I was shooting a music video in Atlanta, in October 2018 and 21 came.
It was my first time meeting with him.
It was like...two minutes meeting.
I was introduced to him, and we were just talking about the set.
He was really respectful and really sober, kind guy.
And probably after couple months, like in December, they hit us on really close to New
Year's celebration like on December 28th, and it was like family time and I got text
message, "We need ASAP treatment for 21, really ASAP."
I was like, "Oh my god, which song, which song?"
He's like, "a lot."
The house in the background, we were searching some big royal great classic house.
When we get inside, looking for location, dinner scene and other things.
I was like, "Yeah, this is where I wanna shoot."
Owner came and was like ... Actually there was ‘Atlanta’ TV show shot here.
I was like, "Really," because I'm big fan of Atlanta TV show.
And, I was like, "Whoa, now we need to shoot here."
This is actually the first time we see 21 in the frame.
And, for me, this type of frame and shot was really important to show his power, to show
that he's leader of family.
Starting from the bottom and now where he is.
He’s like boss.
He’s in the middle, he's Godfather.
This really important shot because we can see there is no waiters, no chefs, only family
members who is putting the food on the table.
When people sitting in the table, like in a family dinner type of thing, everybody tries
to be the best version of [who] they are.
For me, it's bad because family should be firstly the place where people are real and
you don't need to wear any masks.
But, in this music video, everybody wearing masks.
Everybody trying to hide something.
When the father's standing really close to his child in funeral, it's actually like a
gym.
We could see that this is basically the court for basketball, and this is what gives pressure
to our dad.
This is a burden.
It is pressure.
This is his fears and everything that gives really pressure on him.
When I was hearing the samples that 21 used for this song, “a lot” song, I was like
this needs to be vintage.
Xiaolong, amazing amazing DP he was like, “Yo let’s shoot something like the film
‘Cold War’.”
4:3 framing, it gives such great poetry, you know, mood.
That’s why we chose it, to have this photography style, vintage, classic look.
Initially we had three performance for J. Cole, one is with 21, and two where we can
see him kind of related to what's going on in the music video.
Everything that you can see in the frame is basically reflection of what's going on in
the living room.
So, this is mirror, huge mirror.
The most huge mirror in Atlanta that we can buy.
The main inspiration for that, it was film 'Cold War."
They had actually, the same scene.
On the behind of mirror, we can see a lot of people there, our grips, gaffers, we like,
"Okay, I hope it's not gonna fall.
I hope it's not gonna kill artist."
The main reason why we created this kind of weird scene is more because he's like a guest
and I wanted to see on the reflection on the mirror that the party is going on, the living
room is full of guests, the family's speaking and doing their thing and prepping for dinner.
And, J. Cole, he's just guest.
He just came to visit 21.
In each of takes he was amazing.
When I put him with kids in the frame, I was really, really surprised.
You can tell a lot about his personality.
First thing that he done, he's like, "Show playback to this little girl."
I was like…
We had like 15 minutes break, and I was thinking what to shoot on this last verse, and I was
like, "Let's make this scene from 'Godfather II,' when young Al Pacino sitting alone in
the table with nobody there."
What's the last scene of 'Godfather' mean for me personally: It's the power and the
fame leaves you alone.
It seems like he sacrificed his family to be on the top of where he is.
This is the last shot of this music video.
For me this black and white photo is showing the result.
This black and white because it was in the past, and this is what people sacrifice.
Everything that we are seeing is from other perspective.
We're looking from perspective 21, we are looking at perspective family members, and
now we're looking from the wide perspective.
Looking to the whole picture.
It was risk of course to write this kind of treatment, and to present it for big artists,
like "Yo let's shoot this type of music video."
I mean, I think when he was reading it, he was feeling the vibe that I was showing, that
I was putting inside of this music video.
I think it touched people's hearts, because basically this is about not only Americans
it's a worldwide story.
It’s more about what he’s hiding, what he’s hiding from his family.
How many problems he got?
A lot.
My plan with DP was to make the dinner scene really has aesthetic of 'Godfather.'
The man who was grading this music video, his name is Stefan.
He made a lute for dinner scene, and me and my DP were like, “This looks like ‘Godfather’
but it’s not the same.
He was like “I watched the raw footage from ‘Godfather’.
We were like, “Okay, OG, OG.”