Director Malcolm Washington, along with cast members Danielle Deadwyler, John David Washington, Ray Fisher, Corey Hawkins, Michael Potts & Virgil Williams discuss 'The Piano Lesson' at the Variety Studio at TIFF.
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00:00His best friend is, like, my brother.
00:01His name's Dominic.
00:03When Dominic would come over, which was, like,
00:05five nights a week, he'd kick me out the bunk bed.
00:07And I used to sleep in the linen closet.
00:13And Dominic, I would just, I would just, I would just.
00:30Ask her how them pictures got on there.
00:35All right, Piano Lesson family.
00:36Nice to see you all today.
00:39Good to see you.
00:40Nothing happened before the camera started rolling.
00:42Nothing at all.
00:44My first question is to Malcolm Washington.
00:46Sir, directorial debut, very well done.
00:49You should do more of these.
00:51How did it feel to get started with the words of August Wilson
00:54as your foundation and then bring
00:56this amazing story to life?
00:58It's a big undertaking.
01:00But we were standing on such hallowed ground
01:02that I knew if we trusted the words, trusted the story,
01:06and trusted the beautiful actors that we have here,
01:09that we'd be good to go.
01:11And everybody came through.
01:12Awesome.
01:14Virgil Williams made history a few years ago.
01:17First Puerto Rican black man to be nominated for a depth
01:19screenplay for Mudbound.
01:20Well deserved.
01:22Maybe another one incoming soon.
01:25But talk about the hurdles and the fear
01:32of taking on August Wilson and having to change his text
01:36and if his ghost is haunting you now.
01:41Well, first of all, we tried not to change anything.
01:46If it ain't broke, do not fix it.
01:48And there is a whole lot not broken.
01:52Fear and reverence and respect were like flashlights
01:57for both of us while we investigated and unpacked.
02:01And we took the whole thing apart and put it back together
02:05over and over and over again.
02:07So respect, reverence, these things.
02:10And we just talked about this a lot
02:12in sort of removal of ego and self
02:15so that we could avail ourselves to the words, the story.
02:20Because if you listen, the story will talk to you.
02:23And August does not whisper, except in spots.
02:27And you have to find those spots.
02:30So that's what it was.
02:32It was reverence, respect.
02:34Fear was last, but that's always there.
02:38So.
02:40Welcome to the business.
02:43That's like my baseline, so.
02:45Well done.
02:46Danielle Deadweiler?
02:47I know.
02:48Oh, my god.
02:50Yeah, you're going to have to answer that.
02:52You're like, what is this?
02:54I'm like, what is this?
02:55I'm like, what is this?
02:57Yes.
02:59I've been telling a lot of people, when you act,
03:01you make my chest hurt.
03:03Like, it sits in air.
03:06And I can't feel like I can get through a scene
03:08that I'm watching you do.
03:10Yeah, I'm sure you can.
03:12And I said this a few years ago, and I saw you
03:15until that you were someone special to watch.
03:19Can you tell me about taking on Bernice
03:22and the daunting task of having to choose
03:24between two men in the film that,
03:27you know, under normal circumstances,
03:29you probably wouldn't give time a day in real life.
03:31Right.
03:31Excuse me?
03:33What?
03:33So the question was for me.
03:36Everything I do is community-driven.
03:40But it is.
03:40It really, really is.
03:41I just knew I had to over-prepare,
03:45and I was over-prepared by having this man.
03:50All of the conversations that we had beforehand,
03:53I mean, they were so totally raw and intuitively driven.
03:56A lot of that stuff is just purely coming from looking
03:59at you, sitting with you, being with you.
04:01And then, you know, Bernice is there on the page.
04:04August has done all that work.
04:05And I mean, it's stuff that I've witnessed for so long,
04:10like since I was a child.
04:11I've seen just about, or read, or been a part of readings
04:17and seen different productions since I was a teenager,
04:20from New York to Atlanta.
04:21And so it's just like in your bones, in your blood.
04:25And you're finally at a place where
04:27you're able to articulate it through the work.
04:32And making a choice between two men,
04:34it's not really a choice between two men, right?
04:36It's a choice in how you're seeking to live your life,
04:44maximizing like a life force in you, right?
04:48One is actualizing desire that has been halted.
04:51And the other is a kind of mobility,
04:54upward mobility that is being sought
04:56like by black people in that time.
04:58And so, I mean, both of them are, you know, wanted,
05:01but which is really good for you in the moment.
05:04What's happening?
05:06No, it's real stuff going on.
05:07Cool.
05:10But that's what's working at hand.
05:12And, you know, being with them is the fuel for all of that.
05:18John David Washington, sir.
05:20Been following you for quite some time now,
05:22from Black Klansman, now coming here
05:24and taking on a character that is tough, not very likable,
05:29but we also, we need him as a vessel.
05:32So you talk about doing that transition from stage to screen
05:36and how proud of you you are about your little brother
05:40doing a kind of really good job on helming this project.
05:45Well, I'll start there with my brother.
05:47I mean, I'm a fan of the director.
05:49So it was more about,
05:51I was just excited to work with this filmmaker.
05:54I'm glad that he chose us, you know what I mean,
05:56to go on this journey with.
05:59And the transition was interesting because, you know,
06:02the play, the mandate was to amplify August's voice
06:05with the words and the words will be,
06:08will dictate our movements and our decisions.
06:10And the film, it was more lived in,
06:12was more of an experiential thing.
06:15And the fact that we can breathe a little bit,
06:17take the air out, like we can have the moments
06:20because there might be a closeup
06:21or we don't know where the camera,
06:22I mean, I wasn't focusing on where the camera was necessarily,
06:24but it's just more about how real life this is
06:27and how lived in the experiences are.
06:29So that's stuff that we can take with us in our research.
06:34It will be used differently in cinematic form.
06:37So I was very excited.
06:38Your process of taking it from stage to screen.
06:40The process of taking it from stage to screen.
06:43Well, they're similar.
06:44I mean, I remember going to,
06:47I spent my birthday in North Carolina
06:49with my aunties and my cousins and everybody
06:52and visited my grandparents' grave sites,
06:54my uncle's grave sites.
06:55And I was really pulling, asking, begging, pleading
06:57for their spirits to infuse the decisions
07:00I was making as the character.
07:02And I went back before we shot the film as well.
07:07It wasn't as long.
07:08I did about two weeks in Carolina before the play.
07:11And I did about like a week before the film.
07:14And I had a different, I was a different ask,
07:18a different proposition for them
07:19because of the movie and the experience.
07:21But I pulled from the same grounds,
07:23that red dirt rootin' tootin' newton.
07:25Yeah.
07:28Did you guys have bunk beds growing up, by the way?
07:29I just imagined.
07:31So we had bunk beds growing up.
07:33True.
07:34But his best friend is like my brother.
07:37His name's Dominic.
07:39When Dominic would come over,
07:40which was like five nights a week,
07:41he'd kick me out of the bunk bed.
07:43I used to sleep in the linen closet.
07:48And Dominic, I talked to Dominic,
07:51like we talked about this like two weeks ago.
07:52He was like, where was your bedroom?
07:55I never even seen your room.
07:57I was like, Dominic, you took my room.
08:00And they put the little glow in the dark stars
08:02underneath the couch.
08:03Make you feel welcome.
08:04Make you feel like, oh, that's Malcolm's little,
08:07I was just in the linen closet, like, yeah.
08:09Pauletta didn't object to this at all?
08:11She was just like, let it happen.
08:13That's why he created it.
08:14He had his experiences and I had mine.
08:19We remember it differently.
08:24All right, moving to you, Sir Michael Potts.
08:28Sir, sir, it's sir, it's sir.
08:31We genuflect when you enter a room.
08:34Uh, boy, Charles, like, it's a way that opens up the story
08:41that a lot of us don't get to maybe realize
08:44when we read the text or when we see it on stage
08:46and you do such an amazing job.
08:48And we were talking about this in the other room.
08:50You know how to play drunk on screen,
08:51not like a cartoon character,
08:53but like a real, with some gravitas and nuance.
08:57No experience of that at all.
08:58No, no, no, no, at all.
09:00Newly acting.
09:01There was no cognac used.
09:03None, none whatsoever.
09:05Talk about, you know, portraying this man
09:08that, you know, really is the thread to this family
09:12that we're watching maybe heal and dealing with trauma.
09:17Oh, Wine Boy is an extraordinary, complex individual.
09:23He is that eccentric uncle
09:25that some families will recognize.
09:28But he's also, when we see him in this story,
09:31this is a wounded man showing up.
09:32I mean, he's just, he's grieving, basically,
09:37because he's just found out his estranged wife has died
09:40and there's guilt because he didn't know it
09:42until after she was buried.
09:45So he's come up here to, it was always fascinating to me.
09:48He keeps saying, I'm on my way down home,
09:50but he was already in Kansas City.
09:52But he comes up north.
09:53He was closer to home.
09:54He was closer to home in Kansas City,
09:56but he needed to see his brother.
09:58He needed to talk to his brother.
09:59He needed to be with his family
10:01because he's kind of lost his place in the world.
10:03And so it's just, for me,
10:05it was just mining the humanity of this man
10:08and him dealing, using comedy, I guess,
10:11is what they would call it,
10:12to quiet some of the demons, you know,
10:16and drink to put some of them asleep for a little while.
10:21But yeah, the playing drunk is always a tricky thing
10:24because it can become slapstick and caricaturist,
10:29and it's just remembering what you're supposed to do,
10:33what the key to that really is.
10:37Because the drunk doesn't know that he's drunk.
10:42In his mind, he's trying, he's holding it together.
10:46He doesn't see what everybody outside of him is seeing.
10:49So I'm coming in.
10:51I still have this objective
10:52to tell you what happened down there.
10:55He's down there, down there, see for shit.
11:00You know, listen to me.
11:01I'm talking.
11:02I'm telling you something.
11:03Really beautiful drunk sequences that you have,
11:05both after Berta and when you come back in the end.
11:11Yeah, it's the way August has written him.
11:13It's just brilliant.
11:14He becomes progressively inebriated
11:18as the story goes on.
11:19But what you put underneath it
11:21is what makes it so interesting.
11:23Is what makes it so beautiful and so moving,
11:26especially the second one when you come back.
11:27Well, you know, you begin there with August Wilson.
11:30You guys go back to reverence and respect.
11:33I mean, the man is described,
11:35Whining Boy is described as someone who lives life
11:38with an odd mixture of zest and sorrow.
11:41I mean, when you're given that as an actor,
11:43you go like, wow.
11:45But you, though, I think it's tough
11:49to play two contradictory things.
11:53And I think maybe zest and sorrow
11:54might not be completely contradictory,
11:56but they're different sides of a thing.
11:58And for you to carry both of them in all the moments
12:01was like, it was gold watching on the monitors.
12:04It was magic touching in the cutting room.
12:06And then seeing on the finished film,
12:08we were so blessed to have you, Mr. Potts.
12:11That's real talk.
12:12Wow.
12:13I'm embarrassed up in the linen closet.
12:14All right, man.
12:15Move on, man.
12:16Move on to Black Craft.
12:17Awesome.
12:20Ray Fisher.
12:22Listen.
12:26If you'll indulge me for a moment,
12:27I, when I saw the film,
12:32I was very surprised by what you brought.
12:34Because I said, he lives in this very narrow lane
12:38that if you go half a hair to the right,
12:41he's essentially like Bubba Gump.
12:42But if you go half a hair to the left,
12:44he's like underplaying and he's not getting across.
12:47But you ride the line so brilliantly.
12:49And I told Malcolm, I tell you right,
12:51I was like, who'd have thunk Ray Fisher, man?
12:53And he was like, we knew.
12:54We all knew.
12:56And one of my colleagues described to me yesterday,
12:58he said, what a career resurgence, a career saving role.
13:04And you've been through a lot the last few years.
13:06Can you talk about taking on this role?
13:07Because you blew me away in a way I wasn't expecting.
13:10And my wife too, but for different reasons.
13:12Well.
13:13Yeah.
13:14Yeah.
13:15Wow.
13:16Yeah.
13:17That white shirt was.
13:18Well, thank you for the kind words.
13:19I do appreciate it.
13:20I think what really helped this entire process,
13:23I got to give it up to August Wilson,
13:25just like everybody else up here would,
13:27but also our creatives across the board.
13:29You know, Malcolm and I,
13:30we had many hours of conversation
13:32prior to us stepping onto the scene.
13:34And we got to really just dig in,
13:36talk about what everything meant,
13:38find the juxtapositions,
13:40find the things that we could have done differently.
13:42And I think that's what really helped us
13:44dig in, talk about what everything meant,
13:46find the juxtapositions that existed within the piece,
13:49within the character.
13:50And I think there's a little bit of Lyman Jackson
13:53in all of us, right?
13:54There's an innocence about him in this piece
13:56that a lot of folks end up losing as time goes on,
13:59especially when you endure such hardship.
14:01And I think for me,
14:02it was a palate cleanser in a lot of ways,
14:04because I've endured some specific hardships
14:06in my life growing up,
14:07also some career hardships,
14:08and being able to come back into this space and say,
14:11you know what?
14:12I don't want to get hung up on this.
14:15I don't want to feel resentful for anything that's happened.
14:16I want to move on.
14:17And that's what Lyman represents.
14:19And I think it was,
14:20it's one of those things that it came right on time.
14:23It really did.
14:24And being with the people that I was with,
14:26being able to do this piece in the way that we did it
14:28and become a family in that way,
14:30it as much,
14:31it reinvigorated my love in a different way for what we do.
14:36As a follow-up, I mean,
14:37do you see this as like putting the DCO
14:40that's up behind you now,
14:41you're ready to just move forward?
14:43I mean, that's neither here nor there for me at this point.
14:46I'm just focused on working with the people
14:48I like to work with on work that is meaningful.
14:51It can be action.
14:53It can be August Wilson.
14:54It could be anything in between, right?
14:57As long as the work is there and the people are great,
14:59I'm there.
15:00Amazing, thank you.
15:01Corey Hawkins, sir.
15:04Alice Walker, William Shakespeare, August Wilson.
15:07You just wanted to kind of get through all the biggies
15:10for yourself.
15:13I mean, you deliver texts in a way
15:17that not many actors get to do and do well.
15:21Can you talk about what's so different
15:22for you taking on August Wilson
15:24than any other role you've taken on before?
15:32To step into this world
15:36is a great sort of unpacking, I think.
15:39And it's a lot to mine there.
15:42And I think us as actors,
15:44our greatest joy is when something comes across the desk
15:48and you get to jump into it and get messy and explore.
15:54You have the runway to go and to run and spread your wings.
15:59And August Wilson represents the best of that,
16:03I think, for a lot of us coming from the stage,
16:06a lot of us.
16:07But to be able to play with the duality
16:13in the music and the jazz,
16:15and then to have a conductor like Malcolm
16:18sort of take these instruments and put it all together,
16:21because we can all play the music individually, I think.
16:24We all know how to do that,
16:25but it takes a brilliant conductor,
16:27brilliant director to make sure
16:29that we're playing the music
16:30in the way that August would feel and vibe.
16:33And I know he's looking down and saying, well done.
16:36So that is a huge credit and testament to him
16:40and our creators.
16:42But to be able to inhabit this world,
16:44to play Avery Brown, this dude who I mean,
16:49he's walking this fine line.
16:51He's a bit slippery to me, which is fun.
16:54I think we talked about that.
16:56It's just that what are his intentions
16:57and how do you play those things and play that music?
17:03And I gotta say, it was incredible to,
17:08like Danielle said, play,
17:11we're dealing with upward mobility.
17:12We're dealing with people who were escaping something.
17:15When Boy Willie and Lyman are in the room,
17:19when they walk into the room for Avery,
17:21his past is in the room in a heavy way,
17:24but he's fighting for his future with Bernice.
17:27And it's a struggle that he's wrestling with,
17:29but when he puts that collar on it,
17:30just his faith grounds him.
17:34But it's all in the text, man.
17:36It's all in the text.
17:37And that is what we were fortunate enough
17:40to have beautiful writing,
17:41to have August's base to stand on, man.
17:44It's just, I always say it,
17:46it's like running with stallions with this crew.
17:49It was like family.
17:50It was like camp.
17:51Awesome.
17:52Like a full cinema theater camp kind of vibe.
17:55Summer cinema camp.
17:57Repertoire.
17:59Summer cinema camp.
18:0010 times fast.
18:03Oh, sorry.
18:04No, just saying.
18:09To tag onto what Corey was saying,
18:11it is just, I am just so impressed
18:14with what you've done with this movie,
18:18what you've done with the August Wilson text.
18:20It's just brilliant the way he kind of took a different,
18:22it's the same story,
18:25but it's like he turned the lens somewhere else.
18:28It's become this incredibly cinematic thing
18:31without losing any of the essence of the story
18:34or these characters.
18:36And it's, which is so, so difficult to do.
18:39And so I marvel at it.
18:41When I see it, I'm going, wow.
18:43Wow.
18:44Because we're on set and you have no idea.
18:45I have no idea what it's gonna be like at the end.
18:48It's because it's very different
18:49from what you do on stage.
18:51And I was also just so impressed
18:53with your self-possession on set.
18:56You just seem so calm,
18:58like he knew what he wanted to see.
19:01And I would tease him sometimes.
19:02I said, oh my God, have you had this 12 takes?
19:06Are we getting it underneath the piano?
19:08How many different ways do you need to see this?
19:15So I was like, okay.
19:18But then you see the final product,
19:20you go, oh, wow, that's, yeah, you did.
19:25I'm going, that's an eye.
19:27I'm so impressed with that.
19:29The way you've lifted it
19:31and it just amplified the story so much.
19:34I think it's going to be more resonant
19:38with more people because of the way you've both captured it.
19:42Yes, that's exactly what August wanted.
19:44And we'd be remiss if we did not mention
19:45our brother who's not here, Mr. Samuel L. Jackson.
19:47That's my final question.
19:48You gave me a good segue.
19:49Clap it up for him.
19:51He was really cohesive
19:53and sort of the part of the glue,
19:56a really strong piece of the glue
19:58that helped us stick together throughout this piece.
20:00And that's everything, anything you needed to know,
20:02like Sam worked with August Wilson directly, right?
20:04Nobody else up here can say that.
20:07And so he was just a wealth of knowledge
20:09and just fun times in general.
20:12And that gave me a great segue to my final question
20:14because they're not here.
20:15They didn't want to hang out with me either.
20:17But Samuel L. Jackson, Denzel Washington,
20:19producer Denzel Washington, not here.
20:23They have obviously their own contribution
20:24to August Wilson and this work.
20:27But I want to ask you to do a quick roundabout,
20:29favorite Sam Jackson,
20:30favorite Denzel Washington performance.
20:32I'll go to the Washington boys last
20:33because I know this is greater height.
20:36But go ahead, Corey, you first.
20:37Favorite Jackson and favorite Washington role.
20:40I do both?
20:41Yeah.
20:43Oh man, it's so hard.
20:45That's not nice, that's not nice.
20:48I do the whole, go through the whole thing.
20:50Oh, pots.
20:52So controversial.
20:54But what he did in Django was so freaking brave.
21:00And he was so fearless in the doing of it.
21:03It's kind of watching that as an actor.
21:05It's like he went for it and without apology.
21:08And it was just, he really did stick the landing.
21:12So I thought that was just brilliant.
21:13For me, all time favorite Sam Jackson
21:15would be Deep Blue Sea.
21:17And you know why.
21:19I don't know.
21:22To deliver that speech, the way it was delivered,
21:24only to be eaten by a shark two seconds later.
21:27I'd never, that was the first time in my life I'd ever seen it.
21:31You saw it coming.
21:31Oh, I didn't see it coming?
21:33I was like, I might've been like 12 years old
21:36or something when that movie came out.
21:37And I tell you, as a kid watching that movie,
21:40which I probably should've been watching anyway,
21:41it was one of those things I was like,
21:42oh yeah, they're about to get through it.
21:43Oh no.
21:46No, you have that moment, he's like,
21:48oh no, he's over there all by himself.
21:50Yeah.
21:51That's true.
21:51Something about to happen.
21:53For a similar moment like that,
21:55when we did Kong Skull Island and he's talking
21:57and then the gorilla just comes out of nowhere.
22:00Like, he's a man just unafraid and unabashed
22:04and just, you know, he lives fully in all of his characters.
22:07And he's just a wealth of knowledge, man.
22:09But I would say Django as well for Sam.
22:12He nailed it.
22:13What was his character's name in Jungle Fever?
22:16Flipper?
22:18Oh, Gator?
22:19Gator.
22:20Gator, yeah.
22:21Gator sticks with me.
22:22Crackle.
22:24Danielle?
22:25Some of y'all, what, y'all ain't gonna say
22:26Snakes on the Plane?
22:27No, I was about to.
22:28Y'all ain't gonna say Black Snake, Moe?
22:30What's wrong with y'all?
22:32I was gonna say, I was gonna say Jurassic Park
22:34when he said that whole monologue
22:35with a cigarette in his mouth
22:36and it doesn't fall out of your butt.
22:39But being in a theater for Snakes on the Plane
22:41was like, the crowd, when he said,
22:43I'm tired of these motherfucking snakes.
22:46The crowd erupts, erupts, erupts.
22:50Actually, I changed my answer.
22:51It's Negotiator, actually.
22:53I mean, it's a stark difference
22:55between Deep Blue Sea and Negotiator.
22:56But if it was like, you know,
22:57just straight Sam Jackson performance,
22:59Negotiator, I was like, man,
23:00I had never seen anything like that either as a kid.
23:02And to watch him like, just, I mean,
23:05tear through everybody and anything
23:07that was coming through there,
23:08it didn't read to me as an action film in the previews.
23:11But when you get in there, you're like,
23:11it's just action-packed nonstop.
23:13And he's just phenomenal.
23:14And Papa Washington, what do we got?
23:16Oh, I'm Malcolm X all day.
23:18Yeah, there you go.
23:18Yeah, correct.
23:19Me too.
23:20Malcolm X, and also, I mean,
23:22it's classic, but Glory, and it's just such a...
23:26Glory, that became iconic.
23:28The single tear.
23:28Single tear.
23:29The single tear was his icon.
23:30Call that the Denzel.
23:31It's the Denzel, yeah.
23:33But no, when the boxer, no.
23:35Oh, Hurricane.
23:36Hurricane.
23:37Hurricane's good.
23:38Hurricane, he should've, yeah,
23:39got an Oscar for that one.
23:41Since they said all the other ones,
23:42I'll say Ricochet.
23:44I like Ricochet.
23:45I like Ricochet a lot.
23:47All right, we have to give the final word
23:48to the Washington boys.
23:49What's your favorite performance from your dad?
23:51Malcolm X, for sure.
23:52Okay.
23:53Malcolm, I've probably seen Glory the most.
23:56So maybe Glory.
23:58But it was a performance or a line?
23:59Because there's a line that Sam says to...
24:04Damn, it's the courtroom line.
24:08Oh yeah, I hope they die.
24:09I hope they die.
24:10I hope they die.
24:10I hope they die.
24:11Like when I was in training camp
24:13and I'm like going through just anybody,
24:15everybody's the enemy.
24:15They're like, oh, yeah, I hope they die.
24:17I hope they burn it.
24:18I used to just say that all the time, randomly.
24:20Nobody asked me.
24:20You wouldn't know the reference to say that.
24:22It's time to kill.
24:23It's time to kill.
24:24Jackie Brown.
24:25I hope they burn in hell.
24:27I would love to stay at this family dinner all day,
24:29but they're kicking us out.
24:31But congratulations on the movie.
24:33You're all amazing.
24:35Even you, Danielle.
24:36Everyone's great.
24:36Everyone's great.
24:38Congratulations on the success, man.
24:39Everybody's free.
24:40All day.
24:41Thank you so much.