TAYLOR: (As Inez de la Paz) There's got to be another option. I come in and fix something, I got to come back a couple months later. MARK GESSNER: (As Jerry) This building is too old. TAYLOR: (As Inez de la Paz) We have no bathroom, no shower, Jerry. Like, that passive aggressiveness that was happening was hard to watch. You know what I'm saying? It's just, like - especially, like, trying to, like, you know, push my people out. SUMMERS: Has it at all changed the way you view your city? And to know that a lot of the things that were happening then is still happening now in my adult years - it's kind of crazy. So I also was able to kind of, like, relearn a lot, like, very - you know, in a detailed way about what was happening in New York. So a lot of the things that were going down in that time, either I was too young to really all the way understand or, you know, kind of just in those preteen years where I wasn't paying attention. And what's crazy is I also got to further learn a lot of the things that I was too young to really understand because, you know, in '96 I was little Terry's age. What was it like for you being in a movie that is just, like, so New York to its core? The streets tell a story, the businesses that open, the landlords, the voices of New York's mayors that you hear. I mean, as you mentioned, you are from Harlem, and the way that we experience the city changes over the years. We've got to talk about the New York of it all. So I definitely knew that I would be able to relate on top of being a Harlem girl. You know? She was strong, and she was ambitious, and she was a hustler. Without even reading the script, she was so much - like, I feel like it's, like, a little bit of Inez in everybody. A big plus was, of course, me being from Harlem, so I was like, oh, yeah, this is perfect. And just from the synopsis, I was like, OK, this is something I want to be a part of. It was really just a synopsis and the audition scenes. TAYLOR: It's crazy because when I first auditioned for Inez, I remember not even having the script. But what drew you to acting, and what draws you to the character of Inez? SUMMERS: You have had this incredible career, and I am most familiar with you because of your music. And I need you to pretty much promise me, tell me to my face so both you and I can hear, that you're willing to ride this out. Like, we both want the same thing, so we both got to go and get it together. You know, this is something that you believe in - the reassurance that, you know, you're not going to shut down on me because you kind of see Terry going in and out of - like, one moment he's there, and next moment he's, like, kind of over it. But I also - I think it's something that she wanted Terry to hear himself saying. TAYLOR: Yeah, I think it was a little bit of reassurance there. SUMMERS: It felt like to me when I was watching that that, like, she really just needed to hear him say it to affirm herself. Tell me.ĪDETOLA: (As Terry) We're in this together. TAYLOR: (As Inez de la Paz) But I need to know we're in this thing together. TAYLOR: (As Inez de la Paz) They can try all they want, but they're not breaking us up this time. When I spoke with Teyana Taylor the other day, I started with a promise that Inez makes to Terry. The movie follows Inez and young Terry over more than a decade as they make a home and a life for themselves in a changing New York City, dealing with a crumbling apartment, gentrification, racial profiling and policing. SUMMERS: That's Teyana Taylor, who plays Inez. TAYLOR: Inez started out as really young, motivated, ambitious but also, like, a little tiny bit immature, you know, in motherhood and just, like, kind of trying to figure out this thing called life, you know, and trying to figure out how to care for a child. SUMMERS: She takes Terry and disappears into the chaos of the city. TAYLOR: (As Inez de la Paz) Would it make you feel better if you came and stayed with me? SUMMERS: Terry's question prompts Inez to make an impulsive decision, one that will change the course of her and Terry's lives. TAYLOR: (As Inez de la Paz) I don't know yet.ĪDETOLA: (As Terry) Why you keep leaving me? TEYANA TAYLOR: (As Inez de la Paz) Save my beeper number just in case till I find you. SUMMERS: Inez has a young son, Terry, who's in foster care and about to be moved to a different home. UNIDENTIFIED ACTOR: (As character) Is that Inez? (SOUNDBITE OF FILM, "A THOUSAND AND ONE") At the beginning of the new movie "A Thousand And One," we meet Inez, a young woman who's recently out of prison living in Harlem in the 1990s.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |