Latest / The Steve Harvey Morning Show / Brian White Full Interview
Transcript
- 0:00Speaker 1: My Next Yes is a Boston native and son of
- 0:02Speaker 1: a licensed financial consultant mother and the and the son
- 0:06Speaker 1: of the legendary Boston Celtics player Joe Joe White. He
- 0:11Speaker 1: was still with the importance of both sports and education
- 0:14Speaker 1: throughout his childhood. He studied political science, psychology, and theater
- 0:19Speaker 1: at Dartmouth College. He's currently starting in ambitions, a new
- 0:24Speaker 1: night time drama from producing my man. Will Packard did
- 0:27Speaker 1: two movies with him and Oprah Winfrey on their own networks.
- 0:30Speaker 1: It's premier in this June. He's surrounded by the all
- 0:33Speaker 1: star casts and includes My Girl. Robin Gibbons did uh
- 0:36Speaker 1: couple of sitcoms with her on ABC, s An Atkins,
- 0:39Speaker 1: That's m Girl from w B and UPM. The series
- 0:42Speaker 1: tells the tells the tale of two high powered African
- 0:45Speaker 1: American families that class and connect professionally and romantically in
- 0:49Speaker 1: the hot Atlanta. Please welcome to Money Making Conversations, my
- 0:52Speaker 1: man Brian White, Hey brother, how are you? Thank you
- 0:57Speaker 1: for having me on? Well, first of all, thank you man. Listen,
- 1:00Speaker 1: let's let's let's talk about the wee yet right now?
- 1:02Speaker 1: You're you you you just tend at the house. You're
- 1:05Speaker 1: acting on some set. What's going on man yet? Yeah?
- 1:08Speaker 1: Right now I'm at the house. We were getting some
- 1:10Speaker 1: work done. Um, get ready to head out on the
- 1:14Speaker 1: road and promote ambitions. We're getting ready to go to
- 1:16Speaker 1: Miami and breaking my family with me, my wife's family.
- 1:19Speaker 1: She's from Argentina. Some of her family lives in Miami,
- 1:22Speaker 1: soort of bringing my daughter so they can meet them,
- 1:25Speaker 1: and uh, you know, just celebrate the life being good. Well,
- 1:29Speaker 1: you know, that's that's that's that's a lot of good
- 1:33Speaker 1: eating meat, meat, meat, men. Yeah, a lot of seafood,
- 1:38Speaker 1: a lot of seafood down there. Absolutely. So when you
- 1:41Speaker 1: when you start looking at your career, all right, I'll
- 1:43Speaker 1: go through your resume and I put your father's name,
- 1:46Speaker 1: Jojo White, and being a sports fan, being a person
- 1:50Speaker 1: of African American descent, Roshan mcgaunt. Let's meet Jojo White,
- 1:56Speaker 1: watching him succeed in the climate of Boston, watching him
- 2:00Speaker 1: succeed on a basketball, uh team like the Boston Celtics.
- 2:04Speaker 1: What was that like? Because for me, it was important
- 2:06Speaker 1: because he was a successful African American succeeding against the
- 2:10Speaker 1: odds and the succeeding in the environment that that that
- 2:14Speaker 1: that that made me feel that I can make it too. Yeah.
- 2:18Speaker 1: It Uh, I mean it was very educational. Uh. It
- 2:22Speaker 1: was also very challenging because my parents were divorced when
- 2:24Speaker 1: I was four. Um, I was close with my dad,
- 2:27Speaker 1: but I lived and was raised by my mom, and
- 2:30Speaker 1: so you know, I when I wasn't with my father,
- 2:33Speaker 1: I was a witness, you know, like a fan watching
- 2:37Speaker 1: on TV the light that was happening. But I was
- 2:40Speaker 1: very aware of it because he was not living in Boston. Uh,
- 2:43Speaker 1: in my in my teen years, but he was always
- 2:46Speaker 1: in the Boston papers. Uh in my you know, when
- 2:48Speaker 1: I was eighteen. Still he's still playing and uh, you know,
- 2:52Speaker 1: I'm aware of everything he's doing, but I just can't
- 2:53Speaker 1: see him as much. Um. You know, we didn't have
- 2:57Speaker 1: Uh we were texting all day the way we are now.
- 2:59Speaker 1: The word work was the video so you know, if
- 3:01Speaker 1: there was a window, you know, half hour a day
- 3:03Speaker 1: when Dad was free on the phone, when I was
- 3:05Speaker 1: free on a hardline phone and we could talk, but
- 3:08Speaker 1: that wasn't often. So, UM, I learned how this kind
- 3:12Speaker 1: of lifestyle that I'm in now works and how it
- 3:15Speaker 1: can work better. Uh when with the knowledge that I
- 3:19Speaker 1: have of what you know, can potentially be done using
- 3:22Speaker 1: technology to make sure that my daughter has an even
- 3:25Speaker 1: better experience than maybe my siblings and I did with
- 3:28Speaker 1: the with the challenges of distance. And by the same token,
- 3:33Speaker 1: I learned all the great ways my dad uh maneuvered
- 3:37Speaker 1: through space. I learned through his his lessons. He was
- 3:41Speaker 1: in the sixty eight panem Games and in the sixty
- 3:43Speaker 1: night Olympics and that that's the black Govel Olympics movie.
- 3:47Speaker 1: Glory Road is about that. And you know, one of
- 3:50Speaker 1: the things I learned from my god's father read our back, Um,
- 3:53Speaker 1: you know, telling my dad did not get on that podium.
- 3:57Speaker 1: Don't uh let your fans know at your politics and
- 4:01Speaker 1: your opinions before you've won them some trophies. Uh, they
- 4:05Speaker 1: don't care. That very clear to his number one draft
- 4:08Speaker 1: pick in in the nineteen sixty nine that that that's
- 4:12Speaker 1: something that he should not do. So you'll notice my
- 4:14Speaker 1: father is absent from the glove being raised celebration and
- 4:18Speaker 1: instead of celebrating with his teammates the moment and not
- 4:22Speaker 1: making it more than that. Um. And you know, recognizing
- 4:25Speaker 1: his place and his position and and always being happy
- 4:29Speaker 1: to be a part of something positive is an asset
- 4:32Speaker 1: that my father definitely demonstrated and passed on to me
- 4:35Speaker 1: is as something that's very valuable. Congratulations because I guess
- 4:39Speaker 1: what what I thank you, you know, because I guess
- 4:41Speaker 1: what what individuals do when you have so few role models,
- 4:45Speaker 1: and you know, back then, you know you have a
- 4:47Speaker 1: lot of role model because of social media, because of media,
- 4:50Speaker 1: because of the way the system works nowadays, that relationships
- 4:54Speaker 1: can be expanded on and back then you limited on
- 4:56Speaker 1: who you can talk to, on how you can talk
- 4:59Speaker 1: to him, and what you can And because of the
- 5:01Speaker 1: fact that he was featured in a market and Boston
- 5:04Speaker 1: had a lot of success with a lot of African
- 5:05Speaker 1: American talent, but he was definitely in a market that
- 5:08Speaker 1: was perceived to be not favorable to the African Americans
- 5:12Speaker 1: and he exceeded and stuff so very much. So and
- 5:15Speaker 1: what he what I think that the lesson at the
- 5:18Speaker 1: you know, when I look at the when I reflect
- 5:20Speaker 1: from now in hindsight, what Dad didn't do is he
- 5:23Speaker 1: he didn't talk a lot. He walks off and carried
- 5:25Speaker 1: a big stick. And so in the beginning of his career,
- 5:28Speaker 1: he came in hungry to prove himself as worthy of
- 5:31Speaker 1: the number one draft pick, and as soon as you know,
- 5:35Speaker 1: they got a ring um she started the Jojo White
- 5:38Speaker 1: Growth League and his foundations and started the speaking tours
- 5:42Speaker 1: and started doing the things with red support at that
- 5:45Speaker 1: point that we're quote unquote appropriate. And just what it
- 5:47Speaker 1: taught me was a lot with the social media era,
- 5:50Speaker 1: where everybody leads with how great they are, when you
- 5:54Speaker 1: know they haven't really accomplished anything, and instead, instead of
- 5:57Speaker 1: being great, they're worried about being famous or being recognized
- 6:00Speaker 1: for that greatness. And and that's the opposite of the
- 6:03Speaker 1: approach that I was shown and demonstrated by my father,
- 6:07Speaker 1: and and the approach that I tried to apply to
- 6:10Speaker 1: my craft currently, which seems to be the opposite of
- 6:15Speaker 1: you know, the motto or the credo. Not really, not really,
- 6:19Speaker 1: because every role you play I watch, your credit or
- 6:22Speaker 1: your career is your is dignity is strength. Uh you know, articulate,
- 6:26Speaker 1: you're a good looking guy. Uh, and you always come
- 6:29Speaker 1: across as a strong, a strong, independent person and no
- 6:33Speaker 1: matter how extreme your characters are. And uh, I just wanted,
- 6:37Speaker 1: I just wanted to talk about your father, and we're
- 6:39Speaker 1: gonna move on, but I want to just bring up
- 6:40Speaker 1: the fact that was referencing his dad, the legendary Boston
- 6:44Speaker 1: Celtic star Jojo White, and how the impact he played
- 6:47Speaker 1: on the community as a player and also on in
- 6:50Speaker 1: his personal life. But more importantly, when I look at
- 6:52Speaker 1: your characters that you play now, it explains a little
- 6:55Speaker 1: bit about you, know, your your physicality. It also explains
- 6:58Speaker 1: your daring nous. You know. Is one of the favorite
- 7:01Speaker 1: characters that you that I recently saw you play was
- 7:04Speaker 1: on Ray Donovan and uh, and how do you prepare
- 7:10Speaker 1: for a crazy character like that? I'll let you in
- 7:15Speaker 1: on a couple of secrets. David Hollander, Uh, the creator
- 7:18Speaker 1: of Ray Donovan, gave me the opportunity in season one
- 7:22Speaker 1: to to join the show. And Uh. As season one
- 7:26Speaker 1: went on, we had a lot of fun and he
- 7:27Speaker 1: came to me and he said, hey, you really seem
- 7:29Speaker 1: to get the black comedy that is Ray dount of it.
- 7:33Speaker 1: And I said, that's how I saw it, you know,
- 7:35Speaker 1: when I made my audition tape. You know it's it's
- 7:38Speaker 1: it's very dark, but there's an underbelly of humor um
- 7:43Speaker 1: in a lot that they do. As dark as they get,
- 7:45Speaker 1: you have to laugh at it. And he goes all right, exactly.
- 7:48Speaker 1: So I have some things in mind for season two
- 7:51Speaker 1: and you know, just so, are you open to play
- 7:54Speaker 1: and to go with me if I get pretty crazy?
- 7:56Speaker 1: And absolutely, man, I'll be Huckleberry. And uh, you know,
- 7:59Speaker 1: he back to me over the summer and said, we
- 8:02Speaker 1: don't have a lot of He actually said this, he said,
- 8:04Speaker 1: we don't have a lot of writers of color on
- 8:06Speaker 1: the staff and they don't have any. And he said,
- 8:09Speaker 1: we'd like to you know, I would never uh be
- 8:14Speaker 1: so outlandish, has to try to create the dialogue for
- 8:16Speaker 1: you in this type of arc, and I'd like your input.
- 8:19Speaker 1: I'd like you to help us. And so we did
- 8:22Speaker 1: a table read with all six with six scripts at
- 8:25Speaker 1: the time you usually do one, and I got a
- 8:27Speaker 1: chance to read them and submit some some feedback, some
- 8:30Speaker 1: basic feedback, some thoughts to them that they then incorporated,
- 8:34Speaker 1: uh to help shape some of my dialogue. And it
- 8:37Speaker 1: was really an honor and a privilege that's you know,
- 8:41Speaker 1: uncommon to be involved at all. And it helped me
- 8:44Speaker 1: prepare for and be aware of what was to come
- 8:47Speaker 1: and try to help ground it a little bit more
- 8:49Speaker 1: because it was it was outlandish. But you know, Pooch
- 8:52Speaker 1: and I and Donald phase on coming out of season one,
- 8:55Speaker 1: wanted to try to take this and run with it
- 8:58Speaker 1: and make it as entertaining and as stought provoking and
- 9:01Speaker 1: as conversational, like a conversation inspiring as possible, So hopefully
- 9:06Speaker 1: you know it was it was taken with with all
- 9:08Speaker 1: that laughed with and and thought about and uh, you know,
- 9:12Speaker 1: feel a lot of conversations about a lot of what
- 9:15Speaker 1: johns Waite was saying. Why how life is for people
- 9:19Speaker 1: of color like Pooch in not only a black world,
- 9:22Speaker 1: but the black man inside that family. It's a microcosm
- 9:24Speaker 1: of the world. How to be not equal footing when
- 9:27Speaker 1: his father feels like that. You know, that's that's the
- 9:30Speaker 1: kind of stuff that we wanted to that We sat
- 9:33Speaker 1: at dinner and lunch and talked about trying to make
- 9:35Speaker 1: people think about um as they laughed at some of
- 9:38Speaker 1: the things that that, uh, that my character and his
- 9:42Speaker 1: character were talking about saying to each other, and it
- 9:44Speaker 1: was saying a lot and I think I enjoyed the
- 9:46Speaker 1: most goods Pooch his character. We talked about the show
- 9:49Speaker 1: one of the shows you started in uh showtimes Ray
- 9:52Speaker 1: Donovan Um and the character was this this high profile
- 9:57Speaker 1: actor and he uh him and play this role and
- 10:02Speaker 1: they did something very Uh. They saved him because he
- 10:06Speaker 1: he kind of his character kind of lost his mind
- 10:08Speaker 1: one day and they because it was a samurai sword
- 10:13Speaker 1: and uh, they come in the house. He cried, he cried,
- 10:16Speaker 1: you know, and they and they cover for him. And
- 10:20Speaker 1: so I don't want to give with you. So even
- 10:22Speaker 1: they should go back and see it. But his character
- 10:24Speaker 1: is one of the dynamic characters they play. And the
- 10:26Speaker 1: thing about this is that when I looked at your
- 10:28Speaker 1: resume and and I kept going, I see them on this.
- 10:31Speaker 1: I see them on this, and I've seen on this.
- 10:32Speaker 1: Now they surely we want to talk about coming up
- 10:34Speaker 1: on on own premier in this model, specifically on June eighteenth.
- 10:37Speaker 1: It's called Ambitions. I know, I got a shot window
- 10:39Speaker 1: by the minute left in this break, and got ten
- 10:41Speaker 1: minutes coming up in the next break. Just set it
- 10:43Speaker 1: up real quick and then we're gonna go in more
- 10:45Speaker 1: details when we come back, all right. Ambitions created by
- 10:49Speaker 1: our executive produced by Will Packer, cras by Jamie Gideon's
- 10:53Speaker 1: brought to you by Oprah Winfrey on Own UH is
- 10:55Speaker 1: basically a modern day game of Thrones and about five
- 11:00Speaker 1: powerful families, all vying for the land. In this case,
- 11:03Speaker 1: land is Atlanta. You have the Parahoids, the billionaire white
- 11:07Speaker 1: pharmaceutical giant family. You have the Carlisles, which is my family,
- 11:12Speaker 1: blue collar black folks Atlanta. I've made my way up.
- 11:15Speaker 1: I'm now the mayor of Atlanta. I've married into blackwealth.
- 11:19Speaker 1: The three generational black billionaire family was wealthy and black
- 11:25Speaker 1: Wall Street before it and after it, and kept their
- 11:28Speaker 1: wealth after the government show it. You can now have
- 11:30Speaker 1: even more. We're gonna bring the rest back on this
- 11:33Speaker 1: next break. We're right back with my man Brian White.
- 11:37Speaker 1: I just Rashan McDonald and you're listening to Money Making
- 11:40Speaker 1: Conversations on the phone for with me today on my
- 11:42Speaker 1: show money Making Conversations. It is a very very talented
- 11:45Speaker 1: actor Brian White. He's discussing the new show that's own.
- 11:50Speaker 1: It's produced by Will Packer. It's called Ambitions and it's
- 11:54Speaker 1: based in Atlanta, Georgia. Now, he was wrapping up some
- 11:57Speaker 1: a little bit more tidbits about the show before we
- 11:59Speaker 1: had to go the break. It's gonna continue to do
- 12:01Speaker 1: your thing, my friend. Yeah, all I said is it's
- 12:05Speaker 1: like Game of Thrones, modern Day five families vying for
- 12:08Speaker 1: the land. In this case Atlanta. You have the the
- 12:10Speaker 1: pure Boys billionaire white family, UM pharmaceutical dynasty, the Carlyles,
- 12:18Speaker 1: which is uh, Robin Gibbons family black billionaires were wealthy
- 12:23Speaker 1: before Wall Streets, still wealthy after the government took their money.
- 12:27Speaker 1: Meet my family, the Lancasters, middle class. I'm married into wealth.
- 12:32Speaker 1: I'm the governor, I'm an excuse me, the mayor of Atlanta,
- 12:35Speaker 1: so I'm ambitious. Um. The true Hillo's Mexican Americans striving
- 12:40Speaker 1: their blue collar family looking to elevate in one generation.
- 12:45Speaker 1: And then the Hughes. Uh, they are middle class lawyers,
- 12:50Speaker 1: um elevating up to white collar as they have taken
- 12:53Speaker 1: big jobs and moved to Atlanta. And hand Essence Atkins
- 12:57Speaker 1: is one of the Hughes, and she is the soroy
- 13:00Speaker 1: sister of Robin Gibbons, my wife, and they have a
- 13:02Speaker 1: sordid history. So that's the uh, that's the playing field game.
- 13:07Speaker 1: It's Ron's tone is the backdrop. May sense some melrose play,
- 13:10Speaker 1: some Dallas and dynasty with a little empire and some
- 13:14Speaker 1: power for good measure. You threw out power. Now that's
- 13:19Speaker 1: that's some gangster stuff. About the canna be some killing
- 13:21Speaker 1: going on on this show? Now they kill on the
- 13:24Speaker 1: killer not not everybody's gonna make it well nobody. Not
- 13:28Speaker 1: all made it on Game or Throngs either, my friend.
- 13:31Speaker 1: So when you know, when you walk into a show
- 13:34Speaker 1: like this and you see there's so many layers and
- 13:37Speaker 1: you playing a mayor, are you are you gonna say?
- 13:40Speaker 1: Are you looking at the character you already know? Are
- 13:42Speaker 1: you looking to develop that character for this particularly show
- 13:44Speaker 1: we talked about ambitions that is on premiering on their
- 13:48Speaker 1: own network in June. Talk about that character the very
- 13:50Speaker 1: tier answer, three tier answer. I worked as a surrogate
- 13:54Speaker 1: for Barack Obama, worked as a surrogate for Eric gar said.
- 13:57Speaker 1: I took notes, it's too how the process worked realistically.
- 14:02Speaker 1: Um Secondarily, I worked with Kevin R. Katie, our show runner,
- 14:06Speaker 1: and Sheila Duxworth, the head of television for Will Pecker TV,
- 14:10Speaker 1: on a show called Media two years ago for TV one,
- 14:12Speaker 1: where I played a character that was running for the
- 14:14Speaker 1: Mary of Atlanta. We did a lot of research. We
- 14:16Speaker 1: shot in Atlanta down there, had a lot of lunches
- 14:19Speaker 1: with a lot of folks, and then Will and Sheila
- 14:22Speaker 1: came to me with this project with an offer. UM,
- 14:26Speaker 1: and about thirty minutes after I had fainted, I woke
- 14:29Speaker 1: up on the floor with them still on the phone line,
- 14:32Speaker 1: and UM asked them to send me the script so
- 14:34Speaker 1: I can actually read this this role. Because you never
- 14:36Speaker 1: get an offer on a job, you know, it's always
- 14:39Speaker 1: a thousand auditions been on this one. I was very
- 14:41Speaker 1: blessed to be asked to come to the party. I
- 14:44Speaker 1: was on the guest lift and uh, and we really
- 14:47Speaker 1: started developing it further from what they you know, they
- 14:50Speaker 1: gave me note someone we've done previously, what we had
- 14:52Speaker 1: talked about, and uh, you know started from there and built.
- 14:55Speaker 1: And that's true, That's really true. Like as I've been
- 14:57Speaker 1: a writer, a producer, done some acting, stand up comic
- 15:02Speaker 1: and when they when they when they call and ask you,
- 15:04Speaker 1: this is always a different field because you're always in
- 15:07Speaker 1: the hustle, you're always in the ground, you always going
- 15:09Speaker 1: to the room, competing against so many people. So when
- 15:12Speaker 1: that so you say, you know, the call came to you,
- 15:15Speaker 1: the offer came to you. What was running through your
- 15:17Speaker 1: mind when they were offering you and you and after
- 15:19Speaker 1: they pitched the bigness of the series, well, The first
- 15:24Speaker 1: thought was, I need to get a towel because all
- 15:26Speaker 1: these tears on my face, because you know, it's just
- 15:30Speaker 1: sometimes you can get really hard and discouraging, so to
- 15:32Speaker 1: get positive affirmations or encouragement from friends and and powerful
- 15:38Speaker 1: industry folks like Will and Sheila, who are dear to
- 15:41Speaker 1: your dear friends who we worked together before, but they
- 15:43Speaker 1: cannot hire you for everything. You know, when they when
- 15:45Speaker 1: they can come to you with something great, it's it's uh,
- 15:48Speaker 1: it's it's liberating, it's empowering, it's validating, it's it's you know,
- 15:52Speaker 1: all those things that you shouldn't need, and you know,
- 15:55Speaker 1: we really affirmation, affirmation don't need. You know, it feels
- 15:59Speaker 1: good to get them, and so that particularly that I
- 16:02Speaker 1: just remember it feeling really good, and uh, you know
- 16:04Speaker 1: really uh that I had to get to work and
- 16:07Speaker 1: work harder on this because for some reason, I'm being
- 16:11Speaker 1: given a blessing which means you know, to who those
- 16:14Speaker 1: who much who much is given, much is required, and
- 16:18Speaker 1: so you know, I got to work. Now, how does
- 16:21Speaker 1: social media play player role in your life? You know
- 16:23Speaker 1: how just because we talked about it, you just said
- 16:26Speaker 1: your dad was around, there was no social media you
- 16:28Speaker 1: know the land lines. So now you are, you have
- 16:31Speaker 1: a family, you have a career. I see out you know,
- 16:36Speaker 1: if you follow me, what you do? You know? I
- 16:39Speaker 1: use social media to do two things. Celebrate my family
- 16:42Speaker 1: and promote my jobs. You know. The producers tell me
- 16:45Speaker 1: what the show, you know, and what I can give
- 16:47Speaker 1: me the materials to talk about what what's what's coming up?
- 16:52Speaker 1: And other than that, I really try to affect the
- 16:54Speaker 1: world positively and celebrate my family, so you know, show
- 16:58Speaker 1: you know what we're doing, how we're doing it, and
- 17:00Speaker 1: then and you know, silently give examples and and and
- 17:05Speaker 1: you know, be a role model like my dad was.
- 17:07Speaker 1: He didn't talk a lot, but you know he gave
- 17:11Speaker 1: a grade example always of the time. And that's just
- 17:13Speaker 1: one of the things I think I can do with
- 17:14Speaker 1: social media and try to do. Just understand this, Brian,
- 17:18Speaker 1: He affected me, okay. And I always say that those
- 17:22Speaker 1: a little, those a little, those a little moments that
- 17:24Speaker 1: in your life you need encouragement, you need you need
- 17:27Speaker 1: the option to be aba. Yes I can. He did
- 17:30Speaker 1: that for me. And so I noticed you're doing that
- 17:33Speaker 1: with two charities. One is called helping hands. It's a
- 17:36Speaker 1: helping hand celebrity Weekend. It's in St. Thomas and Black Carpenter,
- 17:40Speaker 1: Please explain those to me, uh, well, Black Carpenter and
- 17:45Speaker 1: helping hands or foundations that I've had over the years
- 17:48Speaker 1: that have evolved into our new UH pursuit, which is
- 17:51Speaker 1: black just called black. It's a retooling or reimagining a
- 17:55Speaker 1: Black Carpenter, which is a youth development platform. Black ends
- 18:00Speaker 1: for the acronym stands for be lucid about cultural knowledge UM.
- 18:06Speaker 1: And the idea is if you know where you came from,
- 18:09Speaker 1: nobody can take that power away from you. And UH
- 18:13Speaker 1: in this day and age, as I watched the government
- 18:15Speaker 1: try to erase, you know, stuff Like I mentioned Black
- 18:18Speaker 1: Wall Street. One of the things that Will and I
- 18:20Speaker 1: talked about was, UM, the the Carlisle family in Ambitions
- 18:24Speaker 1: is so important because we have never seen any family
- 18:28Speaker 1: like this on television and they exist in the world.
- 18:31Speaker 1: And what I mean by that is this family was
- 18:33Speaker 1: rich before Black Wall Street. In our current textbooks and schools,
- 18:37Speaker 1: Black Wall Street isn't talked about, it doesn't exist. UM.
- 18:41Speaker 1: Black Wall Street in tuls Oklahoma is where a wall
- 18:44Speaker 1: street like the New York Stock Exchange existed, owned by
- 18:48Speaker 1: black folks. Back in the thirties, the United States came
- 18:51Speaker 1: in and bombed and burned the town in a partnership
- 18:55Speaker 1: the US government, in a partnership with the k k
- 18:58Speaker 1: K came into that town and burn and took all
- 19:00Speaker 1: the money. Some folks were able to keep their certificates
- 19:03Speaker 1: in their money and get out. This story directly translates
- 19:07Speaker 1: to one of those families now being rich down in Atlanta,
- 19:10Speaker 1: all being lawyers and controlling the state of Georgia and
- 19:15Speaker 1: the United States and playing politics on that you know,
- 19:18Speaker 1: Trumpian global you know sometimes dirty level that that we
- 19:23Speaker 1: see ourselves as outsiders too. There there were plenty of
- 19:27Speaker 1: us inside the game. This is one of those stories,
- 19:30Speaker 1: and to my knowledge, the first one ever told on
- 19:32Speaker 1: national television by black producers and writers. So I'm excited.
- 19:37Speaker 1: You know, not all characters to see things that way.
- 19:39Speaker 1: My character is blue collar raised, being an independent. He's
- 19:43Speaker 1: the mayor of Atlanta. We don't say he's Republican, we
- 19:46Speaker 1: don't say he's an immocrat. You know, I'm saying he's independent,
- 19:50Speaker 1: and he is very much like James Brown. People also
- 19:53Speaker 1: haven't seen a character like him outwardly speak about his
- 19:57Speaker 1: politics behind those closed doors in public. He won't. He'll say,
- 19:59Speaker 1: what ever, get them to votes behind the closed doors.
- 20:02Speaker 1: In this show, you're gonna hear his real thoughts. Example, gentrification,
- 20:06Speaker 1: if it's done by black known companies, is a good thing.
- 20:10Speaker 1: Now you brought up HBCUs we're sending kids to HBC
- 20:13Speaker 1: used to be more educated than their parents, to make
- 20:16Speaker 1: more money than the generation that came behind them. So
- 20:18Speaker 1: if they go off to school and some other state
- 20:20Speaker 1: and come back with more money and buy a house
- 20:22Speaker 1: and elevate the property value, that's gentrification. That is a
- 20:26Speaker 1: good thing. That's not how we currently think about it
- 20:28Speaker 1: because we haven't, as people of color, been in the
- 20:30Speaker 1: positions to do that over the last few generations. It's
- 20:33Speaker 1: always been white people that have gone out and made
- 20:35Speaker 1: more money in us that you know. Sale, If Nas
- 20:41Speaker 1: and jay Z decided to go back to Marcy Projects
- 20:44Speaker 1: where they're both from and buy it and then let
- 20:46Speaker 1: all the tenants in the building buy their units from
- 20:49Speaker 1: them so they own them and no longer rent, that
- 20:51Speaker 1: shifts in entire generation. Is that a bad thing, because
- 20:54Speaker 1: that's gentrification, Just like Furious Styles talked about in The
- 20:57Speaker 1: Boys in the Hood, And that's one of the things
- 20:59Speaker 1: that Evan Lancaster wants to talk about through Own so
- 21:02Speaker 1: that people start talking about it again and recognize people
- 21:04Speaker 1: like Marshawn Lynch in Oakland and doing just that, the
- 21:08Speaker 1: football player for the Raiders buying up homes and then
- 21:11Speaker 1: reselling them so the black families can now be in
- 21:13Speaker 1: power and lower income neighborhoods and those incomes to be
- 21:16Speaker 1: lower income neighborhoods become middle class, just like Nippy Hustle
- 21:19Speaker 1: was trying to do. My man, we're talking to Brian White,
- 21:22Speaker 1: the star of the new series on the Own the
- 21:25Speaker 1: network that premiers this month in particularly pacifically on June eighteenth.
- 21:29Speaker 1: It's called Ambitions. He plays one of the major carried
- 21:32Speaker 1: the mayor, an independent mayor, five generations of family. He's
- 21:36Speaker 1: proclaimed it to be the game of Thrones, and it
- 21:40Speaker 1: did and it has been really I really appreciate you
- 21:45Speaker 1: getting on the call with us today. It's one thing
- 21:48Speaker 1: they said, you just landed a new movie. You can't
- 21:51Speaker 1: give the details, but I should ask you about it.
- 21:54Speaker 1: Can you give me some some background on the new
- 21:56Speaker 1: movie that just landed? Brother, Uh, Well, there's a new
- 22:00Speaker 1: movie coming out that I can mention to you. It's
- 22:02Speaker 1: called Dear Frank. I co directed it, Start Myself, Columbus Short,
- 22:06Speaker 1: Claudia Jordan's Uh, Nick de turo, Um, Little Dirk and
- 22:11Speaker 1: Uh and co directed by Josh Weber and Um. It's
- 22:15Speaker 1: a murder mystery. My character and Claudia's characters married for
- 22:19Speaker 1: twenty five years. On our val renewal ceremony date at
- 22:22Speaker 1: the church, and after the church ceremony at her house,
- 22:26Speaker 1: she drops dead. Um. I'm cleaning out the house, packing
- 22:29Speaker 1: up boxes. Columbus, my brother is a cop, comes over, Uh,
- 22:33Speaker 1: says you need to clean out everything of hers. Um.
- 22:35Speaker 1: I find a diary when I'm cleaning out the stuff
- 22:38Speaker 1: and find out she has been cheating on me all
- 22:39Speaker 1: twenty five years, and everybody in that diary is a suspect.
- 22:43Speaker 1: And I go interrogating one at the time, following the
- 22:46Speaker 1: clues like a trail of bread clumbs. And I'm just saying,
- 22:49Speaker 1: I might have to kill a few people in this movie,
- 22:51Speaker 1: UH and get some answers and find out what happened.
- 22:54Speaker 1: It's a It's a dark thriller, somewhat comedic, could definitely dramatic,
- 22:58Speaker 1: called Dear Frank. It will be in theaters in November.
- 23:00Speaker 1: Well you you gotta come back, Brian, you gotta come
- 23:02Speaker 1: back again. We're talking to Brian White. Great series, good friends,
- 23:06Speaker 1: Sheila duckwork. That's my girl, Brian, Brian Willpacker, you know
- 23:10Speaker 1: that's my boy. Please check out the new series called
- 23:12Speaker 1: Ambitions on the own Network