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'Us' writer-director Jordan Peele, Lupita Nyong’o, and Winston Duke talk about the ambitious horror movie
Los Angeles — Writer-director Jordan Peele never stops giving us something to talk about.
After his big directorial debut hit, “Get Out,” here he is again with the ambitious horror film, “Us.” It makes us question ourselves: “Are we our worst enemies?”
The movie is about a family who goes on vacation to a beach house to spend some time with their friends. But instead of having a relaxing time, chaos and tension arise when a group of doppelgangers (referred to as “The Tethered”) who look exactly like them, arrive and ruin everything.
It stars Lupita Nyong’o (as Adelaide Wilson and Red) and Winston Duke (as Gabe Wilson and Abraham).
We talked to Jordan, Lupita and Winston and we discover more about themselves and their thoughts and experiences about making the movie. Below are excerpts of our conversations with them:
Lupita Nyong’o
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What’s interesting about this movie to me is it’s about identity. How do opportunities that are presented to us allow us to be who we are? If that opportunity is taken away, will we become somebody different?
Yeah, that's great. The strength of Jordan's filmmaking style is that he creates cinematic experiences that are open to interpretation. It's definitely an intention, something he's exploring at the core of it but how exactly it resonates with people is not prescribed, so the fact that you put it that way is so beautiful.
This is a film about embracing the different parts of ourselves. It's the recognition of the shadow self, which are often parts of ourselves that we suppress, that we ignore, that we pretend don't exist but really what we end up doing is projecting them out into the world and making monsters as a result.
As an audience member, there were some illogical steps to me. Some of the chess pieces I couldn’t rationalize. How does one grapple with that?
Maybe you should [see it more than once]. Jordan also stories that he would love for people to experience once and then experience again and have a new experience in and they resonate in different ways the more times you watch it.
I saw “Get Out” five times in the cinema in one month precisely because of that. Every time I'd leave, and I'd talk to someone about it, they would have an interpretation, and I would be like 'wait, I totally missed that.' And then I'd have to go back and see for myself. I'd be like oh, I get that but then also I see this so he does make engaging films and films that are about interaction beyond the walls of cinema.
This movie is about identity, and every age, every person we evolve into a new identity. I was wondering with the incredible spotlight on you, are there times where you maybe feel a little lost? Or which Lupita are we looking at?
Which Lupita are we looking at? Well, my job offers me the opportunity to experience the world through other peoples' perspectives, and I get paid to have a multiple personality disorder. And I appreciate that because I think, like in this film playing Red in particular, offered me a chance to delve into the darker side of myself, borrow from that, and use it as fuel for this character.
I was given permission to do so, and it offers like an exorcism if you will, and I think all of us have a duality in us. here's this shadow self that we suppress, that we ignore and oftentimes when the shadow self is unattended to it causes damage.
It rears its ugly head and causes a destruction. It's always healthy, as humans, to befriend the darker sides of ourselves. Because to be human is to be both light and dark, and so when we say oh, that's such an inhumane thing that happened, that atrocity, that war, we are rejecting something that is very much in our nature, and that's when it becomes an enemy to our existence. I feel very blessed that my job has me put the darker sides of myself to good use creatively.
What kind of Lupita are you scared to face?
I'm scared to face angry Lupita. Yeah, there's a rageful Lupita in there somewhere that I would hate to meet out in the world because I think she could be quite dangerous.
How do you handle her?
I meditate. I do films like this that keep me out of jail.
What makes Lupita angry?
I think injustice makes me angry when I feel injustice against myself or people I love, a community that I belong to. Even one that I don't, injustice enrages me.
What have your nightmares been over the years?
When I was growing up, I had this pervasive nightmare and it came from this popsicle that was sold outside my school. It was a strawberry popsicle and it was known as the Red Devil and on it was a red devil.
I don't know why anyone would think that was a good marketing strategy but obviously I fell for it because I loved the Red Devil. I didn't like to look at the packaging so, I would take it out and crumple it up and eat it with my eyes closed and it would terrify me at night.
I had a recurring dream that there was a Red Devil in a trench outside our house and it wouldn't let me through to go to school. It was recurring and recurring and recurring. I don't dream that dream anymore but I remember it. That was the most pervasive nightmare that I had.
Winston Duke
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Have you met Jordan before? What was your reaction when he offered you this role?
I didn’t personally know Jordan in-depth before. We met in passing at the Oscars and I gushed to him about “Get Out” and just loving it. Then I saw him again at another post-Oscars after party and I made some conversation. I finally got a call about three weeks later saying Jordan Peele wants to talk to you about a project. I was like I will talk to him about a shoe shining project if you like, anything.
So once I read the script, he didn’t give me any information. He said I don’t want to color the impact of the film to you, I don’t want to color your experience, I want you to read the script and then let me know if you want to be a part of it and if you are interested.
I read it and sat for about 45 minutes and everything that you have seen today was already apparent in that version of the script. I sat there for a moment and said, I have got to be a part of this conversation. I wanted to be a part of the conversation that would ensue after people had consumed the movie, after people actually started going I like that a lot, why? And I didn’t like that, why? It’s really for me about the why. Whether you like it or not, whether it was comfortable, or about time, it’s about the why. As long as you ask why, I am happy.
Because that’s where I live, I live in process. As an artist, my favorite thing to do is to tear it apart, break the script apart, break it down and get in the weeds with it. The outcome I can’t control, I can’t control what the impact of something is, but I can control the intention that I put into it, I can control the intention not the impact. So I love the thing where I can develop intention, which is the process. So that’s my thing and really getting to work with Jordan Peele on this was just clear.
When we talked to Jordan, he mentioned that your greatest fear is of one’s self. Do you agree with that?
I think that’s how we contextualize things, yeah. I think we look at things from our own lenses. So usually anytime we feel uncomfortable around someone, anytime we tend to go, oh a person would never do that, he’s just not that kind of guy, because if you can think of someone lying in such a terrible way, it actually means am I capable of lying like that? Is my wife or my husband able to lie like that? Have they been lying to me too? So technically, it is all about you. So your fear of others tend to be stemming from a fear of your own capabilities.
So what are your greatest fears and how do you face your fears?
I think a personal fear of mine would be to be voiceless, to be out of touch with my intellect. To be unable to make an impact in the world, and that’s exactly why I fight so hard to be doing the work that I do, it’s my way of securing freedom.
Freedom is acting, acting totally disparate experiences and being truthful among them. That’s really a big thing for me, curating conversations, being part of great conversations like I am here today and being a part of a great conversation like this movie that can have change and also potentially make a lot of money because we are in the world that we live in. So that’s my thing.
So a personal fear of mine is if I got Alzheimer’s one day and lost all my memories, that for me would just be the worst thing that I would have to work through. But it’s tied a lot of appreciation to myself.
What were the challenges you faced as a boy from the Caribbean coming into a school of American kids? What were those challenges that you had to deal with? And in which way were you prepared or not prepared?
Some of those challenges were asking me to distance myself from what would eventually become the most beautiful aspects of myself. And being an immigrant, it literally boiled down sometimes to how weird the food you bring to lunch smells. Then trying to explain that away and saying oh yeah, I don’t like it either.
Then growing into a man that totally appreciates that and totally appreciates where I come from. I come from a people who are survivors and I come from a people who are entrepreneurs. I grew up in the Caribbean and saw my mother build her own house and build a business brick by brick, the foundation of it.
I saw the first supermarket in my neighborhood get built by my neighbor and distant cousin. Those are my strengths. Coming here, it’s those strengths that helped me add to the communities that I am a part of.
Hollywood is a big community, movie making is a community effort and it’s not something anyone does on their own, it’s thoughts that create cool material, thoughts that go into scripts and production meetings that say hey, this color looks good, this color reminds me of the ocean where I am from, this color reminds me of carnivale. We are all technically, we belong to one real artistic collective conscious, and those challenges, they got pretty bad, but I am happy I came out of it.
Jordan Peele
In this day and age, with a lot of these types of movies, a knife or a gun is usually the weapon of choice. What was the impetus for the scissors?
In this movie, as you see, there is a spiritual bond that is to be severed in this event. Scissors both an every-day object, but it has a duality to it, as well. It is connected by two pieces, these two pieces connected into one tool, and it is used to severe. It looks like a rabbit, if you hold it up one way. No, there's plenty of connection. Every choice I try to get as many levels and layers in there. But, at the end of the day, it also just has to be cool.
But you never use a gun.
No. I don't love to use guns because I think it takes a step outside the horror genre for me. I like found objects, although there is a rifle at the end of "Get Out."
How did you get to directing? Who were your heroes?
Horror and directing have been passions of mine since I was younger, since I was a teenager. I was so passionate about it that I didn't go there. I didn't want to fail. That would have broken my heart to make a movie that I couldn't stand by. So, I went into comedy, which I also loved, and was more immediately fulfilling, you get the laugh or you don't and you can move on.
My heroes growing up were Tim Burton, Stanley Kubrick, Steven Spielberg, Spike Lee, John Carpenter, Roman Polanski. "Rosemary's Baby" is one of the best.
At some point, I'd say probably about eight to ten years ago, I made a conscious decision to start to prepare for this transition. And for many years, nobody understood what I was talking about. "You've got a career in comedy." I lost agents because they couldn't understand it. But I was telling people, "Look, I have something to say in the horror genre. And I want to move in that direction." And so, the result is better than my wildest dreams.
Do you remember when you watched “The Twilight Zone” the first time and why did that touch you in that day and age?
I don't remember the first episode that I ever saw, but I do remember a transformative episode was the Talking Tina episode, which was a very horror-themed episode, and it stood out as such. There was something about the accessibility of these high-concept stories that was wonderful. Also, an aesthetic, they're in black and white, the sort of classy attire of the era, and just a beautifully-crafted ability to tell a complex story in a simple way. Very effective to me.
"To Serve Man" was one of those that really appealed to me on the level that it's basically a lead-up to a pun. And yet, it was taken seriously and the stakes of it were so huge.
And how was Lupita?
As a person? She's extremely thoughtful, she has an ability to be effervescent and delightful one moment, and then go real deep and be extremely focused the next moment. More than anything, she is passionate. She wants to challenge herself and, I don't know where she's going to go from here, because this was such a difficult challenge, but I don't think she is comfortable unless she is challenging herself.
You co-produced “BlackKKlansman,” and Spike Lee didn’t win but “Green Book” won. Do you think we, as a society, are not ready yet for somebody like Spike Lee?
You can answer that in terms of awards and award seasons, I mean, yes and no. But I think awards need to be considered less important than the actual effect that someone has on society. Here's a man who has changed the culture because he is a provocateur, because he is taking steps into areas that no one had before he had. So, his impact on this world is so immense, that I'm sure the awards are just the cherry on the cake for him.
I honestly believe it. Look, awards are obviously important to me. I wept when he won it, I wept being a part of that moment when he got his because it felt like it was so long overdue. Yes, I think he's got many films left in him and I think he's got more awards coming. But the fact that he didn't win, to me, does not take away in one notch what he's brought to this world. And I haven't seen "Green Book." — LA, GMA News
