I’m Jeffrey Wright.
Hey, I’m Kelvin Harrison Jr.
We’re in the film Monster.
And this is shot by shot.
Should I get an attorney?
You’re going to have to remain quiet.
Well, can I call my mom?
This is one of the most pivotal scenes
and important scenes in the movie.
We worked really hard to try to take away
any of the stereotypes.
Any of the conventions that have been used
in telling stories about Black families in America.
Twenty dollars in the top drawer dude.
Morning.
It’s a day in the life within the story of
these two characters.
What you working on?
Insurance company ad.
It was also the first scene of the first day of shooting,
and Jeffrey and Kelvin had not met yet.
So Kelvin, one of his idols is Jeffrey Wright,
comes onto set and has a sort of nervous energy
and when we found the rhythm there was a bond there
that was really strong.
-Golden ratio? -No.
I told you. I haven't?
-I don’t think so. -Oh ok.
I was kind of in a shock.
I really did see my dad for a second.
It reminded me of when I would go into like my dad's
practice room and he would explain to me like
what he was working on.
It’s a formula that states that there's a
pleasing symmetry when you create a space.
The father works at home.
He's prideful and he’s successful and he’s smart
and he gives his son maybe more than he understands,
and you feel that that’s always been that way.
And if you plot it out it creates a spiral
found in nature.
Like a seashell?
Yea, nautilus.
He’s trying to find the commonalities between
a father and a son.
Showing interest in stuff that they’re interested in
and watching them want to share with you.
You know why do I go to school
when I can just stay here and talk to you?
Because I love you,
but if you don’t, you're still not too old
to get that beat down.
Yeah?
Yeah.
Me and you?
We’re trying to pass on some perspective,
trying to give all the love you can,
but at the end of that scene Steve walks out the door.
The world out there is not the world inside.
Alright, alright, I gotta go alright.
The story of that scene is what happens in that room,
the exchange.
You got curriculum night tonight.
And as a father there are limitations
to the experiences that I can control
for my child once they walk out that door.
Hey! Do well on that test dude.
Yeah.
Steven.
Dad?
I can’t hear you, are you ok?
What's wrong?
I wanted the non-typical.
I did not want to see the same sort of violence,
the same sort of intimidation and physicality.
I wanted it to be a little more ephemeral
and a little more in our character’s
17-year-old head.
Nah.. nothing's wrong, I’m just calling just to
see how you were and say hey, how are you?
Just what it’s like to leave your cell.
A kid like that, you’d have like the first thirty minutes
of when a cell opens to rush to use the phone
but at some point, the OG’s on the cell block
are going to come and take the phone off you
and then that’s it. It’s over.
And you either got your phone call
or you didn’t.
Well we’re worried about you.
Yeah?
We had been shooting in the prison
for a little bit.
I think I was able to take in the loneliness and
it was the first time, for me personally,
that I had ever been away from my family that long
while shooting a movie.
I missed just having a normal life.
Things that you just take for granted.
I was just processing all that in real time.
Is Jerry with you?
So, I love the idea that we constructed
a scene in like a long lens.
Where you can’t really see what's going on,
but you hear the same things you’ve heard in other
scenes in the movie,
so you know where you are.
And you hear it in his voice.
And you hear dad’s very claustrophobic.
And then out of nowhere that actor comes in.
-Get off the phone! -Steven? Steven?
Beat it!
-Sorry mister. -Steven?
Steven?
Just unimaginable to think that your son
might be on the other end of a call
with all manner of danger
around him.
It’s a moment when it happens and it's done
it’s like you can feel the air around you
kind of compress.
All you want to do is scream and yell
at the world.
The subtlety of the way Jeffrey sort of plays that
is so powerful to me.
There’s so much going on in that scene.
It's one of my favorites of the film.
When you were born I thought of all the scenes
of your life.
You playing football, just like I did.
You going to college, just like I did.
Jeffrey’s performance is so incredible.
Reading it is one thing, but then seeing it
was another thing, and how heartbroken he was
and how scared he was.
Dating a beautiful girl,
someone just like your mother.
Jeffrey Wright is giving you a story in his eyes
and in his expressions.
To give an audience a moment to actually slide down
the mountain with him as he is processing the fact
that his son did something and it landed him here.
I even imagined being mad at you
for a bunch of stupid things.
And seeing the reflection of your child too.
I never thought about my dad looking at me as like
as himself as well too. You know?
And it’s like, you almost kind of want to go
no, no, no, no, no, no, no, it’s not, you did great.
I don’t know what’s happening and that’s really sad too.
That they're both sitting there like, what happened?
I never saw anything like this.
It's one of those scenes that it's like the whole movie
caught in twenty seconds.
The fear, the agony, the love, the confusion.
Everything that a family goes through in that moment.
I don’t know, it just never crossed my mind.
You can check out Monster
now streaming on Netflix.