0:00

What's going on everybody? This week on The Real

0:02

Ones, my guest is David Ayer. David Ayer is one

0:04

of the greatest American filmmakers of all time.

0:06

He made movies like End of Watch and

0:09

Harsh Times and Fury. Wrote the movie

0:11

Training Day. Being in the movie Fury was

0:13

one of the greatest joys of my life. A lot of the folks

0:15

that I brought on this show are people that I've met through

0:17

David. In this conversation, David's

0:20

extraordinarily brave, courageous

0:22

and open. I love this man.

0:25

I admire this man. This man's given me so

0:27

much. He's been through a ton and he

0:29

really opens up here. I'm again

0:32

eternally grateful to David for just

0:34

so many reasons. I love you boss.

0:37

Thanks for coming on.

0:59

Bunch of cameras and shit. How does

1:02

that make you feel man with the cameras

1:04

being on you? Confuses me. It

1:06

does? How so? Why? Because I'm

1:08

on the wrong side. Yeah. Yeah. I'm

1:11

behind the fourth wall. You know what I mean? Yeah.

1:14

Yeah. When was the

1:16

last time you did something like that where you were on

1:18

camera?

1:20

Like never, huh? Media. Bullshit

1:23

like this? Press interviews. Yeah. Yeah. It's

1:26

like, you know, you get to repeat the same thing 30 times in

1:29

a row. Speed dating format. Yeah.

1:32

And then you get the one journalist who's like, I'm going to craft the question that if you

1:34

answer honestly will destroy your career. And

1:38

then I'm going to sit back and watch you answer it. Right. Right.

1:42

But then you do media training and

1:44

then it's like, just answer the question you wish they asked. Yeah. And

1:47

they get that far away look in their eye like my way they should be treated

1:49

like, like literally ignore them completely.

1:51

God. Yeah. Yeah.

1:55

It's crazy, man. It's crazy. There's

1:57

no one as far as like this thing that we've been doing.

2:00

You've kind of been at the center so much. There's so

2:02

many points of connection on this show. It's like Kanejo

2:05

and Bo and Shia and Kev

2:07

and Tyler. It's like they're all kind of, you know, you're

2:09

talked about a lot, man. And, you know, for

2:12

me, you know, I got to

2:14

say, you know,

2:16

when I was a kid, there

2:19

was a football coach in DC for

2:21

the number eight boys club,

2:23

police boys and girls club named Buddy Burkett.

2:25

And Buddy Burkett was a fucking savage. He

2:28

was like a fucking savage. There was once this real

2:30

big kid, this big fat kid named Lamont. And

2:32

we used to call him Lamonty. And he

2:34

had behavior problems. And Buddy Burkett like made him

2:37

do pushups and situps till his

2:39

kidneys fucking, he had to go to the hospital.

2:41

And he used to say, if you got in trouble, Buddy Burkett would

2:43

put like one guy, if you

2:46

fucked around, he'd put

2:46

you on one side of the field and put everybody else

2:48

on the field on the other. And he would basically be like,

2:51

go get him, you know? And I remember

2:53

like even into like my high

2:55

school years, even though I didn't

2:57

play for him or like, you know, didn't see him since

2:59

I was like 11. If he was

3:01

coaching on a field, like you

3:03

would not go by that field if Buddy Burkett

3:06

was there. And it would always put

3:08

you back in this place of fear

3:11

and just

3:13

like unbelievable kind

3:15

of respect. And

3:18

in a way, man, like knowing you were coming up today, it

3:21

put me in this place of,

3:24

I was like, fuck man, the boss,

3:26

the boss is coming. And I remember I went

3:29

to go do King Richard with Will Smith.

3:31

And the first thing he fucking said is like, he was like,

3:33

man, you've done David Ayer movie, like you

3:36

fuck with Ayer and like you get that look in his eye. And

3:38

look, man, when I think about

3:42

not just all the points of connection, but

3:45

the experience that I had with you was

3:49

like the defining artistic experience

3:51

of my life. It was like something, it's

3:53

just kind of, everything changed after

3:55

that for me and not some fucking bullshit like, oh, I started

3:58

getting more up. It just everything changed.

3:59

for me how I view this thing and

4:02

when I think about how

4:07

the mental and physical and

4:09

emotional anguish that we

4:12

were put through and when

4:14

I think about how we were beaten

4:16

down and I saw these grown men, fucking movie

4:18

stars crying and begging and reduced down

4:20

to the way

4:23

they were and it was

4:26

such a brutal experience but now

4:28

when I look at it, now

4:30

when I look at the whole thing looking back man, it's

4:32

just like I see how much fucking love

4:35

was there and how much you fucking cared and

4:37

not just being a vet but your dedication to

4:39

like who that story was about

4:41

and how you didn't give one of us a fucking chance

4:43

of not taking that so fucking experience

4:46

and putting us going

4:50

to the bases, being with the guys, getting to

4:53

spend time with those gems of people who

4:55

actually experienced what it was like in World War II. There

4:57

was no choice, there was no days off, there was no bullshit,

4:59

it was like your foot was on our fucking throat

5:02

the whole time but what's crazy

5:04

is it was like the most loved I've ever felt

5:07

by a director. It was the seminal

5:10

kind of experience and so I don't

5:11

do fucking

5:13

introductions man, I'm like what's up

5:15

today but I just wanted

5:17

to say that man and I also wanted to say like

5:20

do you still

5:22

work like, like you just got off a movie, do you still work

5:25

like that? The

5:28

world's changing. Big time. And

5:31

it's harder and I

5:33

think now for me it's like picking my

5:35

lane and picking my battles and picking my

5:37

opportunities you know and

5:40

right now I'm just happy to fucking work. Can

5:42

I cuss? Yeah you can do whatever the fuck you want.

5:44

I told you literally shit on the table dude. Like

5:46

with Fury, I don't

5:49

know I think there's just moments in life where things

5:51

unfold certain ways and that

5:53

unfolded all these things came together and

5:56

things that shouldn't have come together

5:58

came together. Just

6:00

like getting a freaking Working

6:03

tiger tank on set, you know having

6:05

an actual German tiger tank on set

6:08

instead of like Oh, it's a Volkswagen covered

6:10

with you know green screen or something but

6:14

like

6:14

the time I had everybody the way

6:18

Everybody sensed that something bigger was

6:20

happening with that

6:22

project and It

6:25

just it was just kind of blessed it just

6:27

kind of unfolded, you know And I think

6:29

that's always gonna be

6:31

like that an end to watch or gonna be

6:33

like my two Two

6:35

to beat, you know as far as a director

6:38

you think you could could fury be made

6:40

now Yeah,

6:43

but it would be twice as expensive It

6:45

would be a lot more money. I want to do another World War two

6:48

movie. I'm trying to figure out how how do I

6:50

do it? Yeah, I even do it, you know

6:53

But it's it's a weird movie like

6:55

it was a weird movie because I had full control

6:58

It wasn't by committee. It wasn't a bunch

7:00

of people telling me what to do and It

7:04

was it was just vision. It was just like I was

7:06

chasing something with my

7:08

heart, you know And and then you

7:10

guys were like fully willing to

7:13

dive in all the way and the prep

7:15

you guys did was freaking

7:17

Stupid it was ridiculous. I didn't bananas.

7:19

Yeah guys were crewing Doing

7:22

combined arms The field

7:24

exercises with a freaking operating

7:26

tank in infantry Blasting

7:29

off ordinance and blanks and stuff like that

7:31

like operating the machine

7:33

You know you guys kind of got to the point where

7:36

you became it and and

7:38

it's like, how do you how do you even do? How do you become something?

7:42

Is a soldier in war with everything

7:45

that's happening

7:46

And that's why I

7:48

just kept putting you guys through so much because

7:50

I had to be the war I had to be the source of stress

7:53

I had to be you know, you think about

7:55

like what is a human being go through and war

7:57

and cortisol adrenaline, you know

7:59

stress hormones, right? You get

8:02

banged in your, you know, your lizard

8:04

brain, who are you when you're experiencing

8:07

that stress, you know, and you see each

8:09

character in that tank, everybody had a different

8:11

stress reaction, you know, everybody

8:14

reacted a different way. Yeah, yeah. And,

8:16

you know, like your character would

8:18

kind of fall apart and become very

8:20

beta and very dependent. And like, tell me

8:23

what to do, and I'll do it. I don't want to think for myself,

8:25

just tell me what to do. And I'll fucking

8:28

die for you. If you tell me to go die, I'll go do

8:30

that. And I may hurt be hurt and

8:32

confused, but I love you. And I'm going to do that because I trust

8:34

you. And that was like that whole dynamic

8:37

in that in that tank. It was a pressure cooker.

8:39

Are you like, in this

8:41

film that you just did? I mean, are you still

8:44

having guys fight each other and all that shit? I mean,

8:46

this one was a little different because it's like,

8:48

it's like a straight genre movie. So it's

8:50

like, how do I how do I take like a really straightforward

8:53

genre movie and like elevate it. And

8:55

I just I just didn't have the time. You know,

8:57

it was like, like, it's like money

9:00

and time are the big drivers in

9:02

this. And then it's

9:04

it's it's hard because you need access

9:06

to the talent, you need that rehearsal time, you know,

9:08

build that energy. And, you

9:11

know, it's it's tough. I tell

9:13

people now and y'all talk to us like, hey, you think

9:15

like, you know, DeNiro

9:17

was like double book and Scorsese and like researching

9:19

two projects at the same time when they're

9:22

working together, like, that

9:24

sense of

9:25

rip your guts out and eat them kind of

9:27

dedication is is

9:30

absolutely disappearing. So I'm

9:32

finding like,

9:34

because you know me, like I go I go hard, like,

9:36

like I want the roadmap of your soul. I

9:38

want I want to know everything about you. I

9:41

want to know your best moment or your worst moment

9:43

I want to know, because you're the actor,

9:45

right? Your body is your instrument. What

9:48

what what does it contain? What does your body contain?

9:50

What is your memory contain? How are you wired? And

9:53

I know you want to like, you know,

9:56

the Moscow Academy, which is like, traditional

10:00

old-school Find the human

10:02

pain and explore it and

10:04

now we're in a world where nobody wants to be uncomfortable Yeah,

10:07

right and art comes from

10:10

discomfort art comes from uncertainty art

10:12

comes from pain art comes from agony and And

10:15

then just even like culturally now, you

10:17

know Like like who am I to push my

10:19

ideas into the culture at this point? You know,

10:21

do I have a voice do I have value as

10:23

a human being? Do I have value as a creator? What

10:26

stories am I allowed to tell what stories am I

10:28

not allowed to tell? So it's just like the

10:30

world's changed so fast and so

10:33

much

10:34

And it's like if you can bring

10:36

any kind of truth, I'm just chasing human truth,

10:38

right? I'm just chasing human

10:40

truth and they have I call it

10:42

the corporate map of the human soul, right? Yeah, which

10:44

is like Hollywood filmmaking the human

10:47

soul is in this little specific box

10:49

that makes them comfortable that they've defined

10:51

and

10:53

With the shit I've seen in life. That's right Yeah,

10:56

dude, look the hood the street the military

10:58

the this to that the chaos, you know

11:01

I know I have a much better sense of

11:04

What a human being is Than

11:07

some rich kid that went to an Ivy League

11:09

school and it's not my boss at a studio

11:12

that works for a committee Like it

11:14

is what it is. Right, right and and

11:16

you feel like in I mean Is

11:19

there still world in which guys like you

11:21

get to do your thing without that that

11:23

motherfucker coming in and tainting

11:25

it? Yeah, I mean it's like again.

11:28

It's pick your lane pick your battle, you know and

11:31

You know the good healthy career

11:33

diet is like, you know a couple for them one for

11:36

you, you know but

11:38

it's

11:39

my My canvas

11:42

my paints my brushes cost

11:44

a ridiculous amount of money, you know So like

11:46

in Suicide Squad, there's like days where shoot

11:49

they you know

11:51

$6,700,000 a day, right

11:54

or or even a small budget movie. You're

11:56

looking at a burn rate of a couple hundred grand

11:59

a day, right? It's a lot

11:59

of money, like it's millions of dollars. Someone has

12:02

to hand me millions of dollars for me to do my

12:04

work, right? Which means I got to trust

12:06

me. They got to believe in me, but they

12:08

also have to believe in the business plan. You

12:10

know, so it's like

12:12

the business and the money have

12:14

taken everything over.

12:17

And I'm lucky because I have

12:20

a lot of autonomy and control and I'm able to like

12:22

create an ecology where I can hunt freely, but

12:24

that's disappearing, man.

12:27

Yeah. Like, like everything is just

12:30

being reduced to fucking nothing. What

12:34

do you think? Like, I mean, is it the pain, man?

12:36

Like I just see this like super strong

12:38

connection. Like with you, I just, I

12:41

remember just responding to you like fucking

12:43

immediately. Like my, my, my first audition

12:46

for you, like I was like, man, I'll do. And

12:49

it wasn't just cause like I love and to watch

12:51

that. It's just like the way, the way that you were and

12:53

the way you just size up

12:54

the room and the way you handle yourself. Like you,

12:57

you know, what do you think that is? I mean, is that something

12:59

you've always been able to do to get people to kind of like

13:01

follow you? Cause again, it's not normal

13:04

to see guys like, you know, like fucking

13:06

Will Smith or Brad or shit like that to be

13:08

like, Hey dude, like I'll go to this fucking

13:11

boot can, like I won't sleep for fucking three

13:13

weeks. I'll shit in the ammo can. Like I'll, I'll, I'll

13:15

have guys that call me maggot and fucking, but you know

13:17

what I mean? It's like one thing I'm like, do whatever I don't give

13:20

a fuck, but like those guys to, to, to,

13:22

to follow that holy and to

13:24

make a movie

13:24

as if it's, you had us all convinced

13:27

make this movie like it's the last one you'll ever make. And

13:30

if you think about like what that movie is about, who that movie's

13:32

for, it's fucking worth it. Like it w like

13:34

we really were like, dude, we'll,

13:36

we'll, we'll give you whatever. Have you

13:38

always had that through life? Wait,

13:43

are you gaming on a

13:45

Chromebook? Yeah. It's got a

13:47

high res 120 Hertz display. Plus

13:49

this killer RGB keyboard. And I can

13:51

access thousands of games anytime, anywhere.

13:54

Stop playing. What? Get out

13:56

of here. Huh? Yeah. I want you

13:58

to stop playing and get out of here. so I can game

14:00

on that Chromebook. Got it. Discover

14:05

the ultimate cloud gaming machine, a

14:08

new kind of Chromebook.

14:10

At Kroger, everyone wins when

14:12

it comes to saving big. Because

14:15

when you order online through the Kroger app, you

14:17

get the same great prices, deals

14:19

and rewards on pickup or delivery

14:22

that you do in store with no hidden

14:24

fees or markups. Best of all, you'll

14:26

know when items in your cart have a coupon, so

14:29

you never miss a deal. So whether you're a

14:31

delivery lover, picker upper, or

14:33

you shop in store, no matter how you

14:35

shop, you'll always save big at

14:37

Kroger. Kroger, fresh for everyone.

14:42

Man, that's a crazy question. That's a hard

14:44

question. I mean, I've

14:46

always been an outsider, big time.

14:49

And I've

14:50

always found myself in like really

14:52

fucked up extreme circumstances

14:54

where I had no choice but to figure out how to survive

14:57

from zero, from zero,

14:59

from day zero. I never had family

15:02

and safety and love and all that shit that people

15:04

talk about. That's not my experience. And

15:07

so

15:08

I had to get

15:10

really, really, really good at reading energy and

15:12

reading the room and reading people and

15:15

being super strategic about, oh, that person

15:17

can be an ally. That person is gonna be an enemy.

15:19

I gotta watch out for them. What

15:22

do I have to do to eat tonight? What do I have to say

15:24

to eat tonight?

15:26

So I became

15:29

hypervigilant in the human behavior

15:31

space.

15:33

I'm also fascinated by

15:36

people. And

15:37

it's like a love-hate thing. I love the human

15:40

spirit. I love what we're capable of. And

15:42

what we've achieved is humanity.

15:44

But I hate a lot of the stupid shit we do

15:46

to each other. And I don't know, I mean, I

15:48

started writing and then it's

15:51

like you create something, then you hand it over

15:54

to these parents that raise it up and it's like

15:56

they're abusive parents and they fuck your kid up. And that's

15:58

not what I wanted. So.

15:59

I wanted to direct and I don't

16:02

know, man. It's like, I

16:05

just know how people are wired. And for me,

16:07

it's like respect. Like I don't

16:10

disrespect people. Like I won't disrespect

16:12

you as an actor and human being. I'll fucking hurt

16:15

you. I'll make you hurt yourself.

16:17

I'll make you find pain. I'll make you find love.

16:20

I'll make you find things that you didn't know and you

16:22

had inside of yourself, but I'll never disrespect

16:25

the contents of your soul.

16:27

You know? I think that's like one of the

16:29

reasons I survived so well.

16:31

Where I have in all these fucked up environments is

16:33

because I never judged your dis... I don't judge

16:35

people. I don't disrespect people. And

16:38

every human being is a universe. Every human

16:40

being has a world inside of them and a

16:42

story and value and truth. And

16:45

if you can find that

16:46

and I can connect with that and help you connect

16:49

with that and then create an environment

16:51

where it's safe for you to pull these

16:53

things out of yourself and show people, like

16:56

that's art. That's what it is right there. And

16:58

this unbelievable exploration that you get people...

17:00

Like I've been on that fucking journey with you. You

17:04

feel like you've done that with yourself. You feel like you... I

17:07

have lately.

17:09

Like my life has been... It's

17:13

crazy. My

17:18

life is a shit show. Like it's a fucking tornado.

17:20

And I just call it the vortex. And

17:23

it's like my dad killed himself when I

17:25

was like four years old. Christmas

17:28

day in the fucking house. Merry

17:30

Christmas. Like, and then

17:32

shit got nuts after that. And

17:36

so like this life

17:38

I have, I was fucking passed around.

17:40

I think I lived like 12 different places before I was 12

17:42

years old. Like, and

17:45

fucking abuse and

17:47

horrific shit and neglect. Like

17:50

you name it, over the top shit, right? And

17:54

then I've... Oh, I can write. I have

17:56

this way I can express myself. And

18:02

then Hollywood happened and I

18:04

liked this super traditional marriage

18:07

and kids for a long time. And

18:09

that was how I identified myself. And then suddenly like, oh,

18:11

I'm an A-list director.

18:14

And I started to identify with that. And

18:16

then like COVID hit, everything hit, culture

18:19

stuff hit, Hollywood kind

18:21

of shut down. The culture was reassessing

18:25

people's positions and everything.

18:27

And

18:29

all the noise was taken away. And then I was

18:31

alone. And then the marriage ended. And

18:33

so like everything I identified myself with

18:36

disappeared. So now I'm just like,

18:38

who am I? And honestly

18:40

now it's like, I ain't shit. And it's like,

18:43

I don't

18:44

like getting compliments. I don't like people

18:46

being so effusive about my work and

18:48

stuff like that because I don't identify

18:50

myself with that now. I

18:53

did before and I kind of needed that and

18:55

that ego armor. And now

18:57

it's just like, I just want to pay my fucking

18:59

bills, man. Would you describe

19:01

that feeling as freeing? Is it scary? Like

19:03

how would you describe that feeling of like letting

19:05

go of all that shit?

19:07

Terrifying and then freeing

19:09

and then terrifying. But

19:13

then the question is, who am I? Like

19:16

what am I? What am I? It's

19:18

like really the biggest question, you know? And

19:21

what kind of human being am I? So

19:27

like I know I'm a storyteller. I know I can

19:29

change lives. Like a

19:32

good friend of mine, Sean, who was like in dev

19:34

group was like down range

19:37

and got lit up

19:39

really bad. And they shot like six or seven times,

19:41

right? Fucking thrashed. He was basically

19:43

done and

19:45

depressed, lost his best

19:47

friend in the same incident and

19:49

you told

19:51

me about how during rehabs

19:53

and wheelchair they took him to see Fury.

19:56

And he's sitting there in the wheelchair in

19:58

in Fury. thing happened when

20:00

he was watching that, that,

20:03

that was the moment he defined as the beginning

20:06

of his road to recovery. And

20:08

now the dude's like, you know, he got back into the

20:10

one, you know, back active duty down

20:12

range, all that stuff.

20:15

Throw up plates, lift weights, all that, but

20:17

like, some human decision,

20:20

something inside of him decided to come back

20:22

from the dark place that he was in. And he

20:24

fully attributes that to that collaborative

20:27

creation that is fury. And I

20:29

hear stuff like that.

20:31

And it's, it's like humbling, like what,

20:35

you know, and that's what I'm learning to respect and what

20:37

I have to respect is there is something larger that can

20:39

move through me. But because

20:42

your instinct is to push that shit away or to

20:44

like not feel I mean, I think we're alike that way.

20:47

I don't want to hear it, you know, you know,

20:49

doesn't mean I'm like, I suck. I you know, I

20:52

remember after one take on fury coming

20:54

back to you and being like, I'm quitting, dude, I'm like leaving

20:56

this whole foot, you're like, don't quit. That's all you said.

20:58

You just said, don't quit. And that was like, you know,

21:01

I was like, alright, you know, because

21:03

I just fucking hate myself so much when

21:06

I'm working.

21:08

You know, obviously, you

21:10

know, like part of the process, you

21:12

know, especially in that movie was like, you know, talking

21:15

about what happened with your dad

21:17

and all and kind of going

21:19

forward. And then, you know, our own relationship to,

21:21

you

21:22

know, Brad's character and all that, but it's just like,

21:24

you know, I know you hate the fucking compliments,

21:27

man. But that, you know, that script is just like the

21:29

fucking greatest thing ever written, dude, and everybody

21:31

who read it said that and it just you

21:35

know, man, like, can you can you just talk a

21:37

little bit about your family and

21:39

your upbringing and and and

21:41

and I know, you know, and if you can't, you

21:43

can't but like, you know, I know you spent some

21:46

time and it's sort of near where I grew

21:48

up and and and

21:50

I'm just really curious about how you like found your

21:52

way to California, which had such an imprint

21:54

on you. It's nuts. Um,

21:57

I mean, my family's from California originally,

21:59

like my mom.

21:59

someone to UCLA and all that stuff.

22:03

But like it my life makes no fucking sense.

22:05

So like, I guess, you know, my dad was like a geologist,

22:08

and my mom was like an academic studying

22:10

psychology. And,

22:13

you

22:15

know, he, he passed. Interesting

22:18

thing, like he lost his reputation,

22:20

his career, his woman,

22:22

like his life was systematically destroyed,

22:24

to the point where he just

22:27

couldn't take it. He was like a rock star in

22:29

the geological field, and then got

22:31

convinced to take over a project outside

22:33

of his like expertise. And then a bunch

22:37

of corrupt ass shit was going on. Really? Like

22:39

this is Mexico, you know, and I'm like, like

22:41

my family lived in Mexico in the beginning.

22:43

And

22:45

like, it's just makes no sense.

22:47

They ended up like fleeing the country with the clothes on

22:49

their back, you know, this

22:51

is all this fraud and shit happening. Like, it's

22:53

like deep stuff. You know, I've seen these patterns

22:55

in my life, these echoes watching

22:58

like institutional failures and how

23:00

they destroy people and destroy families and all

23:02

that like, well,

23:04

yeah, I ended up in foster care.

23:08

You know, that's fucked up.

23:10

And then, you know, like

23:12

my mom is a deep cat, smartest person

23:15

I know. Yeah. But just like,

23:17

you know, been married a bunch of times, like not

23:20

a mother in the classic sense of the word, like

23:22

not like fucking hug you. But like,

23:25

here's some soul poison that may fuel you as an adult.

23:27

You know, thanks, mom. I don't

23:32

explain it. When you went

23:35

down with your dad, though, I mean, like to do

23:37

it,

23:37

kind of how he did it, or when he did it, forgive

23:40

me, but there's some sort of like showmanship, there's some sort

23:42

of like, you made a point there and

23:45

whatever that was, no, it's he wrote

23:47

like a 12 page suicide note, made copies

23:50

and hit them all over the fucking house, including

23:52

tape, tape, tape one under

23:54

the toilet tank, right?

23:57

I never saw the note. I never saw what

23:59

he got to said. which is really frustrating,

24:01

you know, and everyone I've later

24:04

in life, I reached out and met people that know him. Everyone

24:06

loved this guy, like, love this guy,

24:09

you know, and but he just got

24:12

destroyed by

24:13

a system and by a woman.

24:16

And I took like a lot of

24:19

lessons from that of like, I'm

24:21

going to understand how fucking power works. I

24:23

understand how the system works. I understand how people

24:25

work. They really put me in the defensive

24:28

in a big way. But did that start

24:30

early on? I mean, you had to like

24:32

I was a foster care man. I'm like, like, I was I was always

24:36

like the spare body in the corner,

24:38

you know, that like somebody legally

24:40

has to feed, I guess, because if I die, they'll

24:42

get in trouble. But that was kind of like my childhood.

24:45

Do you remember your first feelings like having to leave home

24:47

and like going into somebody else's? Do you remember? Oh,

24:49

yeah, I remember all of it. How did they feel

24:52

like? Very conscious. I don't

24:54

know how to explain it, but I was always like stoic as

24:56

fuck.

24:57

It was almost like like I was born

24:59

and it's like, like, this shit is going

25:01

to be a motherfucker and

25:04

it's going to get bad and worse. And somehow I had

25:06

that knowledge as a kid, you know. And

25:08

I knew that like my lot in life wasn't going to be

25:10

like other people. I wasn't going to get like

25:12

the love in the family and all this other shit,

25:14

which I try to create later in life. But

25:17

yeah, I would just like my mom was

25:19

a piece of work. She was like an entrepreneur. She

25:21

was like, like

25:23

really progressive for the times. Also

25:27

like super connected like she knew like her

25:29

her dad was like a colonel and

25:32

military, I come from a military family. And so

25:35

she always knew how to manipulate the government side

25:37

and get in that world and, you

25:39

know, show me a bit of that.

25:41

She's wild.

25:43

I guess she's like in Vegas. She

25:45

used to work at the casino like as a shell,

25:47

like a beautiful woman. Beautiful fucking woman.

25:50

Like like I've just heard absolutely insane

25:52

shit about her, but not a mother

25:55

by any means. And did you guys stay

25:57

kind of connected through jumping around from house

25:59

to house?

25:59

would you go back with her for? I ended

26:02

up back with her and she

26:04

got remarried and

26:08

I was gonna say the guy was like super fucking abusive.

26:11

I'm just gonna say it, the first time, I had an older

26:13

sister who was like nine, he kind of took care of me until

26:16

she punched out and arranged living

26:18

arrangements for herself, right?

26:21

First time we met her, she was 14

26:23

and knocked her out, just fucking knocked

26:25

her out. Like boom,

26:28

out of sight. No, no, it's

26:31

just like, like that's

26:35

how people were treated as I was growing

26:37

up. And so it's like, you're

26:39

not safe. Yeah, these adults that

26:41

are fucking psychotic and violent, right?

26:44

So I've always been around violence, I've always

26:46

seen it. But

26:50

like with my mom, we ended up,

26:52

like we moved all over the place,

26:54

Florida, Maryland, fucking Minnesota.

26:57

But yeah, I ended up in Maryland on the East Coast and

27:00

I really started getting in trouble because

27:03

I was like running the streets and going into DC and

27:06

going to like Shady Grove and underground parties

27:09

and just like, I was a wild

27:11

kid, I was like young as shit too, like 13, 14. Yeah.

27:14

And then I caught a case and

27:17

my mom was broke, like we never had money, right?

27:20

So that's the other, like I never had money growing up.

27:22

So like she couldn't feed me.

27:25

I was doing scams to eat, right? Little

27:28

crimes and shit like that. And

27:30

finally it

27:32

was like I had to get out of there.

27:36

There's some real negative shit going on that she was trying

27:38

to push me towards, like dark. What

27:42

the fuck? And somehow

27:44

I have like this survival mechanism

27:47

where I always know when to get out, when to go, when

27:49

to bail. And so I got out,

27:52

came to LA because my cousins live

27:54

there. I was at a California

27:56

family, so came back and.

28:00

That was like from minor league

28:02

criminality to like graduate

28:04

level. Because I mean, where'd you wind up?

28:06

Like where? Fucking West Adams, South

28:08

Central. And this is the 80s. So

28:12

it's like,

28:13

you know, you come in speaking Spanish like

28:15

you know, not really. No.

28:18

I've always been really good with fucking language and shit

28:20

like that. But I

28:22

come into South Central. I'm

28:24

like the only white boy I met. Only

28:27

white boy in my hood. And this

28:29

is like. I

28:34

mean, that's I guess where I really became who I

28:36

am, you know, like

28:38

so. The

28:43

basic survival pattern sort

28:45

of congealed into like

28:48

a sense of identity. You know, that's the thing.

28:50

Like, I don't know who the fuck I am. Like,

28:52

like I don't know who I am anymore, you know. And

28:55

I think about these things that I experienced

28:57

as a kid or what I went through.

28:59

And it's like it's like unreal, right?

29:03

But it's also normal because it's what I lived. And

29:05

then I talked to people about it and start

29:07

comparing notes. Or you talk to like civilians,

29:09

right? Like normal people. And they're just like,

29:12

oh, shit. You

29:14

know, like

29:17

it's like a dream. It doesn't make sense.

29:20

But like this this like fucking fluency

29:23

in like violence.

29:24

And pain and like understanding and also

29:26

understanding you were one of the people who really

29:29

taught me that there's also like a real beauty. There's

29:31

a fucking honesty in it. And violence is just

29:33

like and and somebody who,

29:35

you know, dealt with shit on my own in my own life,

29:37

like how to kind of like take that and channel

29:40

and then put it into what we do

29:42

is like kind of everything. And that's

29:44

really changed my life in a big fucking

29:46

way. The way that you for

29:49

me, it was always like running away from it. Like, don't let people really

29:52

know. And you were like, no, dude, like dive in. Digging

29:54

in that

29:54

fucking moon. Like go in there and hold it. You

29:57

didn't give like if you were down to take the

29:59

ride with you like. You fucking dude. And

30:02

you have so much love for Los

30:05

Angeles and you have like, I remember one

30:07

time, I mean, you just say these things that just stuck with me

30:09

so much, but I remember one time, I think we were on like some fucking

30:11

press tour, some bullshit, and

30:13

you were just like,

30:15

I mean, we were in like some hotel, you know, we were like in

30:17

some hotel that, I mean, it's just like you get tea

30:19

in a fucking cup that like, you know, it was

30:21

like a fucking car and it's like, you know, butler's

30:24

wiping your ass and shit. And you were like, yeah,

30:26

I was like, so what are you gonna do next? And you were just like,

30:28

I'm gonna get back to the streets, man, figure out the fuck is

30:31

going on. And I was like, that's exactly right,

30:33

man, like it. So like, what did

30:35

you find in LA that you really

30:37

responded to be beyond like the chaos? Like

30:39

what kind of love did you, because I know you made like lifelong

30:42

relationships there and you found like a family

30:44

in the streets.

30:45

It was family. It was like, all

30:50

this shit that made me weird or

30:54

would make people uncomfortable about me

30:58

in regular life became like a superpower

31:00

in the street, right? How so?

31:03

Being able to hang, being able to like,

31:06

like the streets are fucking meritocracy,

31:09

right? I don't care who you say you are. That's

31:11

right. They're gonna break you down and show you who you

31:13

are real fast, right? And

31:17

you know, I'm hanging out with these people. It's

31:19

funny, like I'm 15 years old and

31:22

I'm in this club called the Press Club,

31:24

which doesn't exist anymore because they put

31:26

the

31:27

convention center, the tour down

31:29

and put the convention center there, like on Pico. And

31:32

so like Pico,

31:34

like Pico and Olympic was like crazy

31:36

back in the day. It was like 18th street controlled it

31:38

and they ran prostitution out of there and you go by the hotels

31:40

and you see all the homies and the highness and everything. And

31:42

it was just crazy. And so we'd

31:45

go over there and drink, go to this place.

31:47

I'm 15 years old. I'm sitting in a strip club drinking

31:50

beer

31:52

with the homies. And it never occurred

31:54

to me like, why am I being served

31:56

at 15 in a fucking strip club? You

31:59

know, or I'd go to a...

31:59

neighborhood restaurant

32:01

and the owners are bending over

32:04

backwards to give you a fucking drink. And

32:07

I never put it together

32:09

of what's really happening here.

32:13

You start to

32:15

go through these situations, and it's like, oh, it's

32:17

the LAPD. Here comes a fucking cop that jammed

32:19

us. What

32:21

happens if you fucking press the cops?

32:25

So in a normal civilian world, you

32:27

don't do that, or things don't

32:30

happen. But on the streets, it's

32:32

like, all

32:33

right, two cops, six

32:35

of us, every one of these motherfuckers

32:37

will fight. Some dudes may have

32:39

things that are worth fighting for,

32:42

that they don't want the cops to have.

32:44

How does this unfold now? What's

32:47

the fucking psychology here? And

32:49

then you see that moment where you see

32:51

the fear in the cop's eyes, and it's like, oh,

32:54

we got this shit. Got him. Yeah. Yeah, style

32:56

of course. Fuck yeah. And

32:59

you start to

33:01

savor these encounters. And

33:04

I was like, crazy Dave, Crave.

33:12

I was like, my name, Crave. So I was fucking

33:14

crazy. And there's

33:16

always like a crazy guy, and I guess that was me. You always

33:18

had that reputation. And plus,

33:21

I was just in a stupid shit. Like, there's

33:24

a

33:28

lot going on. A lot of weapons,

33:31

a lot of death, a lot of power.

33:36

And I saw the transition

33:39

from like

33:40

crack, when freebasing,

33:42

like people would freebase. And

33:45

it's like, yeah, the alcohol on the fucking clip

33:47

and the cotton swab, and that's how people were doing it

33:49

for a minute. And then I remember when

33:52

crack hit, it was like, oh shit, microwave

33:55

baking, so fucking rock it up.

33:58

Overnight, it changed everything. And one

34:01

of the first crack houses in LA was like on my block,

34:04

like on my fucking block, right?

34:07

And that's like,

34:09

they would come through, it was like, my neighborhood

34:12

was like rolling 20s bloods. And

34:14

so like, they had the freeway connection and all that

34:16

shit. So there's like kilos coming into my fucking

34:18

neighborhood. And the key was like 14K. And

34:21

everyone was just trying to get 14 grand together because you could

34:23

flip it for 60. Straight up. Fucking.

34:26

It was like,

34:27

and the neighborhood started out like, we would play football

34:29

with a lot of other neighborhoods. And

34:32

so we came up with like, like, like

34:34

Marasaba Trusche. I used to hang out

34:36

with MS. But they were like stoners

34:38

back in the day. They had like fucking long

34:40

hair and would wear like ACDC shirts

34:43

and jeans and shucks. Like it was such

34:45

a different vibe. But because I was close

34:47

to MacArthur Park where they all started and I was like

34:49

a house painter, right? So I was always working with

34:51

them and working with people and in this world.

34:54

And then the violence hit

34:56

and it just went like cartoon level violence

34:59

overnight.

35:00

And the streets flipped from like,

35:02

it was like the old heads and you know, like

35:05

guys that played football in high school and just like

35:07

shit like that. So suddenly like the killers

35:10

ran it. Right. So my neighborhood,

35:12

some kid was like fucking 15 or something. And

35:15

suddenly he was the guy because he

35:17

was just killing

35:18

everyone. He's down for it. Killing fucking

35:20

everybody. And

35:22

that's that violence piece and that language of violence.

35:25

So it's like, OK,

35:26

so if you can just fucking kill people and you don't

35:28

have that conscious thing going on or you're

35:30

going to run the fucking deck, you know, what's that

35:33

look like? For you at that point, you

35:36

had been around, you'd seen all kinds of violence.

35:38

You've seen probably one of the most violent acts you could with

35:41

your pops. You've seen that. But what

35:43

about your own sort of like bursting through the

35:45

bubble of perpetrating it yourself and

35:47

getting your hands dirty? I mean, what was

35:49

your relationship with that? And was

35:51

that hard for you? Because we talk

35:53

about a lot on here, just like how a lot of that starts. I

35:56

know for me, it

35:56

started a lot in like fear and shame, like God

35:58

punks you or you get your you get jumped or something

36:01

and then you like, you sit there and like at night you're

36:03

like, fuck I should have done this or fuck I should have done that

36:05

and then you do it, but then you start breaking

36:07

through that membrane and you start perpetrating it yourself

36:09

and then you kind of become the monster a little bit and you become

36:12

that guy. Did you have a similar journey?

36:16

Do you remember like one of your first sort of

36:18

like real encounters

36:20

with violence that you had to perpetrate? Yeah,

36:23

it was a hash.

36:26

It was a hash. When I was 17, this

36:28

dude got shot across the street from

36:31

me at my house and like, I

36:33

don't know, I was feeling like a good Samaritan

36:35

or something and I like fucking gave him CPR,

36:37

you know, the dude like died, I was like 17. The

36:40

dude fucking threw up all over me and was throwing

36:42

up blood clots and shit and I

36:44

like watched this guy die and I was just like,

36:46

okay. Did you know him? No,

36:49

no, he was from East LA. Like our issue

36:51

was like South Central and East LA were like fucking,

36:54

like, and this was a different world than

36:57

I was like, where are you from? I'm only from nowhere, fucking boom. My

37:02

data girl is in East LA too.

37:03

Taking the bus there. Like

37:05

fucking, I dated this black girl in South

37:08

Central like Compton and I was taking

37:10

like the Vermont line at fucking midnight to

37:12

go hang out with her and stuff. I didn't give a fuck. Like

37:14

I went everywhere.

37:17

Yeah, it's

37:19

hard like, because it doesn't make

37:21

a lot of sense to me and I see things

37:23

and I've like, like for me it's just memories, right? So

37:26

like

37:27

walking to Vermont to go to work and

37:30

like there's this bar in my neighborhood, Mr. X's bar,

37:32

which is like where all the homies would hang out and in

37:35

front of Mr. X's is like fucking

37:37

blood just all over the sidewalk

37:39

and blood clots and shit and just like nasty

37:41

yellow fucking clots and I'm

37:44

like,

37:45

I gotta go to work and I'm just stepping over the blood

37:47

like nothing, you know? And that was like normal.

37:49

That was like a normal thing. Like gun fire,

37:52

holy fuck. Every night there's gunshots,

37:54

but not like fucking, oh, someone shot a gun,

37:57

but like, bam, bam, bam, bam, bam, boom, boom,

37:59

boom, fight. like gun fighting

38:02

every night was normal. Like

38:04

it's crazy what becomes normal. That's crazy.

38:06

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And

38:08

at that point, like when did you meet Richard?

38:10

Like when was it all in that period?

38:13

No, it was a little bit after. Like

38:15

high school world was a shit show. I dropped out.

38:19

I was on LA County Probation all through high school.

38:21

So like I had to take the bus down to Crenshaw

38:24

and Exposition. And I had like

38:26

the gang lady PO. So she was like

38:28

a little harsh on me. I don't know why I had the gang lady

38:30

PO because I was very innocent and didn't do

38:32

shit. And it was like, like

38:38

only white boy on the fucking bus RTD

38:40

back then. She was like 50 cents or something,

38:42

you know? And it was just like,

38:46

to be able to fit into that environment

38:48

and be comfortable and navigate it

38:51

and not get pressed. Like,

38:54

yeah, just to learn that energy. Can

38:56

you describe it a little bit? I

39:00

mean, I really feel like I understand

39:02

what you're saying and being

39:05

in those situations. It

39:07

never really ends, right? Like it's not like it's like from

39:10

place to place. It's not like you can be like, oh, I don't need

39:12

to deal with this anymore. It's like, it's a

39:14

constant navigation. Like

39:17

it's like an energy thing. Either

39:19

you belong or you don't. Either you're comfortable

39:22

or you're not. And like growing up,

39:25

it was always like people of color adopted me. Like

39:28

black families, back to same families took me in, fed

39:30

me, took care of me. So

39:32

it was very comfortable in those spaces.

39:35

Probably not as comfortable with white folks. No, which

39:37

is crazy. Like I remember bootcamp,

39:41

I was looking around, I'm like, look at

39:43

all these fucking white people. What the hell is happening?

39:46

Who are you? Well, what spaces are you comfortable

39:48

being in?

39:50

And then like I just really have always

39:52

connected with

39:55

like heavy people. Like

39:57

fucking killers. Like people

39:59

have been through it. Why the

40:01

military? How did that come about? My

40:05

grandfather, a retired officer, other grandfather,

40:07

a retired officer, one was Army,

40:10

one was Navy submarines. I've always

40:12

been drawn to that world

40:15

through family stuff, but growing

40:19

up in high school, I'm like maybe

40:22

I graduate, maybe I don't, I didn't, but

40:25

I'll join the military and I'll get fucking killed and I'll

40:28

die young and problem solved, right? I never

40:31

thought I would live. I never thought I'd

40:33

live really past 18. So, you

40:35

know, like that was kind of my mindset.

40:40

And then, yeah, I got in it and

40:42

I did really well and then I kind of got my heart

40:44

broken. How so?

40:47

I was too idealistic. I was

40:49

looking for the perfect home and I found

40:51

it for a second. And

40:54

it was like very different world, Cold

40:56

War world, very intense,

40:58

you know, I was on a nuclear submarine,

41:01

different culture back then,

41:03

you know, and like

41:07

there's a lot I won't say, but

41:10

it was fucked up. Like

41:13

it put me in some dilemmas, you know, and,

41:18

you know, I thought I was going to do it my whole life and I ended

41:20

up getting out. Like how did you go? I mean,

41:22

we talked a lot obviously making

41:24

a movie about like going through fucking war

41:26

in a tin box and like the similarities

41:29

to submarine, like why that, like why

41:31

do you think you were drawn for that? How, what's

41:34

the process like to become, to

41:36

go towards a submarine? Like what's that training like?

41:39

Like what can you tell us about that? I

41:41

mean, it's intense.

41:44

Well,

41:47

it's a weird job because you're locked in a tube and

41:49

everything can kill you and it's a nuclear reactor

41:52

and, you know,

41:54

tons of explosives and, you

41:56

know, like a hydraulic

41:58

header, 3000 PS. say hydraulic header

42:01

if it blows a leak it'll and you walk past

42:03

it if it blows a leak it'll instantly

42:06

fill the submarine with a high explosive

42:08

gas mixture

42:09

right like and then the submarine

42:12

can explode from a spark like like everything

42:14

can kill you every you're always on alert you're

42:16

always in danger I

42:19

just like that I like that was

42:21

that common among guys who

42:23

flock towards that yeah it's a volunteer

42:25

you got a double volunteer like in sub school

42:27

they put you in a steel tube light

42:30

a fire put you in firefighter gear and turnouts

42:32

and everything and it's like

42:34

smoke you can't see shit and so if

42:37

you can't handle that then you probably

42:39

don't want to be in a submarine so they do things to kind of make

42:41

sure you know but like what do

42:43

you remember the first time it like what was the first thing like yeah

42:45

I want to be in a fucking tube underwater like what like

42:49

was it just like that's dangerous as fuck I want to go there

42:51

was it like just drawn to it like like

42:54

you know my grandfather did it all through World War 2 you

42:57

know but it's just

42:59

and it was also kind of like

43:01

real you know so you enjoy

43:03

the military end up a lot of bullshit jobs like we're

43:06

cruising around the Indian Ocean on you

43:08

know an auxiliary exciting um like

43:11

the shit we did we were in it we're in

43:13

it

43:14

and I got to see like how the world

43:16

works firsthand got to see like

43:18

the game got to see it

43:20

and it's funny coming to it with a street kind of mindset

43:23

and then you see like oh

43:26

shit this is just big homie shit now and

43:28

they're just just pressing and peeping

43:31

and and you know

43:33

ready to throw down if they have to so

43:35

it was just like seeing politics

43:39

work on a larger scale scale like

43:42

the the cultural violence and

43:44

use of violence and management of violence and

43:46

threat of violence nation-state

43:48

level and like do you have like

43:51

art at this point in your life like any

43:53

like artistic aspirations or

43:55

like did you write did you like fucking journal

43:57

like were you were you an avid reader

43:59

I always read, always read, always read

44:02

a lot, a lot, a lot. That was always my escape.

44:05

And then I could always write.

44:07

So like in high school, I'd

44:09

like write one thing in the beginning of the year and they'd leave me alone

44:12

and give me my C, you know? And

44:15

then in the Navy I started- Why do you think that that's

44:17

just was natural? Natural, God given talent.

44:20

And creative or just

44:22

like essays or- Name it. Yeah.

44:25

Name it. Did you ever write creatively for yourself or

44:27

for other people? Minimally. And

44:29

then like I did the Navy, I started journaling.

44:33

There was a lot to process.

44:36

Like it's so funny because like now in hindsight,

44:38

it's like, yeah, I went through the wringer. I had so much

44:40

shit I was trying to process and didn't even know how

44:42

and didn't even know was abnormal.

44:46

But, you know, it

44:48

was once I got out that I really started writing

44:50

like almost immediately. I wrote my first script the

44:52

second I got out, like in a typewriter.

44:55

Damn. And what was that script? That

44:58

was about the Navy. It was shitty,

45:00

but it got me meetings. So,

45:05

so, so, and why you were in, were

45:07

you like, I'm gonna make a movie about this? No. Were

45:10

you like, I'm gonna write a movie about this or no? No.

45:12

But like why, why a script? You were just like, I

45:14

mean, when did that aspiration- Well, I mean,

45:16

I had a roommate

45:18

who was like trying to be a screenwriter

45:21

and it was also like grown

45:23

up in LA. There's always like, like, oh, Hollywood,

45:26

you know, can you make it a Hollywood and stuff? Like

45:28

this weird industry over there. You can make money if you can get into

45:30

that.

45:31

But I was an electrician after I

45:34

got out, I wired this guy's house up. This

45:36

guy was a screenwriter, Wesley Strick, and

45:39

told him sea stories and he's like,

45:41

write a script.

45:43

And I ended up living in this guy's house and wrote

45:45

my first script,

45:46

you know? And I just kept at it. I

45:49

kept at it. I kept getting rejected. And

45:51

then finally I wrote Training Day, you

45:54

know? Like, and

45:57

I mean, were you aware? of

46:00

the uniqueness of your perspective? No,

46:02

I was just ashamed of it. Shamed of it. Yeah, because

46:04

there's no one I could share it with. Like,

46:07

you know, a lot of my life, for a lot of my personality,

46:10

I could really only be myself around

46:12

like homies, you know, people from

46:14

the hood. You

46:17

know, as always. Do you still feel that way?

46:19

I feel, when I'm hanging out in

46:21

those spaces, I feel very at home. I

46:24

feel very at home. And it was so funny because

46:27

like,

46:28

I was like trying to be the white boy

46:30

for Hollywood for so long. And

46:32

I'd go to these meetings and it's like, oh, fuck, how do I

46:34

dress? What do I say? You know, like, I'm

46:36

gonna talk different. Like,

46:40

I was trying to be like them, you know. What

46:42

a fucking, it was like, it's what a fucking

46:44

dumb, dumb idea, dude. Never works. Oh

46:47

my God. That's what I learned. It's like authenticity,

46:50

you know? And can you be around

46:52

people that see you? And can

46:54

you allow yourself to be seen? You

46:56

know,

46:58

it's deep. Dude,

47:00

so I mean, like I've heard you, can you just

47:02

tell the story about training

47:05

day? And first of all, like how that story came

47:07

to you and then what that's like and

47:09

where you were when you found out that I sold and all

47:12

that shit. I mean, I had been

47:14

writing scripts. Nothing

47:19

had really sold and I kept getting rejected.

47:22

And I was writing- Did you think you were good? I

47:26

knew I was as good as stuff that was selling. So

47:29

I would read shit and be like, how can I do that? But

47:32

I was getting these projects

47:35

rejected. And so I decided

47:37

to write like something I knew they would reject

47:39

so I could be free to write it. Instead

47:42

of like, I'm gonna write into this box, I think you'll

47:44

buy. I was like, oh, I'm just gonna tell

47:46

a story. And you know, I wrote

47:48

it, I started writing it in like 95 or 96, right? And

47:52

this is like

47:53

five, six years before Rampart. Cause

47:56

I was hanging out in the streets and I lived at Echo Park

47:58

at the time. And I was always

48:01

like in it. I was always in South Central's

48:03

always in the hood like

48:06

just in it in it and looking

48:09

for trouble and

48:11

You know you're hanging out and you start hearing the stories

48:13

and you hear the same stories and it's like our is crew

48:15

of LAPD And they're jacking people and this and that and

48:17

the truth of it

48:19

So much beyond what anybody

48:21

knows like like the department It's such

48:24

an amazing job of like like

48:26

a magic trick. It's really about

48:28

this One it was just

48:30

like the beast. It's just the beast.

48:33

They're smashing dude and

48:35

the shit They're up to fucking cop

48:37

car police uniform police radio

48:40

not Now you're gonna go smashing

48:42

the homies doing your own thing, you know

48:45

now you're a transformer, right? Which

48:47

on the streets is the best thing right? Like

48:50

I was a transformer. I was like a Decepticon. I am

48:52

a white boy Yeah But

48:57

they yeah, and I just kept hearing

48:59

these stories

49:01

So I know it started writing it down and

49:04

creating finding the truth around that and

49:07

then I based on

49:09

You know Denzel's character on my homies dad on

49:11

Richards dad.

49:12

It's basically Richards dad, right? Who's

49:15

like this retired? medically

49:17

retired Marine Vietnam vet But

49:22

Like super high-power street guy

49:24

with like just street knowledge like

49:26

that pimp gnosis, you know, like like

49:29

a really

49:30

good street guy Has

49:33

an ability to almost create a magic

49:35

field around them and get you believing anything

49:38

You know in the way they talk and the tails and they understand

49:40

like fucking

49:41

You know the tap you on the knee when they're talking and get that

49:44

hypnotic thing going, you know I'm like this

49:46

guy was all that man. He was like

49:50

He told like it was a fucked-up story, but he talked

49:52

a guy into like killing himself

49:54

Like he just got on this one dude's head so bad

49:57

that that the guy ran into the bathroom

49:59

pulled his wife off chaff and try to cut his wrist.

50:01

Like, like that's the like psychology

50:05

and the power of psychology and

50:07

that dark street psychology, when

50:09

you understand that shit and you're

50:11

able to play with it, man,

50:14

God bless. And so like,

50:17

I just threw that character into that arena,

50:21

wrote the script, nobody bought it.

50:24

So that's not how cops are. And

50:27

the whole police genre was dead, like

50:30

cheesy, cheesy cop movies. They were just

50:32

dead. Like, what is it? What's what are cop movies

50:34

at that time? Yeah, they're just like, like really

50:36

bad. Yeah. Really soulless. And

50:39

yeah, I mean, it's funny because that script

50:42

became my calling card script and got me to work. It

50:44

was originally, you know,

50:46

a different director. There's going to be a Matt

50:49

Damon, Sam Jackson version. Like,

50:51

like it just goes through all these iterations,

50:54

you know, and then,

50:56

you know, Denzel jumped on it to his credit. And

51:00

then, you know, the producer was like,

51:02

do an

51:03

option, you know, where they give you like so much money against the sale

51:05

price,

51:06

right? And

51:08

I told him, and I was, I didn't have

51:10

a refrigerator. I didn't have a mattress. You know,

51:13

I was living in Echo Park. Like, you were

51:15

living with Richard. No, no, no. I was alone

51:17

at the time. Like when,

51:19

when, when this went down and then, I'm like, I don't

51:23

want an option. If you don't

51:25

trust me on my handshake, you don't want to be in business

51:27

with me. And that was the smartest move I did. Cause

51:29

I ended up selling it for like a million dollars,

51:32

you know, and I

51:34

ended up getting made.

51:35

When

51:39

you get, when you get that news, I mean, what does that, what

51:41

is that? What is that like for you? It's not real. Yeah.

51:43

You know, like, like I remember, like

51:45

I used to

51:48

be poor man. You know, I told you to grow up poor. Like

51:50

I know hunger. I grew up hungry. I know.

51:52

What that is. And then like when I was

51:55

like starving artist, like I remember one time

51:57

I bought fucking

52:00

Jars of spaghetti sauce and I'm coming home

52:02

from the store and the bag ripped and they both broke

52:05

and I almost cried I'm sitting

52:07

there looking at my spaghetti sauce on the sidewalk

52:10

like almost in freaking tears because

52:12

that was my money I had no money dude

52:14

like like And

52:17

when I started getting money writing and stuff,

52:20

I just would have the check sitting there Like 350

52:23

thousand dollar checks just stacked on my

52:26

TV because I didn't know what to do with them, right? And

52:29

like at a positive one in the bank and then all

52:31

sudden the banks like calling me this guy's

52:33

calling me nice from the bank right

52:36

What is this? You know, like there's this

52:38

whole new world when you have money who

52:40

knew right? And then

52:42

like I got an accountant and he's like

52:45

so You know, you

52:47

haven't filed tax returns for the past

52:49

seven years So

52:53

I'll need the man up in my business Yeah,

52:58

for me that's always like the watermark like

53:01

like like if you have a period in life

53:03

where you ain't been filing taxes

53:06

But

53:10

it's just this world, you

53:13

know this whole new world opened up to me and Yeah,

53:17

it was schizophrenic cuz like I'd be in the streets

53:19

of being Hollywood to be doing this doing that and then trying

53:21

to pretend I'm not doing nothing. So What

53:25

do you think like I mean that through that time

53:27

of bouncing back and forth at some point you get the

53:29

bug of being Like I want to make this shit myself

53:32

but but I mean What

53:34

was the experience? I mean was was there any

53:37

like big purpose with like what

53:39

what you wanted out of your art or the Possibilities

53:41

that you said not like financial possibilities, but to be

53:43

able to tell certain stories It's the corporate

53:46

map of

53:46

the human soul, man It's like the disconnect

53:48

because like I'd seen all this shit happen

53:50

with human beings and I had a personal understanding

53:53

the lived experience of What

53:56

people are right and

53:58

I felt like my verse version was

54:02

more profound because I'm

54:04

comfortable looking at the whole animal. I'm comfortable

54:07

with the darkness and comfortable with the light. If

54:09

the light

54:11

comes out of incredible darkness

54:13

and pain and agony, isn't it that much brighter?

54:18

I feel like everyone's trying to diminish what

54:20

we are and what we're capable of. It's

54:23

like kill spirituality,

54:26

kill the spirit, turn us into just

54:28

atomized, tribalized,

54:32

hateful fucking atoms, fragments.

54:35

That's what humanity is being turned into. And

54:37

for me, it's like I've seen miracles.

54:40

I've seen human miracles. I've seen the human heart.

54:43

I've seen power. I've seen death. I've seen life.

54:45

I've seen birth. Like there's

54:47

so much in us and nobody wants to

54:49

talk about that anymore.

54:52

And it's like with training day, it was

54:55

kind of simple. It was like what

54:57

happens when you put the devil and

55:00

an angel in a cop car was kind of the

55:02

basic idea. And then the real

55:05

thesis I was kind of answering was in a corrupt

55:07

world,

55:08

what happens when one man says no?

55:11

You know, and it's like the

55:14

big moment in training day that

55:17

like if you're really fucking hood and

55:19

you live that life, you may see it, but

55:22

Denzel is like a thousand miles ahead of this guy all day

55:25

long, right? For the most part of

55:27

Ethan. And then

55:29

later on towards the end of it, you

55:32

know, they're talking and then he finds out that

55:34

Ethan's parents were fucking heroin addicts.

55:37

Right. Which means he was on game

55:39

as a kid, saw that whole life

55:41

and had this whole level of understanding

55:45

that Alonzo didn't know he had. He didn't see it

55:47

coming. He didn't see it coming. Right. And that's

55:49

how this kid was able to fucking outmaneuver

55:51

him because he just that point

55:54

in people's lives where you have the power, you

55:56

have the control, you get fucking lazy and you

55:58

stop seeing the person in front of.

55:59

you. So this dude who had all

56:02

this commanding power over the whole world, couldn't

56:05

see the person sitting next to him and that

56:07

brought him down. Yeah. Yeah.

56:09

Basic. What was that? What was that like to

56:11

see that fucking thing get made then? I mean, were you

56:13

like, did you have? Did you?

56:15

Did you like it? Like, did you? Did

56:17

you have an opinion on it? Yeah, it was a trip dude. It

56:20

was like, um, I was a co producer

56:22

on it. And I was,

56:24

I was there like, I was just I was wild

56:26

at the time. And my problem

56:28

is I didn't really understand how to interface with Hollywood,

56:31

you know, and, and like,

56:34

people saw me as fucking wild. Yeah, I

56:36

know what that's like. Black eyes, dude. I'd show

56:38

up to set with like two black eyes from

56:40

the weekend, you know, from getting into

56:42

God knows what like, like I was wild

56:44

and, and

56:47

me and bone went

56:50

and you know,

56:55

went to Athens Park sat down

56:57

met with the big homie. And

56:59

it was like, hey, this is what we want

57:01

to do. Whoa, whoa, whoa. Can we shoot here?

57:04

Like no one had ever done that no one had ever filmed in these

57:07

neighborhoods, you know.

57:08

And so we went went to all the shot callers

57:11

and all the different hoods getting permission,

57:13

you know, and it's like, okay, cool. Hey, extra

57:17

meals at catering. I need you to hire

57:19

this many homies to security, you know,

57:21

put this dude in the movie, like, like you kind

57:23

of negotiate it, we want to know who the cops are on

57:25

set, you know,

57:28

you know, we just we just need to know who's wearing what's

57:30

going on and how we do our business. And

57:33

because you knew that you needed to make

57:35

a certain kind of film in a certain

57:37

kind of way, telling a certain kind of truth. It's you

57:39

can't do without cheesy otherwise, you know,

57:41

like some fucking act like the other big

57:44

gang moves like colors and colors

57:47

like gets the cop stuff right. But

57:49

the gang stuff feels cheesy, you

57:51

know, and it's it's that thing where it's hard to explain

57:53

like,

57:54

when you're in the streets, or you know, you're like

57:57

you could see someone and read their

57:59

energy.

57:59

Right. And that dude's a fucking

58:02

player. All right. And then

58:04

you watch a movie and it's like they don't have

58:06

the gravitas. They don't have the reality of it. And

58:08

you can't fake that energy. It

58:11

was, it was, it was a wild time.

58:15

It was a trip like there, you know, and

58:17

then sometimes there'd be politics and then you

58:20

get sucked into that and you're trying to clean that up. And

58:22

like, we're shooting over here and you

58:24

know, cause like, like the Hollywood people, like gun

58:26

comes out, someone starts blasting and fucking freaks out.

58:28

Right. Right. But it's, but like, you know,

58:30

you, you,

58:32

to, to, to, to the same extent that,

58:34

that you're so committed to, to,

58:36

to the vets and what, what, I mean, it's like, yeah, man, it's like,

58:39

if we're going to make this, we're going to ask permission, we're going to do it with

58:41

respect. We're going to tell the truth. We're going to like, we're

58:43

going to bring them in. That's sacred. What's,

58:46

what are the human stories? You know, so it's

58:48

like,

58:49

like, am I a thief? Am I stealing

58:51

stories? Am I taking stories that aren't

58:54

mine to tell? Like, like, what, what do we share?

58:56

What do we not share? What, what's my responsibility?

59:00

You know, so like,

59:02

if I'm making a movie about Hoodrat shit, yeah, I got to

59:04

get in there and I got to talk to people, you know, I got to be

59:06

respectful and, and, you

59:08

know, at the end of the day, like,

59:12

even if you're a street guy, right,

59:15

you have a hierarchy, you're connected

59:17

to an organization, it is what it is. There's

59:19

rules. It's worse than the military.

59:22

You know, God forbid you lose money,

59:25

you know, you

59:27

get caught up in the politics like, like, Hey man,

59:29

no, I know you got the kid and you've been with your

59:32

lady now, but we got to go handle

59:34

this thing. Oh

59:36

shit. Is that the end of my life? Is I know

59:38

it, you know, and, and people

59:40

are in these lives and, and, you

59:43

know, I got like, like relatives in prison

59:45

and people, you know, I know people in prison, you got caught up in the

59:47

life, you get the case and that's it. And that's

59:50

murder. She wrote, and

59:51

they're not props. They're not tools

59:54

to be used. They're not something

59:57

to extract value from, right?

59:59

You know, And so

1:00:01

if I'm telling your story

1:00:03

as a matter of respect, I gotta get it right,

1:00:06

man. Yeah. Yeah. And

1:00:09

like compare that, just like that inherent thing that

1:00:14

you, that's just part of you. There's no fucking

1:00:16

choice. Like you're doing it that way. It's processed.

1:00:19

But now you're in a world that's all about sort of like the optics

1:00:21

of that. Now you're in a world that's all about like,

1:00:23

you know, dot in the eyes and checking the T's. Well, okay,

1:00:25

so now, oh, okay, now we're doing

1:00:28

rehearsals. And I have actors with me

1:00:30

and you know, we start getting heavy and talking about

1:00:33

your past and this and that. And then,

1:00:35

you know, what does someone feels like I've encroached

1:00:37

on a boundary, right? And then

1:00:40

now they're uncomfortable and now it's

1:00:42

like, okay, so, and then especially

1:00:44

now where it's like, I'm a white

1:00:47

boy, man. I'm like, I'm the fucking toxic

1:00:49

residue of history, man. I'm like,

1:00:53

I'm like the progenitor of evil

1:00:55

in the world, man. Like, and

1:00:57

that's what people see when they see my skin,

1:00:59

you know, and it's such a trip. Cause I grew up

1:01:01

as like, like the only white boy and

1:01:04

like people of color spaces, right? Right.

1:01:07

And you catch shit for it at first

1:01:09

and then it's like, yeah, whatever, all right. You're fucked.

1:01:12

You're like the rest of us cool, you know? And

1:01:14

then now it's like,

1:01:16

okay,

1:01:18

what does that mean? What are my responsibilities?

1:01:21

You know, what are my responsibilities as a storyteller

1:01:24

in this culture, you know? And again,

1:01:26

it gets to what am I allowed to say? What am I not allowed to

1:01:28

say? Because there sure should have been plenty of fucking people

1:01:30

who did look at these folks as fucking

1:01:32

props to extract their stories. Here we're telling

1:01:35

this to portray you, never have a conversation,

1:01:37

never be in someone's house, never be in their churches

1:01:39

and there, right? And it's like, but how does

1:01:41

it feel being somebody who just did that shit naturally?

1:01:43

Not like on your soapbox, hey, look how great

1:01:46

I am. You just wouldn't do it any other fucking way cause you

1:01:48

give a

1:01:48

fuck, you care about your art. I wouldn't know

1:01:51

how to do it. I know the spaces

1:01:53

I'm comfortable in and I like to be those spaces

1:01:55

and I like to share those spaces. So like the first

1:01:57

movie I directed was like Harsh Times.

1:01:59

Christian Bale. And

1:02:03

so like I took him around to the neighborhoods

1:02:07

and how to meet people and how to meet homies and how

1:02:09

to meet like different like families, you know,

1:02:11

you know, like, Oh, what's it like to sit down with a

1:02:13

family and have dinner in East LA? You know, like,

1:02:16

what's that vibe? Like, what's the table conversation?

1:02:19

I had to meet like,

1:02:21

dudes that he would have grown up with, like,

1:02:23

like us fucking, you know, Vietnam veteran,

1:02:26

you know, who's super big into like, um,

1:02:29

you know, the recovery piece and PTSD

1:02:31

at the cutting edge of it, and you could talk all that stuff,

1:02:34

you know, and you hear his stories, and it's like, like,

1:02:36

this is someone you would have grown up with, and

1:02:39

someone whose energy you would have wanted

1:02:41

to match, you know, and so like,

1:02:43

for actors, a lot of what I do is getting

1:02:45

them in the real spaces so they can see the behavior

1:02:48

and scan it,

1:02:49

you know, because I know, I knew you guys are like

1:02:51

little Xerox machines, fucking watching everything,

1:02:53

man, like, we're some kids, you know, it's

1:02:55

like, fucking you see everything. So if

1:02:58

I can put you in these spaces, and

1:03:00

you can feel that energy and that human connection,

1:03:02

that's priceless, man, and I can do your job

1:03:04

better. And did you know Christian?

1:03:07

Like, did you know he I mean, he's like built for

1:03:09

that shit? Like, and you did you know

1:03:11

that off the jump? Is that why you wanted him? But

1:03:13

I mean, a big part of it, I imagine too, is having Christian

1:03:16

around you and seeing the way you roll and

1:03:18

the way you live in the hood and

1:03:19

how you handle yourself being around Richard, I

1:03:21

mean, because he's only blue and like all those guys are in

1:03:23

the movie, right? And

1:03:27

like, clearly, you can fucking write you write like

1:03:29

this fucking amazing fucking thing. What makes you say,

1:03:31

Hey, I can go make this movie. And then like

1:03:33

you like leverage your house on it like making

1:03:35

the decisions. I did a music video first. So

1:03:38

these homies with a band. And I'm like,

1:03:40

Okay, I'm gonna pay to do a music video,

1:03:42

I'm gonna see what it's like to control a set,

1:03:45

even if I vibe it at all. But why did you want

1:03:47

what was it? What was the first like,

1:03:49

what a lot of us training day, just seeing training

1:03:51

day and in the process and how it unfolded

1:03:54

and seeing the department heads and seeing what

1:03:56

exactly your director does? Was there things that

1:03:58

you thought didn't work or could

1:03:59

worked better or was there things where you were like,

1:04:02

I could fucking do or I could bring something not

1:04:04

to shit on that because it's a masterpiece. But like, right,

1:04:07

but it's like, was there anything you were like, fuck, dude,

1:04:09

my style, you always see it as a writer,

1:04:11

like someone who created that, you always see

1:04:13

it a bit different, you know, so

1:04:16

it was different. And I love the vision

1:04:19

and I love what the movie became. And it had to

1:04:21

become that. But

1:04:23

part of me was like, all right, I want to

1:04:25

do this. I want to do this. Okay, which

1:04:27

was crazy. Because you know, I didn't some

1:04:30

high school dropout man, like, like, and

1:04:35

so I wrote harsh times,

1:04:38

actually, I wrote training to direct myself

1:04:41

and then and then once that started on

1:04:43

spooling, the way I went, I wrote harsh times,

1:04:46

okay, I'm going to direct this. And yeah, I

1:04:48

mortgaged my house is like, like,

1:04:50

I put everything I had into that. And

1:04:53

then I just went for it. That

1:04:56

was terrifying. I bet. Terrifying.

1:04:58

But I

1:05:01

loved working

1:05:03

with actors like it's that that,

1:05:07

that collaborative thing. And

1:05:09

for me, it's like we're all in it together. And I think like

1:05:12

Hollywood can be super

1:05:14

classist, like, and

1:05:17

dude show up and they're so about their ego and

1:05:19

their identity. And I'm the director, I'm the producer.

1:05:21

And that's their armor and that identity

1:05:23

of who they are. And

1:05:26

then if that's how you're rolling,

1:05:29

you can't let anyone see behind the curtain. You

1:05:31

can't let anyone see the magic trick, you

1:05:33

know. And

1:05:35

so for me, it's, it's a collaborative

1:05:38

process. And the most important

1:05:40

thing are the actors in my face up there. And

1:05:44

yeah, I just fell in love with with that process

1:05:47

and hunting truth, like, it's

1:05:49

like a team of people together hunting

1:05:51

truth.

1:05:53

The fuck what's better than that? We

1:05:56

create our own reality, you know,

1:05:58

and So what

1:06:01

is the co-created reality on that

1:06:03

set? And then how do you get there? Like,

1:06:06

you know, that's

1:06:09

my whole world now. It's like, as

1:06:11

a country, we don't really have a co-created reality

1:06:14

anymore. How do you mean? The

1:06:17

mythopedic reality, the United States.

1:06:19

What is the United States? Was it

1:06:22

a corporate endeavor for

1:06:24

the monetization of enslaved people

1:06:27

from the get, and that's all it ever was?

1:06:29

Was it people seeking freedom

1:06:32

from tyranny and against the crown and

1:06:34

all that? Like, what is our story

1:06:36

as a people? Are we a good people?

1:06:39

Are we a bad people? Are we a bad nation,

1:06:41

right? And so when

1:06:43

you don't even know

1:06:45

what is the common reality

1:06:47

that we share? What is the space

1:06:49

that we are creating together? That's

1:06:52

a huge fucking opportunity for the

1:06:54

predators to come in and just tear the ass out

1:06:56

of everything. Like, again,

1:06:59

which is also an exercise

1:07:01

of violence and control and power. And

1:07:03

if you understand that language,

1:07:06

shit's real clear, right? Like,

1:07:08

it's beautiful. The way you have to admire a shark,

1:07:11

you know,

1:07:12

the construction of it and that speed

1:07:14

and everything and how it hunts, the same thing's

1:07:17

happening in our world now.

1:07:20

So just find truth within

1:07:22

that. I think that's all we can do now is surround

1:07:24

ourselves with truth, create safe

1:07:26

opportunities for it,

1:07:28

and then just explore, like

1:07:30

get in it. After you get done with

1:07:33

harsh times, you're like, all right, you're full on.

1:07:35

You're like, this is what I'm fucking doing now, right?

1:07:38

It was

1:07:39

a horrific experience and it was hard and

1:07:41

I didn't understand it and I didn't know what the job

1:07:43

was, but I knew I had to keep doing it.

1:07:46

And then

1:07:48

just, yeah, a lot of it was like, who

1:07:51

am I, what's my role in this thing? Hollywood's

1:07:56

awful, man. Because it's like if you have... Like

1:08:00

I'm fucked up, you know, a fucked up life, you

1:08:02

know, I've like, like all my issues,

1:08:05

psychologically, personality wise,

1:08:07

whatever that I'm working through as a storyteller,

1:08:09

as a father, as

1:08:12

a friend, all that stuff. And

1:08:15

then you get into an industry which is going to feed

1:08:19

your worst solutions to your personality.

1:08:25

This business is so dark, man.

1:08:28

It's pimp-nosis. It's a pimp game, right?

1:08:31

And in Hollywood, they keep all the talent

1:08:34

apart. God forbid two directors ever

1:08:36

talk. God forbid the director gets

1:08:38

alone in the room with the writer. It's all about gatekeeping.

1:08:40

It's all about control. It's all about

1:08:43

atomizing people, you know?

1:08:45

And then when people come together and bring truth,

1:08:48

it just blows the doors off of that. That's

1:08:51

like the one thing they can't fucking take away. It's

1:08:53

happening. And I feel

1:08:56

like the knowledge or the ability

1:08:58

to find that truth is disappearing,

1:09:00

you know? And the craft

1:09:02

and the magic of filmmaking is dying

1:09:05

a thousand percent. What's the biggest enemy?

1:09:11

Corporate industrialized

1:09:14

production and post-production processes.

1:09:17

So let's say you have an entity

1:09:19

that's taken over most of the film and

1:09:21

television production, right? And

1:09:23

that entity is from Silicon Valley, right?

1:09:26

So already there's like a certain way

1:09:28

to view processes, right? And

1:09:30

we got to get these costs under control. These fucking

1:09:33

creative people are making these crazy decisions.

1:09:35

We got to get that under control. Great. Okay. Well,

1:09:37

now the post person is going to dictate camera,

1:09:39

pipeline, processing, look.

1:09:43

Production person is going to dictate lighting package,

1:09:46

how you like the set, the time,

1:09:48

the scheduling, right? Oh shit, we don't

1:09:50

have time. All right. Just stick a top light up

1:09:52

there and then just do a front fill and we'll

1:09:54

knock out three setups in this. Great. Like

1:09:57

nobody cares anymore. Like, like the. the

1:10:00

effort it takes for

1:10:03

like movie magic, like the little

1:10:05

box of movie magic and you sprinkle

1:10:07

it and all that. That's time, that's

1:10:09

money, that's a good crew, that's a crew

1:10:12

that cares. Crazy commitment. Crazy

1:10:14

commitment from your fucking soul. And

1:10:17

all that's been ripped apart. Now it's just

1:10:19

like stamping widgets out. And

1:10:22

you have people growing up in this culture

1:10:24

who have no idea what real filmmaking is. What

1:10:27

about what real film is? Do you feel like the audience

1:10:29

hunger for like, do you feel

1:10:31

like the hunger is still there? The hunger for great memories.

1:10:34

Right, and people don't

1:10:36

want art

1:10:38

delivered to them in sort

1:10:40

of like, well this is art for these kinds of people, this is art for

1:10:42

these kinds of people, but that's awesome. Art's a funny

1:10:44

word, man. I mean, at the end of the day, I have no fucking

1:10:46

illusions what we're doing. It is for-profit

1:10:49

corporate speech.

1:10:51

It's a product, it is for-profit

1:10:53

corporate speech. That's what we're

1:10:55

doing, right? That's the mission,

1:10:58

that's the exercise. And these

1:11:00

people over here, this investment fund,

1:11:03

or this line of credit that the studio has,

1:11:06

they want to see returns on their money. How

1:11:08

do you get those returns? Well, there's

1:11:10

casting, you cast somebody.

1:11:13

There's like a matrix, there's like paperwork on you

1:11:15

guys, right? So I can look up your

1:11:17

Q score, I can look up how

1:11:19

much your movie's gonna sell

1:11:21

in the UK or English speaking territories,

1:11:24

or you know, in the Francophone territories.

1:11:27

I mean, I do that crush in Bangladesh. I got like 13 Bangladeshi

1:11:29

kids, bro. But that's it, it's

1:11:31

all micro-targeted now. And so like,

1:11:34

just how even a movie's engineered, and

1:11:36

they're so disingenuous too, because at the end of the

1:11:38

day, like even a studio, everything's already pre-financed,

1:11:40

right? They got letters of credit,

1:11:42

they got this, they got that, they're throwing up a few

1:11:44

million in cap funding or something, right?

1:11:46

It's so risk averse, it's ridiculous. What's

1:11:50

your biggest heartbreak in

1:11:53

the film industry, which I think that's hurt the most. All

1:11:55

right, so Hollywood, I

1:11:57

tell people, is like watching someone...

1:11:59

you love get fucked by someone you

1:12:02

hate. So, I mean, there's

1:12:05

a couple of them. I

1:12:10

mean, you

1:12:12

know, the big one is like Suicide Squad. That

1:12:15

shit broke me. That handed

1:12:18

me my ass. How so? Come

1:12:22

right off fury, right? Had

1:12:24

the town in my hand, could have

1:12:26

done anything and I did do anything and,

1:12:29

you know, go on this journey with it and

1:12:31

the same thing, like authentic, truthful,

1:12:33

let's do all the rehearsal. Let's really get into each other's souls.

1:12:36

Let's create this amazing collaborative thing,

1:12:38

right? And then I

1:12:42

dropped my director cut, you know, your 10

1:12:44

week assembly, it's a fucking assembly at 10 weeks

1:12:47

for a movie that big, come on, you know? And

1:12:50

Deadpool opened,

1:12:53

right? And then they never

1:12:55

tested Batman versus Superman. So

1:12:57

they put the movie out there and they never did a

1:13:00

test. And they

1:13:02

were expecting a different result.

1:13:05

And then they got hammered by all the critics. And

1:13:07

then it's like, okay, we're gonna turn

1:13:10

David Ayer's dark soulful movie into a

1:13:12

fucking comedy now. I became

1:13:15

the bad guy narratively. Oh,

1:13:17

it was a tough director. He's hard to work with or this or

1:13:19

that, right? Because as they're fucking you,

1:13:21

you were like, stop fucking me. Yeah. And

1:13:23

as in the, but the producers themselves are like, producer,

1:13:27

studio people, executives. I'm not calling anybody

1:13:29

out. Cause we're all like at the end of the day, like,

1:13:33

it's fucking business, right? I get it. But

1:13:36

the narrative

1:13:39

that like, oh, I'm hard to work with

1:13:41

and I'm the problem only puts more

1:13:43

value and equity in their career.

1:13:45

And that's kind of like what

1:13:48

my path has been. Like I wrote the first Fast

1:13:50

and Furious, man. When I got that script,

1:13:52

that shit was set in New York. It was all Italian

1:13:54

kids, right? I want to Stuber,

1:13:57

Scott Stuber who ran,

1:13:59

I started writing Universal at the time

1:14:02

who hired me. I'm like, bro, I'm not gonna take

1:14:04

it unless I can set it in LA and make it look

1:14:07

like the people I know in LA, right? So

1:14:09

then I started writing in people

1:14:11

of color and writing in the street stuff and

1:14:13

writing in the culture and

1:14:15

no one knew shit about street racing at

1:14:17

the time. And I went to a shop in

1:14:19

the valley and met with the first guys that

1:14:22

were doing the hacking of the fuel curves for the

1:14:24

injectors and stuff like that. And they had just

1:14:26

figured it out and they're showing it. I'm like, oh, fuck you, I'm

1:14:28

gonna put that in the movie. It's

1:14:31

what you do, man. Biggest

1:14:34

franchise in Hollywood, I don't have any of it. I don't

1:14:36

have fucking, I got nothing to show for

1:14:39

it. Nothing, because of the way the business works, right?

1:14:41

And the narrative is, I didn't do shit,

1:14:43

right? So it's like people

1:14:47

hijack narratives, control narratives,

1:14:49

create narratives to empower themselves, right?

1:14:52

And because I was always an outsider and because

1:14:56

I

1:14:57

don't go to the fucking parties, right? I

1:14:59

don't go to the

1:15:01

meals, I don't do any of that stuff.

1:15:04

The people that did were able to control and manage

1:15:06

narratives because they're socializing that part of the problem.

1:15:08

I was never socializing that part of the problem. So

1:15:10

I was always like the dark creative dude

1:15:12

beware. And

1:15:15

now it's like, okay, great, fuck

1:15:17

all the middlemen, right?

1:15:20

I get it, it's up to me. I

1:15:23

got a self rescue, right? I

1:15:25

can fucking whine about getting shot at and

1:15:27

all the rounds I've taken over my career. I got

1:15:29

a self rescue and I got to create an ecology

1:15:32

where it's safe for me to be creative. And that's it, and

1:15:34

that's what I'm doing. How do you do that?

1:15:37

Access to money people, access to decision

1:15:40

makers.

1:15:41

There's so many layers of decision makers. Who

1:15:44

has the actual green light authority, right?

1:15:46

How do you get a relationship with someone without authority?

1:15:49

Do you feel like there's people out there that recognize

1:15:52

what's fucking good? Handful, yeah, yeah.

1:15:55

Because I think everybody recognizes

1:15:57

what's good, but your ability to execute.

1:15:59

something good is not

1:16:02

really there. But you come out like you do harsh

1:16:05

times end of watching fear. Like what the fuck is

1:16:07

anybody gonna like, how are these people taking

1:16:09

your movie away from you? Like, like how?

1:16:12

It's their movie. Yeah, but

1:16:14

somebody knows what

1:16:16

the real score is there.

1:16:18

But it's like, they

1:16:20

never tested my cut. And the thing is, I have

1:16:23

it. I fucking have a copy of it.

1:16:25

Right. And if

1:16:27

I didn't, oh my God. Because everyone

1:16:29

I've shown the cut has the same reaction.

1:16:32

Rage. Like, this

1:16:34

is the movie we wanted. Why didn't we get

1:16:36

this? Wow. Right. Wow.

1:16:39

And then like. I'm such a dipshit

1:16:41

bro about all this stuff. But like I've seen that like release

1:16:44

the air cut. I've seen that on, like what? Can

1:16:47

that get released? I mean. Would you want

1:16:49

it to be released? It's like Schrodinger's

1:16:51

cut now. It's almost like, is

1:16:53

it more legendary to see it or more legendary

1:16:56

to not see it? Like I talked to James

1:16:58

Gunn and look, they got their own. He's

1:17:00

trying to figure that out.

1:17:01

And it's

1:17:04

possible, but they want to get some scores

1:17:07

on the board first.

1:17:09

I have, I could show people. I could, you know, like,

1:17:12

but it's

1:17:15

tough because it's like I want to fucking

1:17:17

move on from it. I want to heal from it. And

1:17:20

it pisses me off. Cause like, dude,

1:17:22

I was coming off fury. Right. Yeah.

1:17:25

And then every time during suicide squad, when the dailies

1:17:27

were coming in, people are like, oh shit, maybe

1:17:29

air is going to take over DC. Like, and

1:17:32

there's all this game of thrones in there. The

1:17:34

palace politics were insane. Right.

1:17:37

And the shit that was really going on.

1:17:40

Bro. All right. Okay.

1:17:43

You know, and then, and then they're shooting at me. And every time, you

1:17:45

know, the new movie comes out, a new movie would come out

1:17:47

in this space. The press would come at me again.

1:17:51

Right. Over like, like

1:17:53

that's what became so fucked up. Is

1:17:56

I became a talking point inside of the marketing

1:17:59

for these other products.

1:17:59

in a negative way.

1:18:01

And I'm sitting there like, what is happening?

1:18:04

You know, it's like, it's.

1:18:10

I remember talking to people like, you know,

1:18:12

like talking to Kevin Vance and Sensei

1:18:15

and you know, and then like,

1:18:18

I mean, because that process of making

1:18:20

that movie sounds fucking righteous and fucking, like

1:18:22

everybody was really putting in Joel and Will

1:18:25

and all that. I mean, so let me

1:18:27

ask you now, like, do

1:18:29

you wish you had never done it? Like,

1:18:32

cause you're also somebody who's like, the

1:18:34

pain in the lumps is also what fucking

1:18:36

defines you and gets you where it like, you're always

1:18:39

fucking forward moving. Like, dude,

1:18:42

I remember in the Fury

1:18:44

Press Tour,

1:18:45

being in some

1:18:47

fucking room in some fancy ass fucking hotel

1:18:51

and you were meeting, I mean, probably

1:18:54

can't fucking talk about you, you were meeting like

1:18:56

a very famous actor and

1:18:59

horribly unlucky to you guys.

1:19:01

You got seated right next to like me and Shia

1:19:04

and Mike and you were meeting

1:19:06

about Suicide Squad and Shia

1:19:08

like got up and he's like, he's like, what the fuck

1:19:10

G, why are you doing this fucking movie? Fuck

1:19:13

you for even wanting to be in this movie. You're throwing

1:19:15

it away, bro. Don't fucking do it, bro. And

1:19:18

like. Should've listened to him. Dude,

1:19:20

I remember saying like, I remember

1:19:23

being like Shia dude, like what are you

1:19:25

fuck? Because for me at that point, anybody who

1:19:27

said anything about you,

1:19:29

met like, dude, I'll kick like, but it was

1:19:31

Shia and I was like, what are you doing, bro? I

1:19:33

don't know. It's like you said,

1:19:35

it's a wildly successful movie and it's like,

1:19:38

and now you're in this like place in your life. I

1:19:40

mean, how do you look back on that? Like I understand

1:19:42

the pain that it's caused you, but

1:19:44

like, do you wish, I mean, I don't even know what that fucking

1:19:47

does anyways. I'm ambivalent, man. Like,

1:19:49

I have to

1:19:51

own my life and

1:19:53

I have to own my journey and

1:19:55

my experiences, right? You

1:19:59

know, it's like, like gone. with the wind and there's that moment

1:20:01

where Scarlett or Harrah's like, you know, I will

1:20:03

never go hungry again. You know, like

1:20:07

that taught me I have to have control

1:20:09

over

1:20:10

my work. I have to have control over my work

1:20:12

and I won't get in a situation where I don't have that control

1:20:15

over again. Because

1:20:18

they will strap a bomb to

1:20:20

your back and bury you in a fucking

1:20:22

crater. They don't give a fuck. Like

1:20:24

they'll

1:20:25

rip your guts out if it

1:20:28

serves their empire. Like

1:20:31

for profit corporate speech, right?

1:20:34

Quarterly, oh, this quarter we were

1:20:36

able to save on payroll by firing people

1:20:38

and this movie made a profit and we sold secondary.

1:20:40

That's all they fucking care about. I

1:20:42

don't care about you. Everyone's disposable, man.

1:20:45

Like, and it's like

1:20:48

taking me kind of coming to terms with the reality

1:20:50

of Hollywood, you know, and

1:20:52

what it is. And it's been

1:20:55

so confusing. And then at the same time, this is the business

1:20:57

that's changed my life. This business has built my house. This

1:20:59

is the business that's given me these opportunities

1:21:01

to travel the world and see things and meet people.

1:21:04

So it's tough. It's like, you know, yeah, you

1:21:07

get petted and slapped, sometimes

1:21:09

at the same time. Dude, that's fucking great,

1:21:11

man. That's so fucking right. I

1:21:13

don't know, man, you know, the other, I

1:21:16

don't know, when was that thing for Deamer a month ago?

1:21:18

Like fucking Deamer. But

1:21:22

you know, man, they were like, they were honoring

1:21:24

Newton, you know what I mean? And

1:21:26

they did a screening of End of Watch and

1:21:29

like, you know, like the whole fucking department was there,

1:21:31

bro. And it's like, you know, like

1:21:34

Mikey came and I came and Kevin

1:21:36

was there and it was like, I

1:21:39

don't know, man. Like I remember you talking

1:21:41

about fury and you're like, yeah, dude, like you're

1:21:44

like, you're never gonna pay for a beer again, dude. Like

1:21:46

any tanker is kind of like, and

1:21:49

like, dude, that is like

1:21:51

a truer thing has never been said. And that it's like

1:21:55

literally the honor, just being in that anyways

1:21:57

in the experience, that part of it, like doing that right.

1:21:59

that we put, there's no doubt

1:22:02

about why we made that movie. And the

1:22:04

same is true for law enforcement with End of Watch.

1:22:06

And it's like, bro, you've like, like now is

1:22:08

that like your North star? Like do you like is that?

1:22:10

It's confusing to me. It's confusing

1:22:12

to me because like,

1:22:14

my life is so intense

1:22:17

and so much shit happens in such a velocity.

1:22:19

And it's like,

1:22:21

you know, and a watch was like, 2008 Fury

1:22:23

was like, you know, 2016

1:22:26

or something. Yeah. And it's

1:22:28

just like, who

1:22:31

was I? How did I do that? How did I

1:22:33

create that? And then it's

1:22:36

weird, because like, you know, at the time,

1:22:38

I was like, super married, and the kids and everything.

1:22:40

And that was all my life. And I'm my castle, my

1:22:42

safety, was I able to go

1:22:44

into those places and create because I

1:22:46

had such safety in my personal life. And

1:22:49

now I'm like trying to create that,

1:22:51

that sense again, you know,

1:22:54

do I have to feel safe like that to create

1:22:56

like that? Like what conditions

1:23:00

to pull that out and then again,

1:23:02

like and then I wrestle with like, culture,

1:23:06

like do people want to hear from me? Do people

1:23:08

want to hear what I have to say? Do I have a right

1:23:10

to tell stories, you know, like

1:23:13

deep like that, you know, like, like, what

1:23:15

are we doing? What

1:23:17

am I doing? That's just like a fucking humble

1:23:20

and like, like, like, honest, like,

1:23:23

thing to say, man, you know what I mean? And like, there's only

1:23:25

I mean, you know, as well as me, like only, you know,

1:23:28

that like that understanding and that honesty

1:23:31

and that humility, like only only

1:23:33

the truth and only good come from that just you

1:23:35

get

1:23:35

like everything's been stripped away. Everything's been

1:23:38

stripped away. And, and,

1:23:41

you know, like, I'm on social media a lot. And

1:23:43

it's just fascinating, because now like

1:23:45

the audience wants to know who you are, you

1:23:47

know, and it's like,

1:23:49

you know, when I was about to get nuked

1:23:52

on Twitter after another DC movie

1:23:54

was coming out, and I had to be the devil,

1:23:56

you know, I

1:23:58

was like, fuck it. And I just wrote up my life

1:24:01

and tweeted it because you could see, I

1:24:03

could see like, like I'm really good

1:24:05

at man, like strategic

1:24:07

communications and seeing how shit's moving

1:24:09

and unfolding. I don't want I'm gonna get

1:24:11

nuked on this one. So this is my life.

1:24:14

This is my story. This is who I am. I put it out there

1:24:16

and everything stopped overnight.

1:24:17

It was like, of course, you know, publicist

1:24:20

like nightmare. But it's

1:24:22

that counterintuitive stuff

1:24:24

works. But

1:24:27

right now, it's just like, you

1:24:29

know, you're saying with fury, like, I can't walk onto

1:24:32

a military base without getting mocked, right? And

1:24:34

then like, oh, hey, you know,

1:24:37

my squadron watch fury together, you know,

1:24:39

before we deployed and went down range. And we

1:24:41

always remember that moment together or

1:24:45

like, like my homie Sean, you know,

1:24:47

who found something in it. And

1:24:49

my whole thing now is like, like, I'm so fucking

1:24:51

beat down

1:24:52

that I'm trying to like find value. What is

1:24:54

my value as a human being away

1:24:57

from here are things

1:25:00

you have done that symbolize you and give

1:25:02

your life value. None of that means shit.

1:25:04

I'm here right now, bro. Like past

1:25:06

is gone. Like, like, what is now? What is

1:25:08

tomorrow? What is that? And,

1:25:11

and it's so hard to create. And it's in

1:25:13

like the world,

1:25:15

like world don't want to be saved right now, you

1:25:17

know, and, and I'm like,

1:25:19

Captain save a whole storyteller or like, like, Hey,

1:25:22

use deeper human shit. No, we don't want

1:25:24

that. You know, so it's like,

1:25:26

like, I don't

1:25:28

know, man, like I'm desperate for authenticity.

1:25:31

And I think that's what's lacking in all our shit

1:25:33

now. Like, nothing's fucking authentic.

1:25:36

And

1:25:36

like, my dream would be

1:25:39

like, to have like a cast

1:25:41

for six months and just workshop something

1:25:43

and then like workshop rehearse, right,

1:25:45

find truth, go deep, deep, deep, deep,

1:25:48

deep and then go to set. I mean, I feel like

1:25:50

there's so much fucking hunger for that, bro. Like

1:25:52

the people, you know, you

1:25:54

said something before about like creating, you know, it's like something

1:25:56

shy and I got into real heavy, I think

1:25:59

starting with us.

1:25:59

over there, but just sort of

1:26:02

like the circumstances you're in, the people around

1:26:04

you, your family, the people you fuck

1:26:06

with,

1:26:08

the desire that I think you

1:26:10

know real well, just like sometimes you feel like you

1:26:12

gotta like bleed out to create and you gotta like

1:26:15

fuck up the world and just like drop a bite right. It's

1:26:17

like what comes, feeling knowing the power of that, knowing

1:26:19

like if you're the kind of person that can walk

1:26:21

in a room and create danger and chaos, it's

1:26:24

like if you can do that on a set, it's fucking magic.

1:26:26

So it's like, do you still do that in life? I'm

1:26:29

just wondering like, right? The

1:26:31

whole tortured artist thing, like

1:26:34

I think there's something in an artist nature

1:26:37

that can be chaotic and

1:26:40

that exploration and energy that gets reflected

1:26:43

back to you from that chaos, you

1:26:45

can then put in your work, but it's also a trap

1:26:47

because then that becomes what you're doing and

1:26:50

it can get out of control. You know,

1:26:52

like I used to drink a lot, it

1:26:54

was bad, fucking bad.

1:26:57

And it's been forever

1:26:59

and ever since I've had a drink, but

1:27:01

like I thought that that

1:27:04

was part of who I was, and

1:27:06

part of my creative identity, and

1:27:08

it's like, oh, I'd get high and fucking slam

1:27:11

some tall cans and write weird shit.

1:27:13

And I felt like I needed

1:27:16

that

1:27:16

crutch to tell stories, but my best

1:27:18

scripts all wrote sober. But

1:27:23

it's a trap, but like, and

1:27:25

now everybody's so

1:27:27

constrained and behaviorally constrained

1:27:30

and everyone's so watched. We didn't have cell

1:27:32

phones when I was a kid, man. Can

1:27:34

you imagine? Dudes would get a pillowcase and go

1:27:36

through the whole bus,

1:27:37

getting everyone's bus passes, you

1:27:39

know, not giving a shit, like

1:27:41

no cell phones. Like

1:27:44

now everybody's observing you and

1:27:46

watching you and reverse

1:27:48

engineering everything you do for malice, right?

1:27:51

Plus there's also a sense of like, all right,

1:27:53

if you're older, there's a fucking target on your back.

1:27:56

I'm gonna shoot you off your horse. I'm gonna get your job, motherfucker,

1:27:58

you know? And that's...

1:28:00

That's the work environment now.

1:28:03

That's the world now, right? Like

1:28:05

trying to find fault with people. And

1:28:10

are there valid reasons for that shit? Yeah,

1:28:12

it's a reaction. Of course, people are reacting to

1:28:14

fucking this dog

1:28:16

shit that's been happening in our society, man.

1:28:18

Like, how do you

1:28:21

share in that space? How do you create

1:28:23

something that's gonna be truthful and uplifting

1:28:26

and human and powerful, you know?

1:28:28

And then- And potentially offensive

1:28:30

and potentially less scary, but there's what make you fucking

1:28:33

uncomfortable. Well, now you're a

1:28:35

business, right? And okay, well, I just

1:28:37

invested, I'm on the line for $70

1:28:39

million and we're gonna do

1:28:41

a $30 million P&A commitment. That's $100 million

1:28:43

right there. Oh

1:28:46

no, the subject matter caused

1:28:48

it to get canceled or an

1:28:50

actor had

1:28:51

an incident and now it's canceled. So now

1:28:54

your $100 million investment's worth nothing

1:28:56

and it's a tax write-off, you know? And

1:28:59

so if you're a manager and you're

1:29:01

managing multiple projects,

1:29:03

decision-making gets real simple,

1:29:06

right? You're not gonna take any risks. You're not gonna put

1:29:08

it out there. You're gonna go for old IP. You're

1:29:10

gonna execute it in a proven way. You're

1:29:13

gonna cast people that you know are safe and

1:29:15

feel safe. You're gonna hire a director who

1:29:17

can just get the shit in the can

1:29:19

according to the DGA, NBA, talk

1:29:21

to the actors, check all the boxes, check

1:29:23

the legal stuff. Like,

1:29:26

that's for-profit

1:29:28

corporate speech. And for you personally,

1:29:30

just like about, forget like just the ails

1:29:32

of the industry which is completely

1:29:35

fucked up, but for you personally, like your optimization,

1:29:38

like do you feel like you can operate

1:29:40

where you have

1:29:42

peace or some sort of

1:29:44

like balance and harmony in your life, you can still

1:29:46

bring chaos and danger to your work? Or

1:29:48

do you wanna figure that out? Like are

1:29:51

you figuring that out? Again,

1:29:54

going back to that whole thing that me and

1:29:56

Shai have been going back and forth for like

1:29:58

fucking years.

1:29:59

I mean, I can bring

1:30:02

whatever I need to bring in

1:30:05

the moment that I need it. Like I'm confident

1:30:08

of that. I'm also

1:30:10

lately, like

1:30:12

everything I've gone through, I'm

1:30:14

a lot gentler with people, you know?

1:30:16

Like, I think it's like, you'll

1:30:18

get this also, it's like a generational thing, right?

1:30:21

The way we grew up, it's just like, keep your fucking mouth shut,

1:30:23

show up, work hard and eventually someone's gonna

1:30:25

be like, you come here, you carry the ball, you

1:30:27

know? Okay, you're a dick to me for three

1:30:29

years and now I'm cool. But like that sort of vibe

1:30:32

is gone.

1:30:38

Like, what does the individual

1:30:40

need?

1:30:41

Am I pushing my own shit onto you? Am

1:30:44

I like, oh, I'm a director and you're creating

1:30:46

a character and I'm helping you do that?

1:30:49

How much of that is my own ego about

1:30:51

how I need to see myself, you know?

1:30:54

And so once you start seeing that piece,

1:30:56

you take that away,

1:30:57

then okay, you as a human being, what energy

1:31:00

do you need from me so you feel safe so

1:31:03

you can do your job? So

1:31:06

just, yeah, just being more

1:31:09

respectful of people, you know, and

1:31:11

even the cultural stuff, like, oh shit,

1:31:13

you know, but like, yeah,

1:31:16

let's wake up. How do my

1:31:18

words impact other people? How does my art impact

1:31:20

other people? How does my art impact

1:31:22

different communities? How,

1:31:25

you know, like being responsible

1:31:27

and taking ownership of what you're putting out of

1:31:29

the world is important too. So it's just

1:31:31

like, I'm

1:31:33

just

1:31:35

trying to have a conversation with the world

1:31:37

and yeah.

1:31:38

What's

1:31:41

the most important thing in your life would you say? My

1:31:43

kids. You talk about

1:31:45

that? Yeah, it's just like,

1:31:49

yeah, I went through, you know, intense

1:31:51

divorce and coming from

1:31:53

the world of like a couple that

1:31:56

no one ever, ever, ever thought would

1:31:59

fail. Yeah.

1:31:59

my mind. And you know, and

1:32:02

a lot of it was just how I grew up, how

1:32:04

we grew up not having tools, not having

1:32:07

the ability to communicate what are the patterns

1:32:10

you see as a child, you know,

1:32:13

all that.

1:32:14

I've gone through like, at one point, I was doing

1:32:16

like seven hours of therapy a week

1:32:18

trying to deal all this shit, you know, and

1:32:20

at a certain point, you crack yourself

1:32:23

open. And, you

1:32:26

know, with these kids, I went from like, yeah,

1:32:30

the director of the Hollywood director show up at the house,

1:32:32

eat dinner, you know, very formal,

1:32:34

old school, you know, and

1:32:36

I've had to learn how to have relationships

1:32:39

with my kids, you know, on their

1:32:42

terms

1:32:43

without me pushing an

1:32:46

image of myself into their world. What's required

1:32:48

to do that? Being

1:32:53

honest with who you are, like

1:32:57

identity, like identity, like this concept

1:32:59

of identity is something I fuck with so much now.

1:33:02

And because I've had to be all

1:33:04

these different people. And I

1:33:07

created what I thought was a successful construction,

1:33:09

totally. And I'm just playing a fucking

1:33:11

character, you know, and then it's like, like,

1:33:15

being loving

1:33:17

myself enough to not be afraid

1:33:19

to be seen is what turned it around

1:33:21

for me. And a lot of that was

1:33:24

like, like, again, a lot of therapy.

1:33:27

And like, oh, these things that happened to

1:33:29

me,

1:33:29

that's trauma. Oh, that's

1:33:32

bad. Oh, that's not love.

1:33:35

Oh, survival, fight or flight is not

1:33:38

love. Like, fucking

1:33:42

pain and trauma and red flags are

1:33:44

not love, just because your nervous

1:33:46

system jacks you the fuck

1:33:49

up. It's home. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Because that's where you

1:33:51

feel at home. Yeah, it's not.

1:33:53

And

1:33:55

then it'd be vulnerable, you know,

1:33:58

and coming from a world like like, seriously.

1:33:59

and everything and you know, talking about

1:34:02

toxic masculine and all that shit,

1:34:04

we're like shut down, not revealing

1:34:06

emotion, not being present, having

1:34:09

a persona, like

1:34:12

stripping all that away and

1:34:14

then, you

1:34:15

know, like most of my life I'm

1:34:17

just running from pain, right? Running from intense

1:34:20

fucking pain. And eventually

1:34:22

I had to stop and feel it, you know, and

1:34:24

that's been these past few years and it's like,

1:34:28

like, oh shit, I have a heart, oh I'm

1:34:31

a human being, oh I'm capable of love.

1:34:33

Cause I was told a really, a lot

1:34:35

of fucking bad stories about myself

1:34:37

growing up. I was a piece of shit, I was gonna end up in

1:34:39

prison, I'm gonna fucking kill people,

1:34:42

I'm not a good guy,

1:34:44

like not trustworthy, you know, violent, fearless

1:34:47

guy, whatever, and

1:34:50

I internalized all that. And

1:34:52

so just a lot

1:34:54

of work to get those stories out,

1:34:57

the stories you tell yourself, but the stories other

1:34:59

people have told about you,

1:35:01

discovering yourself

1:35:03

and then feeling safe to be seen. And

1:35:07

the main motivator in this is having

1:35:10

some sort of like, it

1:35:12

is your relationship with your kids. Yeah. That's

1:35:15

the, yeah. It's deeper than I understood

1:35:17

because, like straight up, like divorce

1:35:20

is like hell on earth, and I

1:35:22

was like, for a minute, it

1:35:24

was so confusing and painful, it was like, well maybe

1:35:27

the best thing I can do is get out of these kids' lives

1:35:29

and end this contention and pain, and

1:35:32

I'm a toxic piece of shit anyway,

1:35:35

so me not being around can only be good

1:35:37

for them. And so

1:35:39

it's like, and then my ancestral wounds

1:35:42

of like my dad, which is a fucking

1:35:44

major form of rejection, right? Child

1:35:46

me is like, oh that homeboy didn't fucking love me enough

1:35:48

to hang out and protect

1:35:51

me and stop me from the horrific abuse

1:35:53

that was about to unfold, right? So

1:35:54

I gotta work through that and I gotta fucking love him and

1:35:57

figure out how to love him and love the little boy that experienced

1:35:59

that. before I can even

1:36:01

love my own kids. Like,

1:36:04

bro. And I mean,

1:36:11

it just, that whole process

1:36:13

taught me that there's more to me than I thought.

1:36:16

You know, like, I'm

1:36:18

like a fake ass empty room. Like

1:36:21

I don't exist. I'm just a collection of masks

1:36:23

and personalities and reactions in

1:36:25

any given situation.

1:36:28

No, no, you have a heart. You

1:36:30

can love. And

1:36:33

your love has value. And

1:36:35

it's okay for you to love. Like,

1:36:38

all that was new to me, bro. Yeah, man. Yeah,

1:36:40

man. Yeah, dude. And

1:36:43

where are you at with

1:36:45

your kids now? I mean, I know like fatherhood is just

1:36:47

like, it's like a series of fucking getting

1:36:49

slammed. Like just failing your fucking ass

1:36:51

off and you kind of keep going. And I know there's ups and downs,

1:36:54

but where do you feel like you're out with it, with

1:36:56

the relationship with each other? I'm solid now,

1:36:58

yeah. Fuck yeah. Like,

1:37:00

no matter what stories they've been told

1:37:03

about me, they've seen enough

1:37:05

with their own eyes at this point. What is it that

1:37:07

they've seen? Just I'm there. You're

1:37:09

there. I'm in there. Yeah, yeah. And

1:37:11

I went to the mat for them and fought for

1:37:14

them. And

1:37:15

you know, and it's like

1:37:18

just creating a safe space for them, you

1:37:21

know? Like

1:37:23

parenting them,

1:37:24

parenting myself. Like,

1:37:28

what the fuck? You know? What

1:37:30

the fuck? It's beautiful. Dude,

1:37:33

I mean, yeah.

1:37:36

You know, it's cool. It's

1:37:39

really cool. I mean, again, maybe back to that football

1:37:41

coach thing, but it's fucking

1:37:43

really cool to sit down with you like this,

1:37:45

man, and see

1:37:48

you like this. And like, you know, because it

1:37:50

always was a little bit, for

1:37:53

me, you know, again, I felt so like

1:37:55

protected and I always felt loved

1:37:57

by you. I always felt like even.

1:37:59

just like you choosing me was just

1:38:02

such a it was such a huge thing for me, man,

1:38:04

I took it so seriously, such a

1:38:06

miracle in my life, you know, and like getting to

1:38:08

do that. But I also

1:38:10

like, and I didn't know whether it was the movie

1:38:12

or not, but I always felt like, man,

1:38:15

like, you know, you there was always

1:38:17

this thing, like, you know, you could you could never really

1:38:19

get in, never never really opened up there.

1:38:21

Like, you would see that like, he's the boss, man,

1:38:24

he's a fucking gangster, like he's a real gangster,

1:38:26

like the way he handles himself. Like, I'd seen that.

1:38:28

But I also this unbelievable

1:38:29

ability to like break

1:38:32

people down and open them up and like, and

1:38:34

talk about the most intricate and

1:38:37

most like a net no filmmaker, no

1:38:39

artists I've ever worked with has been able to like, you

1:38:41

know, plate plate people's fucking chords

1:38:44

of the most intricate every ounce

1:38:46

of the pain where the pain and the darkness is like,

1:38:48

just as beautiful as is dark and like, so

1:38:51

fascinated by it. But yet, so like

1:38:53

you ain't gonna get there with me. And I

1:38:56

see like, and you and

1:38:58

just talk just a little bit, man.

1:38:59

And we don't have to go but like, like

1:39:02

just a little bit about Kevin and just

1:39:04

because he's, you know, I think he means

1:39:06

just like a ton to everyone in this room. And like, you know, you

1:39:08

brought Kevin into my life. But like, who is Kevin to you

1:39:10

and like the work that you guys have done and Kevin

1:39:13

Vance. Um, yeah.

1:39:17

No, no minute. Madam

1:39:21

in a parallel life and

1:39:25

watching him

1:39:27

transform. Because like, when

1:39:30

I when I met him, he was just in it. Yeah, like,

1:39:32

like, and he had had that, you

1:39:34

know, hangover of like,

1:39:37

the military. I mean,

1:39:39

the secret to the military is like, a

1:39:41

handful of people do all the work, right?

1:39:43

So it's like, Oh, we have all these army divisions. Well,

1:39:46

they're kind of just holding security on the edge

1:39:48

at the end of the day, while, you know,

1:39:50

this handful of very highly trained,

1:39:53

amazing people

1:39:55

kind of gets it done at

1:39:57

incredible.

1:40:00

incredible moral

1:40:02

hazard, blowback cost to

1:40:04

self. And he

1:40:07

was like one of the first

1:40:09

people I've met from that community. And

1:40:12

it's so funny because what I met him is like solidly in the

1:40:14

community and solidly in that identity.

1:40:17

I am an elite operator, that

1:40:19

is who I am. And he evolved

1:40:23

out of that and didn't need that to

1:40:26

be his identity and then went on this healing

1:40:29

journey and started helping people like right, left and center

1:40:31

and was really a fucking pioneer now. And

1:40:33

now he's out there like trying to save lives,

1:40:36

rescuing people because yeah, these dudes in these communities,

1:40:40

they take so much trauma on our behalf,

1:40:42

massive

1:40:43

amounts of trauma and they do really

1:40:46

dark things on our behalf. And

1:40:49

that whole warrior culture has its

1:40:51

own thing going on

1:40:53

and it's not a safe space to like be

1:40:55

vulnerable and talk about your heart. And I've

1:40:57

seen it in the gang world too where the homies

1:40:59

are like becoming

1:41:01

conscious. And like

1:41:03

we used to be cavemen back in the straight up.

1:41:05

Cavemen. And now it's like,

1:41:08

oh, we're humans and we

1:41:10

have this holistic life and

1:41:12

can impact people. And

1:41:15

there's something about people that have seen that

1:41:17

extreme violence and lived in it and been

1:41:19

around it

1:41:20

that pushes them closer towards

1:41:22

a bigger human truth and they bring

1:41:25

that back into the regular life. And that's

1:41:27

why I've always connected with that because I felt

1:41:29

like they're in the real world and everyone else

1:41:31

is in the fake world. Fucking April.

1:41:33

I mean, honestly, I think that more

1:41:35

than anything else is why I'm trying to do this.

1:41:37

Because it's like, look, if I can, if

1:41:39

I can have, like if you say that and

1:41:41

like Kevin says that, it's

1:41:43

like everybody else in their life can like stop

1:41:46

hiding behind all this shit. It's like, look at who's saying

1:41:48

it, dude. And it's like, look at the potential. Like I know

1:41:50

you've been through it, but like look at the potential for light.

1:41:52

Look at what you can create. Look at how you can

1:41:54

serve. Like that's it right

1:41:56

there is how do you serve.

1:41:59

I'm wrestling my journey

1:42:02

right now at the moment. It's just like, like, am

1:42:05

I worthy of serving, you know? And

1:42:07

it's like, OK, track record, these movies

1:42:09

impact these communities of health people, OK,

1:42:11

there's evidence there that I am worthy to serve.

1:42:14

I would say so. I just got to figure it out.

1:42:16

But like.

1:42:18

Everything's ego, you know, like like. Ego

1:42:23

and trauma and pain and how you shape

1:42:25

your personality to not feel

1:42:27

the pain, you know, and it's like,

1:42:31

I don't know, you know, like

1:42:33

like the homies fucking gangsters, right? Like

1:42:36