saying, titty sucker. They was like it was like everybody room froze. I don't know what titty sucker meant in 1977, I'm a man but it pissed him off when he said when he called him a titty sucker. So Bruno tells Manny basically you jumped in a business of grown men, you shouldn't have jumped in. Manny tells him that I basically got 25 copies of these ledgers all over town and something happens to me. Blah, blah, blah. So they get nicky back, everything is fine and bruno lets him go after asking him. So what happens if you die of like a heart attack or something like that? And manny's like I think we just gonna have to see you better hope.

Pharoah: 1:17:59

You better pray for my good health.

Chris: 1:18:01

You better pray that nothing happens to me, because these ledgers will get out and you'll pretty much go to jail. So the movie ends with the students presenting Miss French and Miss Thomas with awards, because we're to assume they've all gotten jobs. It was 30 jobs, 30 kids. We're to assume they've all gotten jobs. It was 30 jobs, 30 kids. So manny's job was to work with the kids on how to present themselves and dave's job bill cosby was to get the 30 jobs. We're we're to assume that they did all that in three weeks in 1977. It's fucking amazing. It's amazing if you did that in 2024 with the internet start the job program and get all 30 kids on somewhere.

Chris: 1:18:40

All 30 kids got a job.

Pharoah: 1:18:42

In fact, they would feature you in the national media and people would want you to come duplicate this program in other cities.

Chris: 1:18:51

All 30 kids got jobs and miraculously all 30 kids kind of understood the assignment at the end of the movie, like oh, they were here to help us, really, yeah, it's like the whole time they were, the teachers, were the enemy, yeah, and at the end they were like oh, you guys really helped it only takes 21 days to change the life to change the entire life.

Chris: 1:19:16

So miss french gets a necklace and looks like pottery made by timothy, who was willie's younger mentally challenged brother. That's what they gave her and miss and miss thomas got the same necklace and a collection of stevie wonder albums which the collected works of stevie, which was huge back then. Stevie was the man, stevie was multi-platinum, grammy award winning stuff. It's like giving somebody all the Drake albums, right now it's the Collected Works of Stevie.

Chris: 1:19:49

Wonder and Barbara presented Miss Thomas with that. So we have a moment where Barbara, getting back to Barbara Good old Barbara, we never know why she's angry but in this moment when Barbara getting back to Barbara Good old Barbara, we never know why she's angry, but in this moment when she gives it to her, miss Thomas starts to cry. Barbara starts to cry, but Barbara has the look of I want to apologize, but she never apologizes and I'm intentions Right, apologizes and I'm intentions right. So I'm wondering why the director and if you know, maybe I can find in reason why you never had barbara just apologize you know you hurt this woman's feelings that particular day. You, you basically broke her down to a child. She ran out of the classroom crying. You know how you hurt her that day. Why, in this tender moment where y'all both crying without speaking, y'all both feeling energy, why didn't the director just have her say I'm sorry, just them two words, I'm sorry. So Ernest Thomas's character said you two break it up and he kind of pulls her out of the whole mold.

Pharoah: 1:20:56

The sappy moment.

Chris: 1:20:57

Yeah, the sappy moment. But it kind of made me think like, like, why they just didn't?

Pharoah: 1:21:01

That would have been the perfect bow tie on the story if they just had Barbara say I'm sorry, I didn't mean what I said they had a character so ridiculous that her even looking as if an apology was an option was a huge development for where she first started.

Chris: 1:21:19

Right, right, nice, and I don't know. I just feel like. I just feel like, like even with Willie's character, when he had that moment talking about his home life and his brother Timothy, like you could have took that same time or half of the Timothy Willie time and gave Barbara that time and we could have explained barbara situation, since she had the most damn dialogue in the entire class between her and earnest and earnest thomas they had the most dialogue out of all the kids like yeah, but you didn't explain why she was so angry but you let.

Pharoah: 1:21:55

Willie ended up having the biggest careers out of all the kids and they had the biggest career but you let willie walk from the back of the classroom.

Chris: 1:22:01

He never said nothing.

Pharoah: 1:22:02

The whole entire field to have this long dialogue about timothy funny thing is, willie was probably the biggest name at that time, and I let me have my moment, baby correct now I'm back in the cast. It's an ensemble.

Chris: 1:22:19

So the movie ends, everybody start dancing in the credits roll. It's a wrap.

Pharoah: 1:22:26

Funny thing, though, about that is as they're dancing, bill ends up dancing with this overweight chick. And they do the bump and every time they do the bump he pretends to fly across the room and every time they do the bump, he pretends to fly across the room Because back in. Yeah, boo, and all I could think about was last time I watched it was like man, they did that now.

Chris: 1:22:47

Oh my God it would be people.

Pharoah: 1:22:48

So many people would be offended. They'd be pissed Because he's obviously making a mockery of her size.

Chris: 1:22:53

He's making it seem like she's so big. She's throwing him across the room right with the, with the multiple times like and last time I watched it I was thinking like man, they did that.

Pharoah: 1:23:04

Now someone would point out that that was really crass yeah, and.

Chris: 1:23:09

But here's what's crazy about that, though she wasn't really that big compared to now not at all she was actually a regular-sized woman.

Pharoah: 1:23:18

And she got a waist. And that's to get a million followers on IG.

Chris: 1:23:23

She wasn't really big enough for Bill Cosby to actually have to do all that extra flying around the room. Now, if you're going to do it, you need to have a big, big, big, big girl, right, but she wasn't really that big for him to be doing all that.

Chris: 1:23:35

But just think, though, is that like, if, if somebody did that in 2000, say, 23, it'd have been like oh, we can't, we can't put that well, even now, if you, if you're a director, screenwriter, director and you have an actor, you say that I hired you to play this role and the role was. The role was described as an ugly overweight person. They might have an issue with that in 2024.

Pharoah: 1:23:59

In fact, you better not actually put it in the description.

Chris: 1:24:01

You better not put it in the script.

Pharoah: 1:24:03

It will get put on the net and you'll be called out for it.

Chris: 1:24:07

That's what's so weird. As a screenwriter, you got to be careful about how you describe characters that you want people to play. You might hire a dude to play a gay guy and he might come back at you like well, so what? What are you trying to say?

Pharoah: 1:24:22

I look like I'm gay like you never know what people gonna say yeah, you don't want to crawl into anything with somebody. I can say you're stereotyping correct.

Chris: 1:24:30

So it's kind of weird where we're at now. In filmmaking, in society in general, you gotta be very cautious. You have to be very cautious of what you say, how you present it to people. If you're gonna have a woman be, you know, sassy, you gotta explain her sassiness because she might have an issue with it. Why you got me playing this, this black woman talking all this shit and all that like it can become an issue now yeah, if you have those conversations, have them verbally and please make sure you're not being recorded.

Pharoah: 1:24:58

You need plausible deniability.

Chris: 1:25:00

You do you do so? I wrapping this film up is is one of my. One of my favorites from from a child from childhood is one that I used to watch with my parents. I didn't understand it back then, but I understand it now. Yes, it does have its flaws. Yes, it does have its its. Things in there just don't make no sense. Certain things happen. It just don't make no sense. Too coincident, too convenient, too convenient. But I still love it. It will always be a classic to me, not a perfect classic, just a classic in the sense of what a classic is. So I'm gonna ask you this on a scale from one to ten, what do you rate a piece of the action? I give it a solid 7.

Chris: 1:25:42

Solid 7?.

Pharoah: 1:25:43

Yes, see Filmmakers, we rate shit the right way Because, despite its flaws, it works.

Chris: 1:25:51

It does, and I kind of agree. Now you just shocked me with the 7. I was going to give it an 8. I'm like I'm going to give it a solid eight.

Pharoah: 1:26:02

Those convenient moments that move the story forward as you're watching it. Especially when you're younger, it's entertaining.

Chris: 1:26:06

As you watch it as a filmmaker, you'll be like but you still like it, but you're still going to be like come on Out of the whole trilogy.

Pharoah: 1:26:16

It is number three, Correct.

Chris: 1:26:18

I agree. It is number three Correct, I agree.

Pharoah: 1:26:20

It is number three. But I do kind of wonder why they didn't come back and at least in the 80s give us a number four.

Pharoah: 1:26:28

Well, even in the early 90s why they didn't give us the fourth one. That's true. That's true. I don't know if they ran out of gas by that time creatively, but if they had to give us another one in the 80s or even the early 90s, it still could have worked, I agree. I agree. I would love to speak to somebody about was there some behind the scenes drama or something like why they didn't go to the well again?

Chris: 1:26:52

Yeah, that's a good question. Sometimes, as a director, we think about stuff like that, even when I found a little tidbit about Will Smith on the remake and I'm like why didn't that happen?

Pharoah: 1:27:03

Yes, it seemed like that would have been a perfect thing. It would have been hugely successful. It would have been huge I don't know, maybe Eddie might have been reluctant, because I know that was the original. Goal of Harlem Nights was to make this mega film with all the legends Red Fox, richard.

Chris: 1:27:19

Pryor this and that?

Pharoah: 1:27:20

Him and Richard Pryor actually ended up falling out.

Chris: 1:27:23

I didn't know that.

Pharoah: 1:27:24

They never got back cool.

Chris: 1:27:27

I did not know that.

Pharoah: 1:27:28

They actually fell out on Harlem.

Chris: 1:27:30

During the shoot of Harlem Nights.

Pharoah: 1:27:32

I did not know that Richard Pryor was Eddie Murphy's idol. Yes, that's what you know. Even Robert Townor was Eddie Murphy's idol. Yes, you know what I'm saying and that's what you know. Even Robert Townsend, like, if you pay attention watching Harlem Nights. I mean not Robert Townsend, he died Bay Bay Kids.

Chris: 1:27:49

Oh, Robin Harris.

Pharoah: 1:27:49

Yeah, like if you really look around, everybody's in that booth, yes, everybody, you know what I'm saying, everybody, yeah, but apparently they fell apart and they never made up.

Chris: 1:28:02

I did not know that. Damn, that's deep Mm-hmm. Okay, so the name of the show was the Main Ingredient Mm-hmm. So, in your opinion, what was the number one main ingredient in this film that made you feel the way you feel about the film, that made you love it or hate it? What was the number one?

Pharoah: 1:28:19

thing. The one thing I love is that the significance of Sidney Poitier and Bill Cosby on the screen together.

Chris: 1:28:28

Yeah.

Pharoah: 1:28:29

That was just always magical. Like Uptown. Saturday Night was my mother's favorite movie you know what I'm saying.

Pharoah: 1:28:35

The rest of my family liked you know, let's do it again. You know what I'm saying. The rest of my family like let's do it again, you know what I'm saying. So I kind of default with. I like a piece of action. But the thing was, is that seeing them movies and seeing them two dudes, especially at they peak, you know what I'm saying? They both that was huge. I mean, bill went to a whole nother dimension after the show after that, but they were both huge.

Pharoah: 1:28:59

And they both meant like if I saw Sidney Poitier on the screen, it was me like man. That's Sidney Poitier. Yeah, you know what I'm saying. I'm older now, I'm more jaded, so there's not a lot of cats that can walk across the screen now and I'd be like man, go ahead.

Chris: 1:29:13

Yeah, not a lot.

Pharoah: 1:29:14

Rob Markman as a kid in the 70s, seeing Sidney Poitier and, of course, bill Cosby with the Conjuring Kid. He was larger than life to me. You know what I'm saying. That's why I be so tragic. You know how he, when the curtain was revealed, behind the wizard Rob Markman what he was really about, rob Markman, but at that stage of my life when that dropped, and even as a teenager, young adult, seeing Bill Cosby and Sidney Poitier on the screen just doing their thing. They weren't necessarily cooning, they weren't shucking and jiving.

Chris: 1:29:40

There was nothing for me to watch and be embarrassed of.

Pharoah: 1:29:44

They went out. That's the main ingredient of why. Seeing two raw brothers doing their thing unapologetically, that's the main ingredient for me.

Chris: 1:29:56

My main ingredient for this is almost the same thing. It's like seeing those two with a young James Earl Jones at their height in the film together that reached this amount of success. That was major for me to see as a young black kid and I remember seeing the trilogy all three day movies with my parents and my parents just enjoying the moment and nothing to be embarrassed nothing to be embarrassed about no coonin, what?

Pharoah: 1:30:24

none of that, it was just good entertainment. Yeah, it was just great entertainment?

Chris: 1:30:27

uh, they didn't they. They did their thing in the 70s, when black men in general didn't get that opportunity in hollywood to, you know, because the black exploitation thing was one thing, but these were major movies that they were making together.

Pharoah: 1:30:42

So it was like it was on that way, but more better made.

Chris: 1:30:45

More better, made a little bit more money.

Pharoah: 1:30:48

You know just bigger.

Chris: 1:30:50

Just bigger, which means Hollywood at some point in time had to trust them enough to give them that much freedom to make these type of movies and not put them in that black exploitation category.

Pharoah: 1:31:02

That was the main thing to me is that, no matter what was going on, sidney always carried himself with a certain level of dignity.

Chris: 1:31:09

Sure did.

Pharoah: 1:31:10

And Bill with the educational thing and the Cosby show and everything like that. He was a hero for us. Yes, somebody that comes along. Maybe that's born in, say, the late 90s. He just was a character and now he's this abysmal person. But for somebody born in my era, bill was. That's the reason why there's people to this day that, no matter what they convicting love, no matter what they convicting love, no matter what, this and that they still can't bring themselves to talk down on it.

Pharoah: 1:31:44

Oh, yeah, yeah. Some people feel the same way about Michael Jackson. He was a hero.

Chris: 1:31:48

Art Kelly, some people feel some of these artists have meant so much to the average person that they can't turn their backs on them, no matter what they hear about them. Can't separate the art from the artist yeah, they can't turn their backs on them, no matter what they hear about them. They can't separate the art from the art yeah, they can't separate it.

Pharoah: 1:32:00

If you're a younger person, then some of these people just joke some mockery to you already, so they don't have the same cultural significance. Bill and Sidney meant something, oh big time In the days of.

Chris: 1:32:15

Coonery and you know, because Jimmy Walker called a lot of hell for doing the JJ character because he was basically a clown and for these two guys to be smart dudes sharp they had all the girls they had the baddest chicks for that time they were still funny.

Chris: 1:32:36

That was big for black people to see that representation in the 70s people to see that, to see that representation in the 70s, where it was hard to see that type of representation because most black men back then was playing the crook or the robbers, you know, the thug on the street.

Pharoah: 1:32:48

And these two dudes were suited up almost some modern version of step and fetch it or something.

Chris: 1:32:54

There wasn't no step yeah, it was, it was. It was a little bit different. So, yeah, it was. It was an incredible movie. I love it. I will always love it.

Pharoah: 1:33:03

And we'll watch it again tonight.

Chris: 1:33:04

Yeah, you know you know, but I thank you for coming. Farrell, yes indeed I thank you for reviewing this, this classic movie, with me and having this discussion and breaking it down and adding the tidbits.

Pharoah: 1:33:19

And it's good to talk to a guy that's going to look at it the same way I do. You know what? I'm saying Iron sharp as iron. So it's good to be able to talk to a fellow filmmaker about something.

Chris: 1:33:28

For sure, so tell the people where they can reach you.

Pharoah: 1:33:30

Well, you can reach me across the board Facebook, instagram, twitter all that at Pharaoh Films. I'll keep it simple.

Chris: 1:33:39

Okay, and as always TikTok too. Tiktok. Right, tiktok too. Pharaoh Films and TikTok. Yep, okay, pharaoh Films, you said it Pharaoh Films and TikTok. But as always, I'm Chris Ellis, your host, and this is the Main Ingredient. With Chris Ellis, we'll catch you next time.