John Singleton: "In the Writers' Room, I'm a Performance Artist" | Drama Showrunner Roundtable - video Dailymotion

Hollywood Journal

A few short weeks after sharing his creative wisdom with the Drama Showrunner Roundtable, John Singleton suffered a stroke. On April 28, he was pronounced dead at 51. The Hollywood Reporter honors Singleton's life and continued legacy.

Transcript

00:00I'm not really nervous about anything because in the writers room, I'm a performance artist.

00:10You know, I like try to like act out what I think the characters should do and we're

00:15all in kind of a competition for eyes.

00:18So it's like, you know, I'm trying to find the most shocking, organic, natural thing

00:22that the characters would go through.

00:24And so if people bump against it and they're like, no, we can't do that, I say, that's

00:29why we're going to do it.

00:30So give me an example.

00:32What's one of those related?

00:33I mean, there's a couple of things I mean, that we had in the first season.

00:38We had a situation where a really tough guy robs our lead character, Franklin, thousands

00:44of dollars in drug money and Franklin's still a kid.

00:48He's encountering for the first time these really, really dangerous types of people.

00:52And so he has to get his money back.

00:55And he and his best friend are with this guy who they're enlisting to get his help to find

00:59the money from another guy.

01:01And I suggested, well, this guy gets frustrated with interrogating another guy.

01:05So he takes him back and he rapes him.

01:09And so, and I say this in like a writer's room and they're like, oh my God.

01:13And I was like, no.

01:14And I acted out.

01:15I'm not sure how that goes.

01:16And I know that people, I know, I know I'm affecting some of the writers when they're

01:22visually like aghast.

01:24And, you know, and I said, and I was like, we got to do this.

01:29I think part of my reputation that I don't like is that I'm some like black militant like

01:38guy, like really serious and like, I don't like white people and all this.

01:43It's like, dude, it's like, I'm a kind of a goofball.

01:46You know, I'm funny.

01:47I'm self-effacing and everything, but I'm very serious about storytelling.

01:52And then like you say, telling the narrative that hasn't been told before.

01:56And what I don't like is when I have people who are not from various cultures that I'm

02:02trying to tell a story, tell me, dictate to me what they think it is.

02:06You guys can all contest to that when an executive feels that they know better than you the story

02:10that you're telling.

02:12Then I turn and like, you're not going to fucking tell me what my story is.

02:17It's like, this is why this character does this.

02:19And you bought this for a certain reason.

02:22And if I do this, I know the audience is going to respond in a certain way.

02:27If I do what you want to do, we jump the shark and they're going to turn the blinds off.

02:31I don't feel there's a lot of people of color in the business that feel comfortable saying,

02:35it's going to be like this.

02:37I don't care what the hell you say.

02:39And if you didn't fight and capitulated, you're not doing your job.

02:43Exactly.

02:44You know, and that's, I mean, I've actually used that line before,

02:46that if I let you do this, I'm not doing the job you hired me for.

02:50Exactly.

02:51Exactly.

02:57They say this when you're learning how to write, no matter how you try to celebrate it,

03:01whatever you find out who you are as a person through your writing.

03:05And even if you tried not to, your stuff is going to be personal, you know,

03:10and we will know what kind of person you are through the characters that you write.

03:13And I think that's very, very true.

03:15So what kind of person are you? What have you learned?

03:18My thing is I've kind of like, I've evolved into kind of a Zen Meister where like,

03:24I know what I can control and what I can't control.

03:27And I celebrate not being able to control certain things so that I'm,

03:31it makes it more enjoyable to see things propagate and be fascinated with what's happening.

03:38What's the film or TV show that made you want to do this for a living?

03:42I grew up on movies.

03:43Movies, I always believed that films saved me from delinquency.

03:47You know, I watched movies in the theater at an early age,

03:51and I also watched a lot of television at an early age.

03:55But specifically speaking as a writer, what really inspired me to write

04:01and have a certain kind of specific cultural vision as a writer?

04:06It may not be politically correct to pull up this name, but you know, Woody Allen,

04:10you know, when I, I went to see a, when I was in high school,

04:14I went to go see a revival theater and I went to see bananas and Annie Hall.

04:20And I was watching these films and I was like funny and then dramatic and stuff.

04:26And then I just realized that this guy wrote every word there.

04:30Nothing was imprompt. Everything was on book.

04:33And I was just like, you know, okay, so this is what I have to do.

04:37I have to really learn a lot about how to write in a way that the actor had the material

04:45and it just feels, it just rolls off the tongue.

04:56that's really cool.

04:59That's something acknowledgment bedroom,

05:03I love this beautiful world.

05:04I love this year.

05:07The name of I am Nicole.

05:08I go from Iw12.

05:10The name of I like the author is that this boy is the old music here.

05:13This young man, and this young man,

05:15that's me.

05:17And here is....

05:19and at the time,

05:21Oh my god,

05:23that's you love me.

John Singleton: "In the Writers' Room, I'm a Performance Artist" | Drama Showrunner Roundtable

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