Ahoy, squirts! Quint here with Capone's fantastic interview with Terrence Howard, one of the new elite. I get the same kind of feeling from Howard's performances that I did when Don Cheadle broke out in the '90s. He's the real deal and Capone does a great job with this interview! Enjoy!!!
Hey, everyone. Capone in Chicago here. If you'd asked me a week ago, who my dream interview for 2005 would be, without hesitation my response would have been Chicago-born Terrence Howard. Is there anyone in the last 365 days (going back to his strong supporting work in RAY, as well as outstanding roles in HBO's LACKAWANNA BLUES, CRASH, HUSTLE & FLOW, FOUR BROTHERS, and what I've read is continued great work in GET RICH OR DIE TRYIN') who has contributed more to film acting than Howard? I think not.
I knew Howard would be in Chicago last week since he was being honored for his career achievements by the Chicago International Film Festival's Black Perspectives showcase, and when I threw my name in the hat to interview him and was told "We'll get back to you" by the publicist handling the event, I assumed that the interview wasn't happening. I need to have a little more faith in the machine. Here's my 15 minutes with Terrence Howard.
Capone: Welcome home to Chicago. I know you were born here, but you didn’t really grow up here, did you?
Terrence Howard: Just long enough to be born, and then we moved to Cleveland.
Capone: You’re being honored tonight and being given a career achievement award at the age of 36. Does that make you feel old?
TH: Not really, I been in this business for 20 years, and 20 years is a long time. I wouldn’t have seen 20 years pass by, but I would have noticed it going by. Someone brought me a picture of my very first head shot, and I looked so young. I was 16 years old when I got that picture taken. I look at my face now and say, “Oh, wow, what happened to my cheek bones? I can’t find them any more.”
Capone: You a skinny kid?
TH: Yeah, a skinny kid that believed so much. He wanted so much.
Capone: Back in 1999 you were honored by the Chicago Film Critics Association for your work in THE BEST MAN. For a lot of people, that was the first time that they really took notice of your work, though you had been around for a long time before then.
TH: Yeah, I had been in MR. HOLLAND’S OPUS, but the majority of films that I was doing I had smaller parts. I felt like Asian film artists. They’ve been doing films for 20 years over in their country, but it takes a while before other cultures become aware of the ability you have. Your own culture first has to place you up high on their shoulders before someone in another tent or another tribe might see you and say, “Hey, who’s that standing up real tall over there. Looks like a giant.” And, then they come and take notice. That’s the way I see it.
Capone: People always talked about your delivery—it seemed so different than the other people around you in THE BEST MAN. You’ve kind of made a career, in a way, of being the guy in the film who may not necessarily be the lead, but he’s the guy that your eyes go to when you’re supposed to be paying attention to the lead. HUSTLE & FLOW was different, though, because it was you in practically every scene. Why did you select that film to make that leap?
TH: The director [Craig Brewer] believed in me. The director had an opportunity to make the film for $10 million if he put a famous rapper in my role instead of me. And as poor as he was, he stuck to his guns and said, “No, I’m going to make this film with Terrence Howard.”
Capone: So there pressure on him to get a rapper in that role?
TH: Yeah, that’s why we couldn’t make the film for two-and-a-half years.
Capone: So, it wasn’t that you were deliberately not seeking out leading parts up to that point in your career.
TH: No, I was in desperate search of one, but I didn’t have a publicist. I wasn’t well publicized throughout the industry. I had been known more as a bit player, so to speak, even though I never viewed it that way. They could have a star in the movie, but I was always the star of any movie I was in, as far as I was concerned—just the same way each and every person is the star in their own life. I came in there with the full belief that you always take a piece of you into each and every character. I’ve always believed a lot in myself, more than I believe anything else someone may say about me. You may put me number 12 or 24 on a roster sheet, but for some reason, that 12 or 24 gets reduced down to one.
Capone: I guess that maybe was the sense I was getting in THE BEST MAN, that the performance you were giving was a lead performance in a film where you didn’t appear as much as some of the other actors. But, it was that attitude that very much came through. I always got a sense that you seek out something positive in every character you play, even when the person isn’t the nicest.
TH: I look for the truth in them, and the truth is always good, no matter who they are, if the truth is their motivation. It’s how they respond to the truth that determines whether they are good or bad. But, the truth is always good in its essence, and if you stay honest to the truth and you stick to the facts that have been presented by the writer. . . yes, this was the truth of his life, but these are the choices that he made. So, who did that make him?
Every person, no matter how evil they may appear to be, there’s at one given point throughout each day and each moment that they have to look at themselves in the mirror and wish that they could be something better. And, I don’t believe that that should be done away from the camera. I believe that you find the truth in front of the camera with the camera watching, not that you find the truth with your back to the camera and turn around and there’s the truth. No, you let it all take place in front of the audience, and that’s what they want to see: the vulnerability. They want to gain courage and strength to make the right choices in their own personal lives.
Capone: That certainly seemed to be the case with DJay in HUSTLE & FLOW. He was trying to find something positive and truthful in his life, and broadcast it in a way. Let me jump ahead a little bit. Tell me about the character you’re playing in GET RICH OR DIE TRYIN’. You’re 50 Cent’s manager in that film?
TH: Yeah, I’m his friend and manager.
Capone: Is that based on someone real?
TH: Yeah.
Capone: And, is it someone you were able to meet?
TH: No, I couldn’t meet with him. The guy was in jail. One of the things that ‘50’ said to me about him was that this was the most honest cat that he knew, very soft spoken. There was no pretentiousness in him, no pretense. He was just who life is. If you needed him, he was there. If somebody caused some trouble, he would go and shoot ’em, just because. But, if somebody needed some help, he was there to help them. He just had no toleration for rivalry at all, no toleration for it.
Capone: Tell me a little bit about working with Jim Sheridan.
TH: Oh, that was a dream. That was a dream come true. He’s the most gifted individual I’ve ever met on this planet. I call him the Lucky Leprechaun, because he has magic, you know. He has an invisible shellaley. He’s just going around and touching and blessing. He was a better actor than any actor on the set, a better cinematographer and camera operator and DP. He can do anything. And, I would follow him anywhere.
Capone: Were you at all concerned before the film started shooting that he wasn’t necessarily the best guy for this particular film? Or, did you not even consider that because he’s such a master?
TH: No. Einstein said, Everything’s relative. If you understand one thing about one thing, you understand one thing about all things. Jim seems to be someone who understands that law of relativity and can find common frames of reference from his own upbringing, and what he had to deal with in Northern Ireland and what takes place with the disenfranchised inside of the urban communities. And, that’s the story he was telling, you know. Every human being wants one thing, and that’s just to be happy.
Capone: So, where he was coming from wasn’t so much a black/white thing. It was, as you said, more a story of disenfranchised people.
TH: It’s a human story. I don’t believe that there are black people, white people, or anybody. We’re all made in God’s image. We’re all the same…reproductions of Adam, no matter how far or what direction you go in. I’m an earthling. I don’t have a race. I’m being honored by a group of people that call themselves black, but I don’t think there’s any such thing. I don’t make that distinction. We’re all part of the human race.
Capone: Amen! Some actors have said that they don’t really like working with
rap artists in films. You’ve clearly embraced the practice at this point. Do
you ever find on a set that they’re looking to you for advice and guidance
on acting?
TH: Yeah, the same way I look to other actors for advice or the same way
I’ll look to the camera operator for advice. I mean, I get more advice from
the camera operator than I ever get from the director or from the producer,
you know. It’s just because, though they may not be practicing the field in
which I am, does not mean they haven’t been observing it. And, I believe
that every person that’s been called to this business is an artist. You as a
writer, you’re an artist. And, if you wanted to, you could translate the
same power that gives you the ability to rule that pen into ruling your eyes
or ruling your voice and sing.
We can do anything as an artist. That’s the beautiful thing. We’re the
cuttlefish of the world. We can change and transform and become whatever we
must become. That’s how I view these artists, these poets who have been
coined ‘rappers,’ but I think they use the term ‘rapper’ to describe more of
a negative connotation towards them.
Capone: For the record, I did say “rap artists” when I asked the question.
TH: Yeah, I noticed. The initial picture when you see ‘rapper,’ is the cap,
the baggy pants, the growl on the face, the potential gun somewhere or the
thought of guns, the thought of violence, the thought of drugs, the thought
of misogynists.
I like the term ‘hip-hop artists’ a lot better, because the other term
carries some very, very ugly things with it. And, every so-called rapper
that I’ve worked withhas believed so much in the
desire to become a better actor, not that they want to be an actor. They
already are. They already see the actor inside of themselves. You’ll meet no
one more dedicated than Andre Benjamin [Outkast’s Andre 3000, whom Howard
worked with in FOUR BROTHERS and the upcoming IDLEWILD].
Capone: Who you’ve worked with a couple of times.
TH: Yeah, the same thing with Ludacris, with Chris Bridges [Howard’s co-star
in HUSTLE & FLOW and CRASH]. And the same thing with Curtis Jackson [50
Cent]. All three of these people, even though they have a persona that
they’ve been able to master one particular side of this jewel called art,
there are so many other facets that they have to learn.
Me, as an actor, I’m playing my guitar and my music as a songwriter, and I
want to learn how to sculpt, and I’m trying to pin my arm to painting now.
And, is it right for a painter, who just because he’s trained for 20 years
and went to a special school, to say my pictures have no business hanging up
in the same gallery that his are in? No, I think that would be hypocritical.
Capone: In a single year, because of two crucial scenes in the two movies he
made with you, I have come to think of Ludacris as an exceptional actor; I
want to see him act more. I know that John Singleton always seems to have
been a fan of casting hip-hop artists in his films. What did you learn from
working with him on FOUR BROTHERS?
TH: I don’t talk about John Singleton.
Capone: No?
TH: My mamma said, “If you ain’t got nothin’ nice to say, don’t say nothin’
at all.”
Capone: Oh no, really?! [Realizing that I was already well over my time
limit with Terrance Howard, I decided not to pursue this, and go to my last
question.] No problem. Talk to me a little bit about IDLEWILD. What are you
doing in that film?
TH: That film is amazing. [Director-screenwriter] Bryan Barber has put
together a film that’s almost like the bastard child of SIN CITY and MOULIN
ROUGE.
Capone: So it’s a highly visual film?
TH: Yes, his vision and ability to translate his vision into a cinematic art
is…awww…he’s wonderful! It’s set in 1929, ’30, ’31, and we’re involved in
finer things of society--those who provide what’s missing from the tables.
Capone: You’re a bootlegger in the film, right?
TH: Yes, a distributor of fine goods,
Capone: You’re in the right city [Chicago] to talk about that for sure.
TH: Yes, indeed. It was built upon it.
Capone: Congratulations on the tribute tonight and continued success in
whatever you artistic endeavors you line up for yourself.
TH: I appreciate that sincerely.
Capone
Capone: You’re a bootlegger in the film, right?
TH: Yes, a distributor of fine goods,
Capone: You’re in the right city [Chicago] to talk about that for sure.
TH: Yes, indeed. It was built upon it.
Capone: Congratulations on the tribute tonight and continued success in whatever you artistic endeavors you line up for yourself.
TH: I appreciate that sincerely.
Capone
