Spike Lee’s CHI-RAQ is a complicated film—it’s vital, present, a bit schizophrenic, a scrapbook of various tones, ideas and performances that somehow coalesces into a singular statement about the city of Chicago and all major cities in America. It’s primary through-line tackles the issue of black-on-black crime on the city’s Southside, but it also uses its rhyming-verse dialogue and classic story (adapted from the play “Lysistrata” by Aristophanes by Lee and Kevin Willmott) to address police brutality, socio-economic inequality, male-dominated culture—you name it, it’s probably in CHI-RAQ.
For those who don’t know, the film centers around one woman’s effort to end the violence in her community by organizing all women to go on a sex strike until men put down the guns. It’s about a whole lot more than that, but that’s the jumping-off point.
I don’t usually attend press conferences for films, but something told me I’d be foolish to miss the one held the day after the Chicago premiere of CHI-RAQ. On the panel were Lee, Willmott, actors Teyonah Parris, Nick Cannon, John Cusack, Wesley Snipes, Harry Lennix, and D.B. Sweeney, as well as Father Michael Pfleger (listed as “spiritual advisor” in the film’s credits), the Roman Catholic priest and social activist, on whom Cusack’s character is based. Some of these fine folks never spoke during the event, since questions all seemed to be Lee (who did a great job enlisting others on the stage to answer as well), Cusack, and Cannon. The event could have easily gone another 30-45 minutes, giving everyone in attendance a chance to ask questions and answer them. But that didn’t keep things from being interesting and informative. With that, here are the highlights of the CHI-RAQ Chicago press conference…
Question: Good morning. I believe it was a French critic who said—
Spike Lee: What’s his name? See, you can’t be quoting French critics without saying who the French critic is. It could be Charles de Gaulle or Pepé Le Pew [laughs].
Question: She said that DO THE RIGHT THING could never be released in the United States, because it would spur race riots in every major city. My question is, what’s the difference between the pushback you got from that film and the pushback you’re getting now?
Lee: Well, I think it’s hard to make a comparison, because this film has not come out yet. DO THE RIGHT THING specifically, it was David Denby, Jack Kroll, and Joe Klein who said that this film would incite African Americans to riot all across the country, and told their white readers to pray to God this film does not open in your theater, that blood would be on my hands, that this film would stop [New York] Mayor [David] Dinkins from being the first elected African-American mayor. Look it up. It’s all truth. Google it. All this stuff was written about DO THE RIGHT THING when it came out. Released the same day as the original BATMAN with Jack Nicholson, June 30, 1989. [Actually BATMAN came out a week earlier, on June 23, but it still would have been a direct competitor to DO THE RIGHT THING, even in its second week.]
Question: Spike, my question to you is, obviously the film has so much Greek mythology to it. It’s like a modern day in Chicago version of a Greek myth. Is there any concern that casual movie-goers going to the movie will not understanding that concept? And maybe finding the dialogue off-putting or confusing?
Lee: I’m going to hand this off to Kevin Willmott.
Kevin Willmott: I think that Spike and I both thought from the very beginning that it was important to really connect with the original Greek play by Aristophanes. We both agreed that the style, the verse that’s in the actual play of “Lysistrata,” that it connects in many ways to the long tradition of African Americans. Sidney Poitier, Harry Belafonte, both of them early in their careers were in the play “Lysistrata,” and it was a big key to their success as actors later on. The actual verse from Aristophanes has a lot of connections to rap, to spoken word, to a whole tradition to African-American traditions in literature. So we thought that there’s no reason why people won’t connect with it.
Question: This question is for Mr. Lee and Father Pfleger. Spike, I think you spoke very eloquently about satire being a very valid way to address serious issues. But I’m wondering if, as you shot it, and even more particularly as you edited the film, and Father Pfleger after you got a chance to see it, how you felt audiences might respond to the contrast between the very broad sexual satire and the very serious tragic elements of the film?
Lee: Father?
Pfleger: First of all, I think that the reality of the movie was good. You can’t talk about a sex strike and not deal with sex. It’d be a little bizarre. But the language and the rest, if they had changed that, the accusation would have been “This wasn’t real. This was sanitized.” I thought it was the raw reality of the movie, and I thought it dealt with the realness of the situation I laughed at parts of it last night, I cried at parts of it last night, and I was angry at the end of this issue. I thought some scenes just took me over. I was telling Nick this morning that the scene at the end with the mothers, it just left me angry that this reality is still going on in our city, in our country. I didn’t have a problem with that. I was twice asked last night, “Well, you’re a Catholic priest. How did you feel sitting through that?” I live in the real world. This is America, and I wasn’t always a priest [laughs].
Lee: Sir, to answer your question, the purpose of satire is to address serious subject matters. It’s a different approach. I know I’ve said this many times, ladies and gentlemen, so please forgive me. It’s redundant. But Stanley Kubrick is one of my favorite filmmakers, and there are several homages to DR. STRANGELOVE. The character who’s in his Stars in Bars briefs, his character’s name is General King Kong. That’s in direct reference to DR. STRANGELOVE. What is more serious than the destruction of God’s planet? But that film is hilarious. So I really can’t understand this mindset that you can’t have different tones, that you can’t laugh and cry, in a single form of art. Why does it have to be one thing? I don’t understand it.
Pfleger: I had some brothers who were from the block last night that I brought…
Lee: From the BLOCK block.
Pfleger: And one of them, who’s facing a court case right now and might be sent to prison said to me afterwards, and I won’t use the language, but he said, “I wish I had seen this two years ago.” And they encouraged me that on the opening weekend, we’re going to take about 40 brothers together from different groups to go see it December 4 weekend and come back and talk about it. They loved it. They said, “We’ve got to go get more brothers to see this.”
Lee: And to piggyback on my Father, when Kevin and I got together, that was the goal of this film. I’m going to start the chronology, and you can finish it. But Kevin and I worked together. He did this funny-ass mockumentary called CSA, CONFEDERATE STATES OF AMERICA, with the premise where would we be today in modern America if the Confederacy had won the Civil War? So I presented the film, and we became friends. He’s a professor at the University of Kansas, a Jayhawk. I’m a professor of film at NYU, both filmmakers. Did I ask you if I had a script?
Willmott: Yeah, you asked if I had anything else.
Lee: And what’d you say?
Willmott: I said, “Yeah, I have this little thing.” At that time it was called GOTTA GIVE IT UP, based on the “Lysistrata” play. I was in the play in undergrad a long time ago, and the translation, there’s a Southern translation to “Lysistrata,” and it really spoke to African Americans, just the whole idea of a sex strike, in the play women going on a sex strike to stop war, and I thought it clearly connected to gang violence. So Spike read it at that time, and that’s how the whole ball started rolling.
Lee: Six years ago, right?
Willmott: Yeah.
Lee: And who did we have readings for?
Willmott: We had readings for Dreamworks. I think we went to pretty much every major studio.
Lee: We had another reading though, right?
Willmott: Yeah, we had two readings for Dreamworks.
Lee: So we couldn’t get it done, and I’m active on my social media, and I have an artist friend, his name is Adrian Franks. Every time an African American got killed by a white private citizen or a cop, he would do a portrait, and I would post it on my social media, and every time I posted something, I’d get comments from people from Chicago saying, “What about us? What about us? What about us?” And that made me start to think, and I called Kevin and said, “I hope you did not sell that script.”
Willmott: I said, “No, I’ve been holding on to it.”
Lee: I said, “We’ve got to write it together. Let’s do a new version.” Here’s the key, because the first one was a nondescript urban area. And I said, “Kevin, we have to have this take place on the Southside of Chicago and call it CHI-RAQ.” I think that gave it a foundation, you might say. And by choosing Chicago, we felt that it would really address what’s happening. If people saw the movie, the scene with Angela Bassett, she said, “This is not just happening in Chicago.” She mentions Killadelphia, which is Philadelphia; Bodymore, Murderland, which is where homicide has sky rocketed in Baltimore Maryland. And Brooklyn. So we address and acknowledge that this problem has happened in America, in all the cities, urban areas, in this country, but Chicago, if we want to deal with this, we have to deal with where is most prevalent.
I know people in Chicago are very sensitive about this, but the truth is the truth. Chicago is the murder capitol of the United States of America. Chicago is the mass murder capitol of the United States of America. New York City is three times the population of Chicago, yet Chicago has more homicides than New York. That’s not me saying that, that’s the mother-fucking truth. So if you don’t like it, do something to change those numbers. Also, we did not make up the term CHI-RAQ. That was your fellow, local Chicago rappers from the Southwest side who came up with that term. Not us. So it’s unfortunate that a lot of angst and dialogue was really a distraction. I’m a sports fan, it’s like a misdirection playing football. You fake it this way, you run this way to tackle the guy, and the guy’s going down 80 yards to the house. So let’s, if we can, focus on what’s important and not get distracted about whether the mayor liked the title or not. That’s not important, in my opinion.
D.B. Sweeney: In the debates when you mention the other candidates, you get to speak out, right? So you just referenced the mayor. I get 60 seconds, right?
Lee: D.B., you got the mic. Go for it, baby.
Sweeney: I thought it was extremely silly. A lot of people asked if I was playing Rahm. Spike never said to me we’re doing this to get at Rahm [Emanuel, mayor of Chicago]. But I personally thought it was incredibly silly that we had politicians criticizing Spike Lee coming to their town to make a movie. I mean, this guy is a one man African-American jobs program. He got more jobs for young brothers and sisters on the Southside last summer than any other man that I know about.
And the other thing is, these guys were threatening to withhold the film incentives that every city needs to have, and these incentives are so important to towns. You can ask the people in Albuquerque—“Breaking Bad” went off the air two years ago. People still fly into Albuquerque, which is probably the worst city in America of any note, and they go on “Breaking Bad” tours. They go around to see where they made crystal meth. So there’s hotel rooms, there’s lunches being bought. So I assure you, two years from now, somebody or maybe a lot of people, are going to fly into Chicago, buy a hotel room, go into the Southside to see the Armory we filmed in, and along the way, they’re going to buy lunch, they’re going to spend money. There’s an economic stimulus that comes from films and TV that can not be underestimated. But I would ask all the aldermen in question to go see the movie, because judging a book by its cover is the first thing they teach you in school is a bad idea.
John Cusack: And I’ll just jump in. I play the priest, and I’ll say when I was making HIGH FIDELITY in Chicago, where I brought films to Chicago, I had an English director named Stephen Frears, and we took a book that was set in England and we transported it here. No one said to me, “Why is it not a Chicago filmmaker?”“Okay, so I can only make a movie with Harold Ramis?”
This movie hired great, local Chicago actors. It was the first film that had an open casting audition for the people of St. Sabina on the Southside. I think the Chicago Film office said that’s never happened before. And when I made HIGH FIDELITY, Jack Black wasn’t from Chicago, and I didn’t take any shit. So I don’t understand. I thought it was a jive issue.
Question: I’m Mark Konkol from DNAinfo.com…
Lee: I wanna thank you. I know a lot of numbers try to get suppressed, but you guys had the numbers, so we made many references to your research—people wounded, people shot every weekend. So I want to say you do a great service for getting the word out.
Question: I think you deserve a lot of credit for making this movie in Chicago, and I think it’s important that a national audience sees what’s actually happening, because they’re not going to read the local papers. They’re not going to look at what’s happening in certain neighborhoods, so credit for that. This question is for you and John Cusack. I’d like to know what you think about the end of the movie, where there was this magical solution of the Fortune 400 companies and the new hospitals. There’s a lot of focus on what the problem is, and not a lot of focus on the solution. One of the things I’ve been writing about for a few years is the tale of two cities, which you’ve mentioned before in other interviews, and I just want to know, movie aside, because it’s really just a movie. It’s not journalism—it’s a statement in some ways—but it’s just a movie, but your thoughts on the solution and the need to bring the two Chicagos together, because I don’t think without rich white Chicago and its very powerful mayor, that a lot good can come without it?
Lee: But I’m not from Chicago…
Question: That’s exactly the point. You’ve been very angry…
Lee: I’m not a politician.
Question: You’ve been very angry and very defensive about, this is what’s wrong with Chicago. That’s why we’re here. I just want to know when it comes to solutions, what your thoughts are on this?
Lee: So here’s the thing, when you’re talking to me, I heard the same criticisms for DO THE RIGHT THING back in 1989…
Question: I’m not criticizing you.
Lee: Let me finish, Mr. DNA. People who come to this film looking for solutions get the same answer when it came to DO THE RIGHT THING. “Is Spike Lee going to tell me we’re prejudice and racist in this country?” The goal of film was to put the spotlight on this problem and through dialogue, discussion, legislation, we can arrive at the answers, but anyone who comes to this film and thinks that Spike Lee says, “If you do A, B, C, D, E, F, then the ills and woes of Chicago will be fixed”…
Question: I think you’re misunderstanding my question.
Lee: Well, rephrase the question.
Question: I would just like your personal thoughts and John’s also, because you’re a Chicagoan.
Cusack: You want me to take it?
Lee: Take it, John.
Cusack: I think in the tradition of satires, if you think of films like NETWORK, STRANGELOVE, PUTNEY SWOPE, I made one called WAR INC. It’s a very difficult thing to do. The problems and the solutions are mixed together, and you have to pay attention because you’ll hear it. You’ll see Sister Hellen talking about the fact that we are all looking at these [picks up a cell phone] all day and Tweeting and stuff. That’s desensitizing. She says, we need to read more, right? Father Corridan says, “You cannot talk about justice unless you have the economic component, unless you talk about jobs, unless you address the hopelessness.” You have other characters talk about seeing young men and women who haven’t had fathers, haven't had mothers, and have broken families. So the solutions and the questions are all wrapped up.
I think one of the things I hear from Father Pfleger in church each week, and I’m sure it’s repeated in mosques and synagogues and in churches of all denominations all over the country is, if the local communities who are taking back their communities block by block, I don’t know if we can look at Washington and the top down. I don’t think the corporations will do anything unless people are mobilized and hit the streets. If there are enough people who care and enough people who take action, then things will change, but there’s no sound bite answer to the question.
I think you also have to say three letters that no one wants to talk about, because they’re a very powerful lobby, but NRA. You’re not going to solve the issue until you talk about where the guns are coming in. There’s too much to talk about in a sound bite, so I could probably go on for half an hour and look like a fool.
Lee: He could too.
Question: I have a question for Nick Cannon. In your performance, I sense almost joy because you have an image of being a clean-cut, nice guy. But you play a character so unlike anything we’ve seen you do before, and I wanted to know what was it like getting into that role, how did you prepare for it, and how much fun was it to play?
Cannon: I wouldn’t necessarily say it was fun, but it was definitely a task and a challenge to embody someone, one that obviously the world may have not seen me do before, but the seriousness in what was going on and really connecting into that authenticity, and I thank Spike and Father Pfleger for really introducing me to real people in the community and giving the opportunity to hear stories of pain from both sides, to speak to the victims and the victims families, and at the same time to speak to a lot of these troubled young men who lack guidance, who are actually crying out. To know this community and communities all across the country are hurt, and because these young men don't have the proper guidance, and so many things have been sensationalize and building up the male ego and the power of being what they call a savage, or a misconception of what a soldier is.
These things have been conditioned in our community and have created these young men who are going down the path the wrong way. You can relate sometimes, because really if you don’t have the guidance, if you don't have a father, you can easily get misguided by the things that seem fascinating to you—the money, the cars, the women. For me, I tapped into that. I tapped into the idea that this is a young brother who’s troubled, who’s searching, who’s crying out and thinks he’s doing the right thing and thinks he’s following in his father’s footsteps, but then he realizes that his father was also lost, and his father was searching for guidance.
Lee: That’s why we put in that flashback scene, because so often in films we have black people just doing crazy shit for no other reason, like it’s pathological. It feels important to have some background. How did Demetrius become Chi-Raq? And we have that flashback scene when he walks in on his mother. That was there for a reason.
Cannon: Right. So to take that journey and tap into these stories I heard from the Southside and the West Side of Chicago, and these people telling me what it’s like and actually getting the opportunity to spend time with the peacekeepers and to hear their stories, which are just so phenomenal and remarkable, and to see what they’ve overcome and that these are just young brothers who want to do what’s right. They actually focus on humanity but at the same time, it can be misguided. But it takes them awhile to get to that place, but to see that journey is also pretty compelling.
Question: I was 13 when DO THE RIGHT THING came out, so I was busy seeing BATMAN that opening weekend. But, I heard “Fight the Power.” And I remember thinking, what is this? What is this about? And I remember reading Roger’s reviews and the press, and I went and saw it, and I saw that opening scene with “Fight the Power.” And then I saw this, and that opening scene with “Pray for My City,” which I think is such a powerful song. I want to talk to you Nick and Spike about how that song came to be, what it means to the film, and its creation.
Lee: I’m going to let Nick take it, but I didn’t even know he went into the studio to do this. He just said, “Play this.” I said, “What the fuck is this?”
[Everybody laughs]
Cannon: Honestly, to get into the character, and I really became a part of the community in so many different ways. Again, to the credit of the peacekeepers, who are really part of not only the block and the city in a real way, they introduced me to the music community, these hungry young up-and-coming rappers in Chicago.
Lee: Producers too, right?
Cannon: Yeah, producers too. We were supposed to do one song for the movie that I perform, which is actually called “My City,” and we did that song first, and it was like a room of like the hottest, realist, rawest rappers in Chicago, and everybody was trying to get on. There was this one brother by the name of Hypno Carlito, who was like, “Man, I know we in here making all of this drill music, but I really lived this, and I love my city, and we need prayer.” He would just talk, and I was like, “Yo. Let’s get in the booth. Let’s talk.” And to have a room full of these young powerful minds, and to really say what’s true to the message, that’s how that song came about.
We didn’t know if Spike was going to like it, we didn’t know. But it was just really helping me get into character, and at the same time allow them to get their voice out. I was just trying to give them the opportunity to say something positive about their city, truly from them. So many powerful words, but that statement is like, “Y’all mad cuz I don’t call it Chicago, but I don’t live in no fucking Chicago. I live in Chi-Raq.” That was in that conversation and them saying “Everyone’s mad because we’re not saying Chicago. I don’t know that life. I don’t know the downtown life. I know this life, and I love this life because it’s all I know.” And to hear them say that is so powerful. So when I had the opportunity to say we made this, Spike was like, “Give me that!” And from there, he took it and ran with it.
Question: Once it opens December 4, are any of the production companies involved planning on taking some of the box-office and donating that back here to Chicago to anti-violence programs? Has any of that been discussed?
Lee: No. Amazon is going to do something, but I can’t say what it is. But hopefully, God willing.
Question: After the opening scene to the film, pretty much all of the violence is kept off screen for the rest of the film, and I was just curious about the decision to do that.
Lee: That’s what we wanted to do.
Willmott: From the very beginning, Spike never wanted to really glorify thug culture or violence, and as well, the Greeks always did violence off stage, and we really stayed in that tradition as well, I think.
Question: Spike, will you make another movie in Chicago?
