Cynthia Erivo Says Filming 'Harriet' in Virginia "Felt Rural, It Felt Connected" | TIFF 2019 - video Dailymotion

Hollywood Journal

Cynthia Erivo stars as Harribet Tubman, in the first film narrative of her life, with Leslie Odom Jr. They joined Kasi Lemmons at TIFF 2019 to discuss 'Harriet.'

Transcript

00:00What is the last film or TV show you watched that made you cry?

00:04Probably Coco.

00:06Oh my gosh! Yes!

00:08Probably Coco. My daughter.

00:11It was the second movie. I have a two-year-old.

00:14It was the second movie that we allowed her to see.

00:17So when you have these little people that come, they're blank slates.

00:21So we're super intentional about, okay, now we introduce this one.

00:25And my sister showed her Coco before, you know, so like we, you know.

00:31Anyway, it happened before we could like decide if it was okay.

00:34So I sat down and watched Coco with her and I was done with Coco.

00:46It's a historical adventure film about Harriet Tubman.

00:48The first theatrical film about Harriet Tubman.

00:50And it really takes place in freedom.

00:53It starts just before she runs for the first time.

00:57And it really follows about a decade, a little more than a decade of her life

01:02when she was at her most active and doing her most kind of exciting work.

01:06My main priority was for people to see the human woman behind the hero.

01:12You know, we know of her heroics.

01:15We know of the incredible things that she had done.

01:18But I felt like knowing how human she was, the losses that she had suffered, the love of her life leaving her,

01:28all of that made her heroics even more incredible.

01:32Because it's one thing to do something and be a hero.

01:35But it's quite another to be very human, suffer a loss and decide to keep moving forward.

01:41And that's what she did.

01:42Paul Taswell, who did our costumes, allowed us to sort of work with him to discover who these people were.

01:50His intention, I believe, was to also tell the story of each person's growth through what they wore.

01:57Definitely for Harriet, her costume would change as she went through another phase in her life,

02:05another moment in the time that she was working.

02:08So by the end, it felt really rich and heavy.

02:14And it felt like I was wearing a superhero costume by the end of the movie.

02:18And it progresses right from the beginning to the end.

02:22And to be able to be on the set with the people in that place.

02:27We were in Richmond, Virginia shooting.

02:29So it felt rural.

02:32It felt connected.

02:35And Leslie, for you, what was it like to step into this character?

02:38How did you sort of find out who he was and what was sort of driving his work?

02:44William's a storyteller in this movie and in life.

02:50He understood the importance of not just helping anybody who wound up on his doorstep.

03:00Anybody who had the courage and the great luck and fortune to make it all that way to him in Philadelphia.

03:09So he'd help them.

03:10But he really knew the importance of recording that.

03:14Of putting that down for all time.

03:17Writing that down, which was an act of bravery and risking his life and everybody else's life to write those narratives down.

03:25But I'm so glad he did.

03:27History is so heavy.

03:28It can be so heavy.

03:29But there's so much amazing inspiration in it.

03:33You know what I mean?

03:34These people were so amazing to have fought and survived and achieved so much.

03:42And these incredible acts of bravery and bravado.

03:48You know?

03:49I think of William still like hiding that book every night in the graveyard.

03:53You know?

03:54These wonderful stories.

03:55And Harriet was so, became such a guiding light in my life.

04:00She became very, very present to me.

04:04Like with us all the time.

04:07With us all the time.

04:08And you know, Cynthia really brought her.

04:10So she was just, it was like, it was a blessed, you know, couple of years of my life that I spent really deeply involved with Harriet.

04:19And take care of you.

04:20Thanks as well.

04:21Thanks, hon.

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Cynthia Erivo Says Filming 'Harriet' in Virginia "Felt Rural, It Felt Connected" | TIFF 2019

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