: The first draft that I read, that’s how Kemp introduced all of our legends. And it was one of the things that I immediately thought was clever. Before I actually met with Kemp, I bought the play. After, I read the screenplay just to see what things he took out, what things he put in, how he chose to open it up. I really appreciated what he did, not only because it opened the story up, but it also quickly humanized the four legends.
There’s a man, Jacob Lawrence, his paintings also were inspiration to capture that energy, and also movement. While we were in a room for sometimes almost 20 minutes, I still didn’t want the camera to feel static, but I didn’t want it to be a distraction.
Nelson McCormick was also a director that we had often that was very much present in allowing me to see his process. One of the things that he shared with me that I thought was invaluable, and it’s kind of proven to be so, is that he always felt like I would be going far beyond.