John Singleton Talks Tough

If John Singleton didn't make movies, he'd be the perfect subject for one. Perhaps too perfect. Who would believe a movie about a kid who grows up in South Central Los Angeles with dreams of becoming a filmmaker? Who lands a slot in USC's prestigious film school, where, as an undergraduate, he twice wins the Jack Nicholson Screenwriting Award? Who, disgusted by Hollywood's clichéd portrayal of the gang experience, writes his own script and refuses to sell it unless he's allowed to direct it--and pulls it off?

Of course, Singleton's real-life story is no fantasy. A studio executive gave him the chance to direct his script, and shortly thereafter, Boyz N the Hood was released to praise from the critics as well as to a spurt of opening-night violence at the theaters. Singleton--a mere 23 years old at the time--was nominated for two Oscars, one for original screenplay and one for directing.

Now, two years later, the precocious Singleton is back with his second film, Poetic Justice, starring Janet Jackson. If it does well, Singleton will join Spike Lee as one of the most influential African-American filmmakers around. If it bombs, he may become just another one-hit wonder. No matter what happens to his new movie--or to Burnout, the action thriller he plans to make next--Singleton is already one of Hollywood's most outspoken directors, as we discovered when we met with him several times shortly after Poetic Justice finished filming. Singleton held forth on a variety of subjects. Here are some highlights:

Where the Boyz Are

Boyz N the Hood was my American Graffiti, my coming-of-age story. I wrote about what I knew: the streets, friends who fell off from gangbanging and from being in the wrong place at the wrong time and getting shot. I knew about having to worry about the police. That's all I knew about. Not to pull my own dick, but I pushed aside all the shit "gang" movies that had come before--like Colors. I did something different. I made a life-affirming movie, about family, about being strong, about trying to raise your children to be mentally strong.

My Brilliant Career

One reason I got to direct Boyz N the Hood is because I said "I'm not gonna let anybody else do it, I don't give a fuck whether or not you want to do the movie or not. I'll walk out of here right now and go back to my life. Either I direct or I step. I could be a schoolteacher. I don't give a fuck." They'd never met anybody like that. My agent told me, "If you mess up, there will be no way I can save you," and I said, "No sweat, man."

What else was I going to do? I had never had a job for longer than nine months. I couldn't drive an airport shuttle or give museum tours anymore. I didn't know if I could direct, either, but what the fuck. Other guys were doing it and they weren't as smart as me. What did they know that I didn't? I figured, "Just let me try this out." And boom, I get the film done, it's a hit, I get nominated for two Academy Awards, and I have a career for myself.

Advice from On High

The first thing I did when Boyz N the Hood came out was to go around and talk to my idols: Francis Coppola, Steven Spielberg, George Lucas. Steven, of all people, told me to make sure that my stuff looks as rough as possible for as long as possible. And he gets criticized for being too smooth and pretty, like in The Color Purple. I listened to everything these guys had to tell me about their own experiences. I took their advice. They said that nobody is perfect and that nobody knows everything. And they do nothing that I can't attain. They know nothing I can't know.

When Everybody Loves You

I've seen other blacks wanting to be accepted. Then they get what they think is acceptance. It lasts for a moment, then it's pulled away. Then they get ridiculed. So just accept yourself.

Developing an Attitude

When I did Boyz N the Hood, there were white students who said, "Oh, he got it just because he was black." If anything, I used the hype of being a black filmmaker to get Boyz N the Hood done. I'm a black man before I'm a filmmaker. I had to learn how to make movies. I didn't have to learn how to be black.

I have a cushy job. My greatest fear is getting all caught up in the bullshit over "Do people love me or want me to continue what I'm doing?" I wouldn't let those people kiss my black ass if they asked. I didn't give two fucks about them when I went to USC, so I don't give two fucks about them now. It's that same attitude that says affirmative action is really reverse racism. They talked like that among themselves, but they didn't confront me face-to-face. They were cowards. I was one of the few blacks in the film school, but not like the blacks they were used to being around, who said, "Oh, I want to be your friend," kissing all their asses. My attitude was "I have a higher mission. I'm trying to become a filmmaker. I don't have time for your bullshit. I'm going to push over as many people as possible to get what I want. I want to come out of school just like a first-round draft pick, but in a filmic sense. I'm not going to let nobody get in my way. All you people from these well-to-do families, you ain't shit to me. Ain't shit. You all ain't never going to make movies anyway. I got true heart. I got true passion. As long as I can put that in my work, I'll always be around."

When I was a kid, not knowing where life would lead and having forces around me fuck with my self-esteem, I had to find my own light at the end of the tunnel. I found it in movies and comic books. There were heroes. I learned to appreciate myth. I learned that you carve your own destiny. Later, I applied that to my work.

R-E-S-P-E-C-T

The thing I don't like is people who ask me how I survived. I hate anybody condescending to me, no matter who the fuck they are. I don't care if they own the fucking studio. I expect the same respect as I give anyone else.

Oliver Stone fucking pissed me off once. I admire his work, but the day I got nominated for an Academy Award, after I told him I liked his movie, he just says to me, "Yeah. Too bad about Barbra." As if it's my fault that Barbra Streisand didn't get nominated. If a great honor comes someone's way, one of the first things you say--if you have a good heart--is "Congratulations." A lot of black folks have a tendency to read into things. Jewish people, too. It's like Woody Allen said in Annie Hall, when he was walking up the street with Tony Roberts. I remember he said, "Did you hear what he said? 'Did Jew eat? Did Jew eat?' " We look for any little tinge of covert, subtle racism. But that wasn't the case this time. I'm just angry when somebody I admire disses me. Then it's war. If I like you and you treat me like shit, then you deserve to get beat down.

Racism in Hollywood

In a way it scares me that I haven't experienced it. I have two sides. The positive side realizes that I'm in America, I can do anything I want, I couldn't have done it anywhere else. My cynical side says, "I can direct movies, I can win an Oscar, I can affect so many people with a movie. But I can go down the street right now and a cop can stop me and shoot me in the back of the head, and no fuss will be made of it because that person is an authority figure. That person may be white. And the court system in America says that, by law, because that person has a badge and because of the color of his skin, he has more rights than I do." It doesn't matter how legitimate I've been. So I'm always looking over my shoulder, always expecting someone to try to get the drop on me. I look for stuff before it happens. But it hasn't happened, probably because I look for it.

Racism in America

Maybe it's backdoor now. It's covert. It's in the eyes. All these neo-Nazi fuckers living in fucking Colorado or Texas talking about how much they hate niggers and hate Jews. Do you think they would bring their monkey asses out to Los Angeles or New York? You think they would do that in the midst of a whole bunch of black people who weren't singing in church and who were listening to Public Enemy and Ice Cube? You think they would do that shit? No, they wouldn't. You put me and Tom Metzger in one room, who do you think's going to come out of there alive? If I sat this close to Metzger or Daryl Gates or Ronald Reagan, I would be in jail.

Don't Call Me Bro

I've never been called a nigger to my face. In school I wouldn't even let anyone call me bro. I've only suffered peripherally at the hands of white America. Being in the wrong place at the wrong time, being a young kid fascinated by the helicopter lights going down the street, going in and out of a big gigantic oak tree, taunting the light to follow me and my eight-year-old friend in and out of a tree. And then all of a sudden, six police cars converge on us. They tell us, "Watch out. Next time you might get shot."

I'm not the kind of man who's going to blame all my problems on white people. That's what sets me apart. I'm going to take mine. I'm going to go for mine. I know that there are a lot of white people out there suffering. There are people I went to college with who come from well-to-do families who are defaulting on their student loans right now. They're living from hand to mouth and they don't look nothing like me.

Pc or Not Pc

Political correctness has made things worse. You have to look under the surface. Racism is not culturally correct, so people put up a front. I'd like to fucking choke the person who coined the term. Most people who use it are actually closet right-wingers. The same people who talk about political correctness are the people who would just as soon stereotype black people. I don't give a fuck what's politically correct or what's in good taste. Everyone has their own choices about what they want to watch or what type of people they want to interact with. As long as people have those choices, that's fine. People are going to do what they want to do anyway.

In the Neighborhood

I still live close to where I grew up. I can't see myself moving out. I have a nice, modest, four-bedroom house in a black neighborhood that overlooks the city. Which is cool. At least I know when I walk down the street that nobody will call the cops on me. I'm trying to hold on to that as long as possible. A friend of mine--he's a primary rapper--had to move to another neighborhood because people were coming to his house and harassing him and stuff. Ain't nobody fucking with me. I don't get anything but love. It would take a hell of a lot, a hell of a lot, for me to move. Gangsters, politicians, (continued on page 168) John Singleton (continued from page 100) gangbangers, junkies--that shit don't frighten me.

When you grow up in the ghetto, you're not afraid of it. You're there. I never want to be so far removed that I'm afraid of it. I remember my apartment with my mom. We'd hear everything in the night. She'd look out the window, being nosy and stuff. I'd tell her, "Stop being so nosy. Keep your mind on your own business." My father lived nearby. I didn't have to tell him nothing. Everybody in his neighborhood respected him, and they knew he had a big gun. That's how you build up a rep. You beat somebody's ass or you shoot somebody in the neighborhood. They know not to fuck with you.

Armed and Dangerous

I own a gun. My father owned one, too. And his father before him. I've grown up around guns and drugs and all that stuff.

The difference between you and me is that the brother in jail or the welfare mother or the lady on crack, those are my relatives. Those are people I've grown up with, who share my last name or are part of my family that I see at Thanksgiving or Christmas. Anyway, I'll be damned if I'm going to have somebody get the drop on me in my own house, and all I have is my Akita.

That scene in Boyz N the Hood where the father shot at the burglar actually happened. A guy broke into my father's house. My father had these mirrors up in the living room. He plastered them on the wall just so he could see, from the bedroom, a reflection of anyone who walked in the living room, who jumped through a window. He saw the guy and he got his magnum out--this is in the late Seventies. He had it halfway loaded and stuff. He got up to the hallway and just as he clicked it, the guy ran. My father fired on him, but my father didn't hit him.

He told me later, "Hey, this ain't like Starsky and Hutch." The cops came and one--black or white, I don't remember--said, "You should've got him--that would've been one less nigger we would've had to worry about." That's real life. That's the truth. That shit is real fucking life.

Opening Night Massacre

That first weekend Boyz N the Hood opened, lots of what happened was really overblown. Shootings around the corner and miles away were attributed to the movie. The media needed something to talk about on their six o'clock news. This stuff goes on every weekend in any major city in America. Only the media won't focus on it unless it's tied to a film opening. It happens with regular films, too. But that doesn't get reported.

I understand why some people are afraid to see a picture of a black man with a gun rather than a white man with a gun. In an American context, the former image is more threatening. [Actor/ rapper] Tupac Shakur on a Juice poster, with a gun in his hand, is more threatening than Arnold Schwarzenegger with a gun in his hand on a Terminator 2 poster.

When you see a crime show on TV, you see all these brothers getting shaken down. Or the Willie Horton thing. It's a debilitating image for a lot of black youth. Some of it is self-perpetuating. But these shows act like white people don't do any crime. They don't talk about the guy in Seattle who raped little boys and hanged them in their closets. But there's a lot more of that going on.

It's not concerts or the movies that get the people excited. It's the conditions they're living in. And one person doing something crazy can mess it up for 10,000. But the 10,000 can't be accountable for that one person.

Ketchup as a Vegetable

Reagan getting elected was the only thing I can point to that actually changed my life. I was 12 years old. Children in junior high school thought he was going to drop the bomb. During the 1981 assassination attempt, the news came over the school intercom. Here in the ghetto everybody clapped. I clapped. I thought they put a guy in there who didn't care about anybody. At 12 years old I already had a contempt for fascist politics.

He was more of a monster than I could imagine at 12 years old. When Reagan got in office, my neighborhood went straight down. And I didn't know things were bad. I didn't know that we were the underclass. The drug trade was more prolific. Just think if the president attacked education the same way they attacked Saddam Hussein. But no, teachers get treated like shit. I used to eat free lunches in school. Reagan deemed ketchup a vegetable. Ketchup was my vegetable! Truth is, he didn't want us to eat free meals. When I got to college, the motherfucker made it hard to get loans. However, I think things are like the early Sixties again. We're on the brink of another big revolution in terms of the way we all look at life.

Why America Loves Black Culture

America has always been fascinated. Look at Elvis. He made his fortune off the blood, sweat and tears of black music artists. The attitude with Elvis was that if they could get a white to do what was already being done by Chuck Berry or Fats Domino, it would elevate it. Any art form that black Americans start becomes distorted by others.

It's a natural thing, not a diabolical plan. Men in sheets aren't thinking, Hey, let's create Vanilla Ice and cash in on rap. It's about democracy and capitalism. But what sets then apart from now is this: Then, whites co-opted the culture and we weren't reaping any reward. Now, we're reaping the rewards. We're not expending all our creative energy and giving up our heart and artistic expression to make somebody else rich. Even white kids are buying hard-core rap now. [Laughs] I'm still trying to get my profit, though.

Rap: The Real Information Highway

In the Sixties different voices spoke out against repression. That's done now by rap music. Black men in this country, regardless of where they're from, just because of the conditioning that America puts down on them, are built to be soldiers. We're built to fight for our lives. Not only from the police and all the other forces in America that are against us but from our own. It's a constant battle. But some of that is beginning to subside because we are, in fact, getting our message out. For instance, there's no way that the Bloods and Crips could have formed a unity in Los Angeles if it hadn't been for the ascension of rap music as a communication base. It's our primary way of speaking out against the repression that we have to live with as black males in America. Even more so than black film, rap music has allowed black people to have a voice they didn't have before.

What gets some people mad is that rap also speaks to white kids. It scares the parents. It upsets the powers that be. They can sell it and they can pay us to make it, but it's not something they can control. If something comes out that they deem to be offensive, then they try to squash it. But I think it's great that young black men in my generation have a voice and can express it on any street corner in the country. If they get lucky, they can make a record and everyone else can hear what they have to say.

Everybody has creative energy. It doesn't matter if you make a record or make a movie, or jack somebody for their car, it's just energy. And it can be expressed in different ways.

If I couldn't be doing what I'm doing now, do you think I would just be passive and not be angry about my situation, not want to do something to strike out? If I were so far into cars and into money that they were my priorities, and if the system prevented me from attaining them the so-called right way, don't you think I would take another way out? Anybody whose creative expression is squashed is a dangerous person.

Spike and Me

I first met him just two weeks before I started film school. He was cool. Every so often, when he would come into town with a picture, I would see him. I'd be, "Hey, what's up, man?" We got to be on a first-name basis. Here I am in film school and Spike Lee knows me basically as John. That's cool for me because when my friends see me talking to him, they're like, "Man, some of that stuff's going to rub off."

Now, it's pretty cool because I've gone from Spike being my idol through film school to him being my peer. We know each other. There's things that he's experienced that I haven't experienced, and sometimes I'll talk to him about the things that are going on. If there were no Spike Lee, there would probably be no John Singleton. Spike has worked as a buffer for me. All the shit he had to climb through made a clear path for me. I've had it easy because he's had it so hard. That kind of angers me because it's like, here I am, poised to wade through it all and I haven't had to wade through it all. Spike took it to the next level. His very existence advanced black people in this country. He's shown that you can be African-American and carve a niche for yourself as a filmmaker. Before 1986, how many blacks had done that to his level? With the jackets and the T-shirts and the movies and the Levi's commercials and the Nike commercials, he's like a black P. T. Barnum.

Poetry in Motion

The first time I saw Janet Jackson was at Portola Junior High in the San Fernando Valley. In the eighth grade I got bused out there. My grades went all the way down. It was so bad--culture shock--but that's another story. I was a prepubescent kid and she was a year older, looked like a woman. It's interesting that our paths would cross years later.

What black man, what male in America, has not looked at Janet in the videos? So I wrote this script with her in mind. To actually have my plan totally come through is cool.

But I wouldn't work with her if she were plastic and could play only herself. People will see Janet born as a renaissance woman. They'll expect one thing and get another. They'll see an actress, which she was before she started singing. She's not playing herself. She's not singing. She's not hopping around in tight jeans and bustiers. It's beautiful, man. She's really like the girl next door.

The Girls in the Hood

Some critics called Boyz N the Hood misogynistic. Oh, please. The mother was a college graduate. She didn't dump the kid off with his dad. He told her it was his responsibility to make sure the boy became a man. She saw him on weekends. I cut out a scene where he's visiting her on a weekend because I wanted to get the pace up.

Those motherfuckers who say Boyz N the Hood is misogynistic are the same people who give good reviews to films that have black women who are maids and prostitutes. This movie was about guys--boys--who eventually survive to become men. It was in the title, you know. But at the same time, I can say that all the women in the movie were well-rounded and like real people. They weren't like the black women you see in all these other movies. Put my characters up against the others. You'll feel a different vibe.

Generation Sex

Sex in the Nineties? Got to be careful. You can't go around fucking 2000 women. Nothing wrong with safe sex, either. Ever since high school I've practiced it. I was always the dude to bring the protection. Like a Boy Scout, I'm always prepared. That just carried on into my adulthood. So it's cool with me. Of course, two years ago I didn't have to worry about bitches trying to get pregnant by me and shit, but that's the kind of shit I worry about now. And AIDS. That's greater incentive to put that hat on. My grandmother says: "Keep a sock on your worm."

She has another great saying: "A bitch will dig a nigger a ditch." Which means the wrong woman can lead to any man's downfall.

The New John Singleton

I'm already hearing young black filmmakers referred to as the new John Singleton. It makes me feel old. I'm still trying to be the next John Singleton. It makes a lot of young black filmmakers mad to be compared to me. I'd be mad, too. People were always comparing me to Spike Lee. My attitude is: "Hey, I had to carve my own niche."

The World According to John

You want a philosophical thing? Life is a bitch. So fuck hard, eat good and die. I know my life hasn't been that hard. Although at any point I could have gone in the wrong direction growing up. I could be in jail, I could be dead, depending on the decisions that I made. Otherwise, I'm just your average 20-something American. It just happens I have a good job.

My primary interests are video games, fast cars and comic books. I look at movies. I like to get laid. It's cool. I'm a modern man. It's cool.

"What gets some people mad is that rap also speaks to white kids. It scares the parents."