Malcolm Washington
speaker
151 appearances
3 recordings
2 series
first heard Nov 2024
last heard Nov 2024
Malcolm Washington’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.
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Appearances
From WHYY in Philadelphia, this is Fresh Air Weekend. I'm Tanya Mosley. Today, John, David, and Malcolm Washington join me to discuss bringing the August Wilson Play the Piano lesson to the screen for Netflix. It's about a brother and sister battling over what to do with a family heirloom piano and what to do with a family heirloom piano.
And the production of it was a family affair that included their sister Katia and their father, Denzel Washington, who both served as producers. We also hear from Selena Gomez. She stars in the new Spanish-language musical Amelia Perez. Gomez plays the wife of a brutal drug cartel leader who decides to undergo gender affirmation surgery.
Gomez had to relearn Spanish to take on the role after losing her fluency as a kid. And film critic Justin Chang reviews Gladiator 2 and the musical Wicked. That's coming up on Fresh Air Weekend. This is Fresh Air Weekend. I'm Tanya Mosley. And today, my guests are Malcolm and John David Washington. The brothers collaborated on the late August Wilson's The Piano Lesson for the screen on Netflix.
It's the fourth play in Wilson's American Century Cycle, a series of 10 plays inspired that captures the Black American experience through every decade of the 20th century. Malcolm serves as the director, and John David stars as the brash, impulsive, and fast-talking boy Willie, who wants to sell the family piano to buy land in Mississippi that his family was enslaved on.
The family battle ensues between boy Willie and his sister Bernice, played by Danielle Dedweiler, who wants the family to hold on to the piano, a family heirloom engraved with their ancestors' faces. The production of this film was a family affair. The brothers' sister Katia and their father, Oscar-winning Denzel Washington, are producers.
And Denzel, who starred and co-produced in Wilson's Fences, has committed to adapting Wilson's plays into 10 films. Their mother, Pauletta Washington, even appears in the movie, starring as Mama Ola. The Piano Lesson is Malcolm Washington's directorial debut for a feature film, and John David portrayed Boy Willie in the Broadway revival of The Piano Lesson.
He's also starred in several films, including Spike Lee's Black Klansman and Christopher Nolan's Time Travel Mindbender Tenet. John David and Malcolm Washington, welcome to Fresh Air.
Thank you for having us. Hello. Yeah, thank you. That was quite an introduction. I was like, whoa.
Well, I want to get right into our discussion about the film by playing a clip. And the story takes place in 1936. Bernice, played by Danielle Deadweiler, lives in Pittsburgh with the piano and her brother, boy Willie, played by you, John David. is a sharecropper in their hometown of Mississippi, and he's driven up to Pittsburgh in hopes of persuading Bernice to sell.
And their uncle, played by Samuel L. Jackson, explains why Bernice won't do it. He speaks first. Let's listen.
That was my guest today, John David Washington, with Samuel L. Jackson in the Netflix film The Piano Lesson, directed by my other guest, Malcolm Washington. And, you know, this is such a Black American story that endures that yearning to pass down items of value up against this very real society.
an often desperate need to sell for practical reasons, or in Boy Willie's case, to gamble towards this American dream of owning land. And I want to start by asking you, Malcolm, what was it about this story that you felt was not only enduring, but an urgent one that needed to be retold now?
Yeah, I think it's really, really, really important for people to learn their history, both ancestral and just culturally. Know where you come from and acknowledge it. Because we're living in a time where... People are trying to rewrite history or erase people from history and their contributions.
So it's kind of incumbent upon all of us to reclaim our stories, you know, and proclaim them and declare them who we are as a people, who we are as a culture and identity. All these things are super urgent to reclaim.
You also wanted to bring a modern touch to this. And I mean, August Wilson is one of the greatest playwrights of our time. So, I mean, this material is just right. But I can imagine that's also intimidating, possibly. What was your first step in bringing your director's touch to what is well-established material?
Yeah, it was intimidating, but it was also very exciting. The first step was putting this in a context, a historical context, understanding the moment that the play was written in, the moment that it's speaking to, that it's set in. It was about learning...
as much as I could about August Wilson, his considerations as a writer, who he was as a man, where he's from, what he stood on, his belief system. Understand all these things about him and his intentions so that you can kind of pass it through the prism of yourself and bring your voice to it, but always trying to serve this kind of bigger thing.
John David, in the scene that we played, you were in character with Samuel L. Jackson, who actually originally played Boy Willie in 1987. And in this film, he plays the uncle to Bernice and Boy Willie. His performance, it's quiet, it's contemplative. He exudes kind of like this wise knowing as he watches you. And for me, it was a little bit emotional.
I'm like going through this moment where I'm looking at all of our actors as we move through time and they age. It was just emotional to watch, knowing his history with the character. What was it like for you to watch him watch you, both in the Broadway version and in this movie?
He was supportive of you guys talking to you about like the industry and the craft. But like, did he talk to you about this character or did he kind of leave that to you to interpret it?
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