Ryan Coogler (INTERVIEW)
Ryan
Coogler
The
“Creed” Interview
with
Kam Williams
Coogler's
Creed!
Filmmaker
Ryan Coogler hails from the East Bay Area of Northern California. In
2011, his student film, Fig, which followed a young street
prostitute’s fight to keep her daughter safe, won the Director’s
Guild of America's Student Filmmaker Award, as well as the HBO Short
Filmmaker Award. He earned his MFA in Film and Television Production
at the University of Southern California in May 2011.
Ryan's
feature length screenplay “Fruitvale,” based on the 2009 BART
police shooting of Oscar Grant, was selected for the 2012 Sundance
January Screenwriter’s Lab. In 2013, he made his directorial debut
with the critically-acclaimed adaptation of the script, “Fruitvale
Station,” which won both the Grand jury Prize and the Audience
Award at the Sundance Film Festival.
Ryan
still lives in the Bay Area where, in addition to making movies, he
works as a counselor at Juvenile Hall in San Francisco. Here, he
talks about his sophomore offering, Creed, the seventh installment in
the Rocky franchise. The picture stars Michael B. Jordan, Sly
Stallone and Tessa Thompson.
Kam
Williams: Hey
Ryan, thanks for the time.
Ryan
Coogler:
What's
going on, Kam?
KW:
I loved
the film!
RC:
Thank
you, bro. I really appreciate that.
KW:
I loved
how you weaved a new character-driven storyline in with the old Rocky
so well. You did a masterful job.
RC:
That
means the world to me because we worked really, really hard on it.
KW:
Michael
[Creed's star Michael B. Jordan] told me that this was a project that
you already had on a back burner when you were shooting Fruitvale
Station. How long had you been thinking about making this movie?
RC:
I've
been a fan of the Rocky movies for about as long as I can remember,
because of my father. He was a big Rocky fan who watched the movies
with his mom when she was bed-ridden. So, it was kind of a tradition
that got passed down to me and my brothers. That was before Mike and
I even met. I came up with the concept for the script while watching
my father deal with his own disease. I came up with a story that I
hoped he would like about young man who has a relationship with a
hero going through the same illness.
KW:
How did
you come up with the idea of making a Rocky movie revolving around
the son of Apollo Creed?
RC:
When I
would watch the Rocky movies with my father, I loved Rocky, but I
would also relate to Apollo instantly, every time he walked onto the
screen. And I would root for him, even when he was at odds with
Rocky. That's one of the things that was so interesting about that
character. How he was so beloved. I spoke to Sly who said Apollo was
inspired by Muhammad Ali.
KW:
How did
it feel to get Sly's blessing to make another Rocky movie?
RC:
That
character is very much a part of him, emotionally and creatively. so,
it was a very big deal when he said, "Let's do this!"
KW:
What
was it like directing him?
RC:
It was
amazing in every way, Kam. I learned a lot in the process, and he was
so much fun to be around and to have on set. He challenged me in some
ways I'd never been challenged before. Remember, he has a 40-year
background in being a movie star. Not just an actor, but a star. So,
he has an incredible perspective. Plus, he's played this character
for 40 years. My biggest job was to convince him that all he had to do
was to show up and act, since he was also used to writing, directing,
producing and choreographing. That being said, he was always
available when I sought out his advice. But i would say that his
performance here was very much Sly as an actor unfiltered by
distractions. He was very focused. That enabled me to bring out a lot
of elements of the character that were within Sly, but people hadn't
really seen before. And he was excited about that. .
KW:
Yeah,
when I first interviewed him, I was surprised at how intelligent,
sensitive and sophisticated he was, because I was expecting to meet
somebody like Rocky or Rambo.
RC:
I
walked into my first meeting with him the same way. You realize
within a few seconds that you believed those characters as the result
of world-class acting. He's very creative, and an intellectual, and
nothing like the characters he's famous for. Once I realized that, I
was just taken aback, and became really excited, the same way a
sports coach would be if they had an opportunity to add someone with
great talent to their team. I was salivating at the idea of working
with him. He's so convincing on set to the point that you find
yourself calling him Rocky.
KW:
I told
my readers I'd be interviewing you. Attorney Bernadette Beekman says
that you and Michael remind her of De Niro and Scorcese.
Of the
many famous actor/director duos, which do you feel you two most
resemble?
RC:
[Laughs] That's a great question. It's so hard for me to compare
us to them, Spike and Denzel, more recently, Scorcese and DiCaprio,
or any other pillars of the industry. you could also look at David O.
Russell, who tends to work with Jennifer Lawrence, Christian Bale,
Bradley Cooper and De Niro, too. I could never compare us to any of
them after just our second time working together. But I do hope that
I won't feel as comfortable about the comparison 20, 30 or 40 years
from now. You know what I mean? [Chuckles]
KW:
After
Fruitvale Station, which was a true story about the shooting of an
innocent, unarmed young black man, Oscar Grant, by a police officer,
the whole Black Lives Matter movement began to blossom.
RC:
What
Fruitvale was about had been going on for years, and it's still
happening. Technology played such a role in that movie. Folks had
cell phone cameras on that train, and they just happened to take them
out and capture Oscar's murder. The thing about the Bay Area is that
it's on the leading edge of technical innovation. Now, the rest of
the world has kind of caught up. Today, everybody has a camera on
their phone. So, the type of violence that you used to only hear
stories about, and ordinarily couldn't be verified, is often being
caught on camera. That's why the movement is getting so much
traction. But Mike and I are definitely proud to have had the
opportunity to make that film.
KW:
I wish
cell phones existed when I was young. I was profile stopped dozens of
times in my teens and early twenties.
RC:
That's
heartbreaking, man. What people take for granted is the trauma that
comes from being stopped when you look like us.
KW:
Editor/Legist
Patricia Turnier asks: What was the greatest barrier you faced in
Hollywood and how did you overcome it?
RC:
My own
inexperience. It's very much a business that's risk averse. And when
I became a filmmaker, I had some great ideas for feature films, but
the way the industry's set up, you have to have an agent before
anybody will give you the time of day. That sets up a strange
Catch-22. You basically have to make something on your own without a
lot of outside help that gathers enough attention to make the studios
take note. That was the biggest hurdle, although I also had to deal
with being young, black and from Oakland.
KW:
Thanks
again for the time, Ryan, and best of luck with the film.
RC:
Thanks,
Kam. Really nice talking to you.
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