Ryan Coogler Talks Chadwick Boseman and Teases Rihanna Song on ‘Black Panther: Wakanda Forever’ Soundtrack

Hollywood Journal

Director Ryan Coogler spoke with The Hollywood Reporter on the red carpet of ‘Black Panther: Wakanda Forever.’

Transcript

00:00I wanted to lead off with the most recent news, which is that I know that Rihanna has

00:03a song on the upcoming soundtrack and everything like that, and she kind of came back into

00:06the game with this.

00:08How did that come together?

00:09That's a great question.

00:14When we realized what this film was going to be about, we were looking for artists who

00:19can embody it thematically, and we were taking a different musical approach with the film.

00:23Ludwig Jornstein, who's our composer, and myself, we were looking to make the film and have

00:29actual songs that were incorporated into the score throughout the movie, but we knew we

00:35were able to kind of thread the needle with Kendrick last time, so we were looking for

00:38artists like that that could work with the film's thematics, and Rihanna was at the top

00:44of that list, and we were able to get just about everybody who was on that list, we were

00:48able to work with Timbs and a few other great artists that people will know about as the

00:52film starts to come out to the public, but for Rihanna, man, we knew she was at a point

00:57in her life as well, where she was focusing on different things, focusing on business,

01:02motherhood, which is a big theme in our film, so we were hoping that maybe it could work

01:06out.

01:07And boy, it did it for this song.

01:08I can't wait for people to hear it.

01:10What was the process to, you know, I know that you kind of had to rework and rewrite the

01:14script especially, and chose to make grief and loss obviously a major element.

01:19How did you navigate that, both personally, but also as, you know, a writer?

01:24I mean, navigating how to restructure something, rewrite something, it's, for me as an artist,

01:31there's parts of it that are technical, you know, and then there's parts of it that are

01:34more emotional, you know.

01:36And, you know, film is an emotional medium, you know, it just is.

01:41So having to infuse those things is a big part of my job, you know what I'm saying?

01:46Thankfully, the process is iterative, you know what I mean, we work through several

01:48drafts and then the actors come to town, they give us their thoughts and we work through

01:51that and then by the end of it, you know what I'm saying, everybody's kind of had their

01:54hands on it, you know, in their own way.

01:57So the best way I got through it was by leaning on my collaborators, I had a brilliant co-writer

02:01and Joe Robert Cole, great producers and Kevin Feige and Nate Moore and the rest of the

02:04folks over at Marvel and we just got through it together.

02:09What do you think Chadwick would have thought about this film and did you work with his family

02:12at all on the sequel and just sort of speak with them just about

02:15his presence?

02:16Yeah, well, you know, Chadwick had people who were in his life creatively as well as

02:24family and we were in close contact with those people, you know, very close, specifically

02:28with his wife, Simone, and his creative partner, Logan Coles, who, you know, he and Chad had

02:36a production company.

02:37So, you know, we were staying tapped in with them as much as we could and, you know, they

02:42gave us the space to create.

02:43But obviously we were seeking out their opinion the whole time and we're looking forward to

02:47sharing it with everybody.

02:48One more quick question for you.

02:49I know that you're building out, developing something for Disney Plus based on the world

02:53of Wakanda and just wanted to ask you what elements are you pulling really from the film

02:58to sort of navigate that new format?

02:59Uh, no comment.

03:00Thank you so much.

03:01Nice meeting you.

03:02Thank you so much.

03:03Nice meeting you.

03:05Thank you so much.

03:06Nice meeting you.

03:07Thank you so much.

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