Josh Johnson

And I'm curious how many times something changes and something evolves over that much time.

Because it's one thing if you take this much time for a first draft, but you're shooting and you're probably re-shooting.

What changed about the story as you started to tell it?

Yeah, absolutely.

The other thing that I'm really interested about when it comes to process is that, you know, for your music, you're taking so many different things, so many different influences.

You've got, like, New York grit, you've got jazz, you've got, like, Asian film culture, mixing it all together.

And I'm wondering if for the movie, you almost make it the same way, where you take a bunch of these influences and you wrap it up into something new.

Got you.

And, you know, this thing seems like such a, I mean, you already said pure, like such a holy passion project.

You know, you directed, you produced, you did the music.

Like, so much went into this one project, right?

And when you were directing this, you had to direct white people to be very, very racist.

Was that awkward to be like, I'm not feeling it from your heart?

Thank you.

There is also something on my mind.

You created distribution for this film.

You have what I would say is one of the four most creative minds in doing deals.

Whether it was with Wu-Tang back in the day or it's what you're doing now, you always really think artist forward and the way that...

the artist can work without getting lost in sort of, whether it's jargon or legalese, whatever the thing is, and I see you making this distribution for yourself for the film.

Is that something you want to do more broadly, or did you feel like it was the only vehicle that you could get into theaters the way you wanted?