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00:00 [MUSIC PLAYING]
00:02 The film is called The American Society of Magical Negroes.
00:18 It's a response to the magical Negro trope, which
00:21 is a longstanding trope in movie history.
00:24 And it is a satire in response to that,
00:27 and also a love story about trying
00:30 to find someone who sees you in a world that might rather
00:32 see you as a stereotype.
00:34 Yeah, yeah.
00:34 So it's the magical Negro-- Spike Lee coined the term
00:38 in the '90s, identifying this recurring character
00:42 that he'd seen, really a stock character.
00:44 And the way I define it is a black supporting character who
00:47 doesn't have their own internal life.
00:49 They only exist to support the white protagonist
00:52 and their goals.
00:54 Also very knowledgeable.
00:55 Magical Negroes know everything.
00:57 Yeah, and there's a bunch of characteristics of them,
01:00 a lot of folksy wisdom floating in
01:02 to offer plain spoken but subtly wise advice.
01:08 They take a bunch of forms.
01:09 Sometimes it's a black best friend.
01:11 Sometimes it's an old janitor with a magical twinkle
01:15 in his eye kind of vibe.
01:16 So I started working on this film
01:20 really to criticize the trope and to play around with it.
01:23 But then when I began working on it,
01:25 it became a much more personal exploration.
01:28 And what I think the film is ultimately about
01:30 is there's a very particular defense mechanism
01:33 that I was taught as a black person about how
01:35 to survive racism in America.
01:38 And that defense mechanism is to be accommodating
01:41 to white people who have power over me.
01:44 The classic example of this is my dad sitting me down
01:47 and teaching me how to be friendly to the cops
01:49 to keep myself safe.
01:50 And that kind of lesson is-- it's really
01:54 a kind of assimilation lesson.
01:56 It's like fit in, don't rock the boat.
01:58 And the pressure to do that has been, I think,
02:01 quite destructive in my life.
02:02 And this film is about my particular attempt
02:06 to unlearn that.
02:07 You know what I thought about?
02:09 When I was in 10th grade, a Detroit police officer
02:14 came into our classroom and instructed the entire class
02:18 how to behave during a police stop.
02:21 That's wild.
02:22 Really?
02:22 Absolutely.
02:23 He said, now I'm going to walk you guys through this.
02:26 And he said, you're stopped by a policeman.
02:29 He walks over to your car.
02:31 What do you do?
02:31 And we would all say, nothing.
02:33 We don't have to do anything.
02:34 He said, you're absolutely right.
02:36 But I'm going to give you some suggestions
02:38 what you should do.
02:39 That's wild.
02:40 And so I remember one kid, he said,
02:43 if the policeman says roll down your window,
02:45 would you roll it down?
02:46 No, because I don't have to.
02:48 And he said, absolutely right.
02:50 But he's going to break the window.
02:52 And he's going to be angry.
02:53 So he walked us through it.
02:55 He has a gun.
02:57 I'm going to bet none of you kids will have a gun.
03:01 So you have to think about how you behave.
03:03 I don't know what initiated this.
03:09 But that was separate and apart from the talks
03:14 we all went through in our families.
03:17 Well, it was like a police stop.
03:19 And Kobe was the angry white policeman.
03:23 That's my directing style.
03:24 Well, one of the questions I asked
03:27 is, even though I saw this name Kobe, I was like,
03:30 I had to make sure who wrote and who's going to direct this.
03:34 Is a Black person doing this?
03:38 Because if they had said a white person,
03:41 I probably would have passed.
03:42 Because I immediately, I just get anxiety.
03:45 I'm not going to be on this set for however long trying
03:48 to explain to this dude what is right and what's wrong.
03:51 And I can't say what he wants me to say.
03:56 So yeah, Kobe originally had me at the Sundance Labs.
04:00 He asked me to fly out and workshop it with him.
04:03 And it was the first script that I read that accurately
04:06 showcased my own racial experience,
04:10 and really highlighted a lot of the ways
04:13 that I've erected these survival tactics in order
04:19 to cope with my environment, my homogenous white environment.
04:22 So I had such a--
04:25 I have two mics.
04:26 I had such a blast and a catharsis shooting this film,
04:32 because I learned how to take up more space,
04:35 how to be more unapologetic in my identity,
04:42 and in my right to exist on this planet.
04:45 And it's still a journey.
04:46 I still have longstanding conditioning
04:48 about politeness, which is code for being
04:55 put in your place a little bit.
04:58 But I've come a long way because of this film.
05:01 So I thank you for that, Kobe.
05:03 Do you want two mics?
05:04 Can I ask you a question?
05:05 I can't pull it off.
05:06 I can't pull off two mics.
05:07 Justice, have people, white people,
05:09 ever asked you about, well, what are you?
05:15 When I was younger, because I grew up in a--
05:19 I started out in a predominantly Mexican neighborhood.
05:23 And then, so a lot of people thought I was Latino.
05:27 Not a lot of people, actually.
05:28 A lot of people knew I was Black.
05:31 Because even within other ethnic groups, they--
05:37 yeah, like, hmm, this is a very difficult conversation
05:41 to talk about.
05:43 There is a racial hierarchy at play.
05:45 And Black is often on the lowest rung of that racial hierarchy.
05:51 And so even in a Latino neighborhood,
05:53 it was like, for the Black kid.
05:55 But there's also an urgency to categorize, which I find--
05:59 Absolutely.
06:00 --really troublesome.
06:00 And to hold on to what power you have,
06:03 whatever power you might have.
06:05 But you guys do know that it was white Europeans that
06:08 were obsessed with categorizing the Blackness of Americans.
06:13 Because they, in fact, are the ones where you're mulatto,
06:18 you're a quadrone, you're an octorone.
06:20 I mean, they went in minute detail.
06:23 It was a caste system.
06:24 Wait a minute.
06:25 I love talking about race.
06:27 I really do.
06:28 I mean, I've had to equip myself with the language around race
06:32 just to survive in society.
06:33 It's another tactic.
06:35 But these are the conversations I'm having with my friends.
06:37 And I'm so happy to be doing it publicly.
06:39 All this to say, it was such an interesting phenomenon
06:44 to see white actors come into the room
06:47 and perform what their version of quote unquote "racist" is.
06:53 They really-- white people will do mental gymnastics
06:57 to separate themselves from any accountability.
07:00 And so much so that the Ku Klux Klan
07:06 won't even call themselves racist.
07:08 We just want the groups to be separate.
07:11 But it's not race--
07:12 well, then who is?
07:14 If no one is, then who is?
07:17 So the beauty of casting Drew Tarver
07:20 was that he was just playing the honesty of the situation.
07:24 Because he's really a racist.
07:25 Well, that was it.
07:27 He was a devout racist.
07:28 And it came easy to him.
07:29 But no, he just played the honesty of the situation.
07:33 And he was so likable and funny.
07:36 And it was important that white people could identify
07:39 with him in some aspect.
07:40 Even though he is one of the antagonists of the film,
07:43 they had to be able to see themselves in him
07:45 in order to make the change within themselves.
07:49 And Kobe paints that character so beautifully
07:51 throughout the film.
07:52 There's an actor-- there's one actor I'll--
07:54 there's the character of--
07:56 Nam-- Nam-pliss.
07:59 The actor's name is Mia is her first name.
08:01 And she plays--
08:02 Lacey is the character.
08:03 She's the drunk white girl in the film.
08:05 And in looking at a lot of those auditions,
08:08 obviously, there's a bunch of really talented actors
08:10 who did beautiful work.
08:11 But there were so many actors who the choice they made
08:15 was just to really just comment on the character.
08:19 Say, this is the-- and almost say through their performance,
08:22 this is a racist character.
08:23 This is a character that has a problem with--
08:25 Well, it's to separate.
08:26 I contend that those actors who went so far over the top
08:31 is fear of self-incrimination.
08:33 That's exactly right.
08:34 You know what?
08:35 This is so not me that I'm going to do a caricature.
08:38 Because I know nothing about this.
08:40 Because you know I'm not that way.
08:42 And it was for the--
08:43 it was for some day players, too.
08:45 Yeah, these very-- these very--
08:46 they're small roles.
08:48 And the actor we cast I love, because she's just
08:50 having a good night.
08:51 You know what I mean?
08:52 She's not trying to get this black man into a bad situation.
08:55 She's just drunk having a good time, you know?
08:58 It's so funny that when white people see themselves
09:01 in a supporting role to black people,
09:03 they have to put on a caricature.
09:04 But when they're the protagonist of their movie,
09:07 they're just going through the motions.
09:09 And so you had to constantly remind
09:11 these supporting white characters that, no,
09:12 you are in your own movie.
09:14 This guy is the supporting character to your movie.
09:17 And I think it's--
09:19 so much of this movie is about shame.
09:20 It's about, for black people, the shame
09:23 of doing some of these defense mechanisms,
09:25 even if we were coerced into doing them.
09:27 But for white people, I think the shame
09:29 is being labeled a racist, which is a radioactive term.
09:32 And one of the best things white people could do for all of us
09:35 is take the temperature down on that accusation,
09:38 where if white people can own their biases
09:42 and have that kind of accusation and implication
09:44 be more banal, not need to distance themselves
09:46 from it to the same extent, that would do a lot of really
09:49 good things for us.
09:50 My favorite--
09:50 I have biases, too.
09:53 I happen to think I'm an incredible person.
09:55 [LAUGHTER]
09:57 Sue me.
09:57 You know what I mean?
09:59 I don't know.
10:00 But I was born with.
10:02 I was going to say, my favorite form of white allyship
10:06 amongst my white friends is when something will happen,
10:10 something microaggressive will happen, and they'll be like,
10:13 oh, that was racist.
10:13 What I did just then was racist, and I'm sorry.
10:15 And moving on--
10:16 And it's just that quick.
10:17 It can be that easy.
10:18 It can be that easy.
10:19 Don't focus on it.
10:20 Don't wear the guilt of it.
10:21 That doesn't help anybody.
10:23 Just be like, oh, that was racist.
10:24 Name it.
10:25 I did something racist, and I'm sorry.
10:26 And moving on.
10:27 And yeah, I think with that, the comedy
10:29 is how the shame is bearable for everybody,
10:33 for myself about the defense mechanisms,
10:35 and I think for other audiences with the different shame
10:37 that they might be experiencing about it.
10:39 You know what I got, a reaction-- and this is--
10:41 I'm telling you, I didn't expect this after the screening.
10:44 A lot of people, strangers, came up to me one after another
10:47 and said, why didn't my character have more lines?
10:49 And I didn't even know how to react to that.
10:55 And I also had a song that was cut.
10:56 Maybe I'm racist against this guy.
11:00 I sang the theme song.
11:01 Sing the theme song now.
11:02 The American Society.
11:06 You know, that's where it really--
11:11 It's one of--
11:12 Of magical Negroes.
11:14 You know, it was really great.
11:16 It was really great.
11:17 It's one of the last cuts we made.
11:18 It was a really hard cut.
11:19 Yeah, it was.
11:19 I thought it worked.
11:21 That's it.
11:21 There you go.
11:22 There you go.
11:22 Yeah, so a couple of things.
11:24 One, it's just-- part of it is just
11:26 landing in the pocket of the genre,
11:27 where it's like you want to evoke other wizard movies that
11:30 shall not be named, but also part of what--
11:35 That's such a funny thing you just said.
11:37 That's so layered.
11:38 I like that, because we've all heard it.
11:40 Like, was that supposed to be Harry Potter?
11:42 You know, with Stone Taste.
11:43 Harry what?
11:45 I've never heard of that.
11:47 That was such a quick wordplay.
11:49 I can't--
11:50 He's never going to repeat that.
11:52 I know, I know.
11:52 But really good.
11:53 But the other thing about it is part of--
11:56 there's a visual thing that I was
12:00 playing with in the contrast between the society
12:03 and this tech world that we go into.
12:05 And when I think of those mahogany,
12:09 sort of like wood paneled places like Yale and Oxford,
12:12 they're so self-serious.
12:13 They're working really hard architecturally
12:16 and from a design perspective to tell you
12:18 they're important and they're serious and they
12:20 demand to be taken seriously.
12:22 And to me, part of--
12:24 and you contrast that with the tech spaces that
12:25 are light and airy and breezy.
12:27 And do they even have doors?
12:28 You know, it's a joke my production designer
12:30 and I had about them.
12:32 They're almost trying to seem like it's not-- like no
12:35 seriousness of purpose happens in those environments.
12:37 And to me, there's a contrast in privilege there, right?
12:40 Where Black people have to work so hard to be taken seriously
12:44 and be given that credibility and respect.
12:46 And then White people can sort of almost pretend
12:48 that there's no work because they
12:50 get that credibility for free.
12:51 Well, there's a known statistic.
12:54 Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, other billionaires
12:58 increased their wealth during the pandemic by almost 30%.
13:03 Yet the hourly rate has gone up by nothing.
13:11 They seem totally fine with that.
13:14 Of course, I'm not in that category.
13:17 I got to make the bucks, the big bucks.
13:20 [MUSIC PLAYING]
13:23 (upbeat music)
13:25 (upbeat music)