Five Things: ‘Summer of Soul’ Director Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson On Why He Didn’t “Tyler Perry” His Harlem Cultural Festival Doc
28.01.2022 - 21:51
/ deadline.com
Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson’s Summer of Soul (…Or, When the Revolution Could Not Be Televised) turns back the clock to 1969 when a series of concerts by Black artists transfixed Harlem. Under different circumstances, the director thinks the film would have turned out very differently.
“What if the same amount of 40 hours of footage winds up in another filmmaker’s hands? What combination could they come up with?” Questlove asks. “I don’t feel like mine is the definitive combination.”
He worked on the documentary amidst dramatic upheaval in America.
“We were dealing with the pandemic that we knew nothing about, happening in real time. Number two, the George Floyd situation really turned up the degrees another notch. And then on top of that, we were in the [2020 presidential] election. Those three things happening really affected our storyline. Basically, the result is the current story that we told. Had I finished in 2018 or 2019—in time for the 50th anniversary—this definitely would have been a way different story. I would have probably just stuck to a straight-ahead concert film without all of the explanation.”
Despite being a famed hip hop artist himself, and a leader of The Roots, The Tonight Show house band, Questlove doesn’t appear in the film and his voice is barely heard. Some versions of the poster brand it as “A Questlove Jawn” (the word “jawn” is Philadelphia vernacular for “joint”). But Thompson didn’t go overboard trumpeting his role.
“I could have Tyler Perry’d this thing, been like, “Questlove’s Summer of Soul.” That’s the calling card of a lot of directors, [like] Alfred Hitchcock. I didn’t want to be that person. It took a long time for me to get talked off the ledge of not being in this film whatsoever. The two
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