Terrence Howard has been a working actor now for many years. Most people remember him as the villain in Big Momma's House and more recently in Paul Haggis indie hit Crash. But now he has the role hes been waiting for all his life as DJay the Memphis pimp who discovers he has a gift for crunk in Hustle & Flow.
Check out the official site for Hustle & Flow
Daniel Robert Epstein: This is such a great film and its getting a lot of buzz, how does that feel?
Terrence Howard: Man, I feel great. Everybody smiling and looking at me like yall know something I dont. Like you got a car waiting for you when you get home.
DRE: How much of your life did you have to let go into order to do this role?
TH: I had to let go of all of my sensibilities. I had to let my conscience go to bed for about a year because I knew it would take a good year of demoralizing myself because thats how I work. I wish I could just snap on and be somebody but I had to go through all the motions. I had to learn all those things I had to let go again. I had to start smoking cigarettes again. I watched a bunch of pornography again just to desensitize myself to my own conscience and my own sensibilities. It bothered me and I was telling them I was so afraid to do that.
DRE: Did it affect your personal life though?
TH: You watch two or three hours of pornography every day. What do you think? I had to isolate and alienate myself from my children to accomplish that. What [producer] Stephanie [Allain] had asked me is, For two years can you put your wife away, put your children away, put your God away and lend yourself to us.. First I said no. Then I read the script and saw the hope associated with it. So I considered what I was going to have to do to myself was more giving people an opportunity to see a lifestyle that might give them encouragement and hope. That if DJay could climb out from what he did, then anybody else can climb out. What people may not realize was that DJays happiest time in his life was when he was in jail because he knew he was finally paying for his sins. The message to me, you can accomplish your dreams but you still got to pay for what youve done wrong.
DRE: Did you base DJay on anyone?
TH: My uncle had a friend named Tweety Bird that was a pimp. I loved Tweety Bird and I wanted to portray him because Tweety Bird died ten years ago. Tweety Bird would come by and give me 20 dollars when I was 16 and didnt have any money in the house. When it was too cold he would let me come stay at his house so I would watch him with women in his world. Id be sitting up crying and Tweety Bird would be like, you know, Stop crying like a little bitch you got to be a man. That became where that came from.
DRE: How many children do you have?
TH: Three children.
DRE: How old are they?
TH: Theyre eight, ten and twelve now.
DRE: Did they wonder what you were doing?
TH: No, they knew. Fortunately it was at a time me and my wife were divorced and I was just at the point of fixing my relationship with her.
DRE: Are you back together?
TH: We got remarried in February.
DRE: Congratulations.
DRE: Obviously so many rappers are acting and some people are good and others arent. Did playing a rapper help you understand how a rapper can sometimes be good actors?
TH: Rappers are artists. Ludacris is an artist. He created the character of Ludacris to sing a rap but hes an artist and an artist can play in any medium that he wants as long as he learns the medium. It takes some training and time to learn how to adjust and apply yourself to that new medium. But I wasnt trained as an actor. How in the hell did they let me come and act?
DRE: Did you ever have a time in your life when you were as hopeless as DJay?
TH: We all have had that. Thats what makes it such an appealing story. You wake up and say, I didnt look like this years ago and I didnt think like this. What kept me going then? I mean niggas are always broke.
DRE: White folks are too buddy. Dont be fooled.
TH: [laughs] Well my Dad moved us into a house in Cleveland when I was 16 years old to live and support ourselves because my stepmom wanted to shoot us. In the winter time we didnt have any electricity because we couldnt pay for it and we had waterbeds. My waterbed would freeze because all we had was a kerosene heater. I remember all the other kids would go to school and be able to do their homework. I couldnt do that. I had to go and figure out whose snow I would shovel or something so I could just get a $1.25 to get a gallon of kerosene. But guess what, when youve got the kerosene burning in the house, youve got to have a window open or you will suffocate. So I had the kerosene on in the middle of the winter, sleeping on a frozen waterbed with my brother and five different blankets, trying to be warm and trying to wash up because all the pipes are frozen in the house. That was my life from 16 to 18 years old.
DRE: What gave you hope back then that you could get out of that?
TH: knew that there were people living out in Cambodia that didnt have a house. I had to go to school and I was good looking so I got a whole lot of attention. I just knew one day I would be an actor.
DRE: What first drew you to acting?
TH: I crashed an audition in New York. At 19 I moved to New York and I was pretty good at talking so I conned my way into college. I had a 1.6 grade point average and I went to the admissions office at Pratt Institute and I told them that my transcripts were coming from LA and how can I get extra funding? So they sent me to the HEOP office and when the HEOP office asked me wheres my transcripts I said the admissions office had them but can we get it going. They told me I could go down, get on welfare and I can get a supplemental student loan. The only point I wanted to go to college for is that I knew if I was in college I could live on campus and not lose my job and not lose my house. I started crashing auditions, made a fake resume. I said I had 20jobs, I was a member of SAG, AFTRA and whatever.
DRE: What was your first break?
TH: I crashed an audition for The Cosby Show, got on and made $1900 for one week. Then I got into an argument with Bill Cosby so the casting director wasnt kind with me anymore and I had to start the whole process over again.
DRE: I read this morning about a TV series based on Crash. Have you heard anything about that?
TH: They did not say anything to me about it.
DRE: What did shooting in Memphis do for you?
TH: It gave me the opportunity to live and tell a complete story. Other than that, if we had shot in LA it would have been the same. But you could feel the street, you could feel the heat. You were tired and exhausted and popping mosquitoes off of you all day.
DRE: What do you think of when people call you the next Denzel and that you might get an Oscar nomination?
TH: Im appreciative. I love what Denzel has done, but theres only one D in my name and thats in my middle name. I dont want to fill Denzels shoes. I just want to do what Terrence is supposed to be doing.
by Daniel Robert Epstein
SG Username: AndersWolleck
Check out the official site for Hustle & Flow
Daniel Robert Epstein: This is such a great film and its getting a lot of buzz, how does that feel?
Terrence Howard: Man, I feel great. Everybody smiling and looking at me like yall know something I dont. Like you got a car waiting for you when you get home.
DRE: How much of your life did you have to let go into order to do this role?
TH: I had to let go of all of my sensibilities. I had to let my conscience go to bed for about a year because I knew it would take a good year of demoralizing myself because thats how I work. I wish I could just snap on and be somebody but I had to go through all the motions. I had to learn all those things I had to let go again. I had to start smoking cigarettes again. I watched a bunch of pornography again just to desensitize myself to my own conscience and my own sensibilities. It bothered me and I was telling them I was so afraid to do that.
DRE: Did it affect your personal life though?
TH: You watch two or three hours of pornography every day. What do you think? I had to isolate and alienate myself from my children to accomplish that. What [producer] Stephanie [Allain] had asked me is, For two years can you put your wife away, put your children away, put your God away and lend yourself to us.. First I said no. Then I read the script and saw the hope associated with it. So I considered what I was going to have to do to myself was more giving people an opportunity to see a lifestyle that might give them encouragement and hope. That if DJay could climb out from what he did, then anybody else can climb out. What people may not realize was that DJays happiest time in his life was when he was in jail because he knew he was finally paying for his sins. The message to me, you can accomplish your dreams but you still got to pay for what youve done wrong.
DRE: Did you base DJay on anyone?
TH: My uncle had a friend named Tweety Bird that was a pimp. I loved Tweety Bird and I wanted to portray him because Tweety Bird died ten years ago. Tweety Bird would come by and give me 20 dollars when I was 16 and didnt have any money in the house. When it was too cold he would let me come stay at his house so I would watch him with women in his world. Id be sitting up crying and Tweety Bird would be like, you know, Stop crying like a little bitch you got to be a man. That became where that came from.
DRE: How many children do you have?
TH: Three children.
DRE: How old are they?
TH: Theyre eight, ten and twelve now.
DRE: Did they wonder what you were doing?
TH: No, they knew. Fortunately it was at a time me and my wife were divorced and I was just at the point of fixing my relationship with her.
DRE: Are you back together?
TH: We got remarried in February.
DRE: Congratulations.
DRE: Obviously so many rappers are acting and some people are good and others arent. Did playing a rapper help you understand how a rapper can sometimes be good actors?
TH: Rappers are artists. Ludacris is an artist. He created the character of Ludacris to sing a rap but hes an artist and an artist can play in any medium that he wants as long as he learns the medium. It takes some training and time to learn how to adjust and apply yourself to that new medium. But I wasnt trained as an actor. How in the hell did they let me come and act?
DRE: Did you ever have a time in your life when you were as hopeless as DJay?
TH: We all have had that. Thats what makes it such an appealing story. You wake up and say, I didnt look like this years ago and I didnt think like this. What kept me going then? I mean niggas are always broke.
DRE: White folks are too buddy. Dont be fooled.
TH: [laughs] Well my Dad moved us into a house in Cleveland when I was 16 years old to live and support ourselves because my stepmom wanted to shoot us. In the winter time we didnt have any electricity because we couldnt pay for it and we had waterbeds. My waterbed would freeze because all we had was a kerosene heater. I remember all the other kids would go to school and be able to do their homework. I couldnt do that. I had to go and figure out whose snow I would shovel or something so I could just get a $1.25 to get a gallon of kerosene. But guess what, when youve got the kerosene burning in the house, youve got to have a window open or you will suffocate. So I had the kerosene on in the middle of the winter, sleeping on a frozen waterbed with my brother and five different blankets, trying to be warm and trying to wash up because all the pipes are frozen in the house. That was my life from 16 to 18 years old.
DRE: What gave you hope back then that you could get out of that?
TH: knew that there were people living out in Cambodia that didnt have a house. I had to go to school and I was good looking so I got a whole lot of attention. I just knew one day I would be an actor.
DRE: What first drew you to acting?
TH: I crashed an audition in New York. At 19 I moved to New York and I was pretty good at talking so I conned my way into college. I had a 1.6 grade point average and I went to the admissions office at Pratt Institute and I told them that my transcripts were coming from LA and how can I get extra funding? So they sent me to the HEOP office and when the HEOP office asked me wheres my transcripts I said the admissions office had them but can we get it going. They told me I could go down, get on welfare and I can get a supplemental student loan. The only point I wanted to go to college for is that I knew if I was in college I could live on campus and not lose my job and not lose my house. I started crashing auditions, made a fake resume. I said I had 20jobs, I was a member of SAG, AFTRA and whatever.
DRE: What was your first break?
TH: I crashed an audition for The Cosby Show, got on and made $1900 for one week. Then I got into an argument with Bill Cosby so the casting director wasnt kind with me anymore and I had to start the whole process over again.
DRE: I read this morning about a TV series based on Crash. Have you heard anything about that?
TH: They did not say anything to me about it.
DRE: What did shooting in Memphis do for you?
TH: It gave me the opportunity to live and tell a complete story. Other than that, if we had shot in LA it would have been the same. But you could feel the street, you could feel the heat. You were tired and exhausted and popping mosquitoes off of you all day.
DRE: What do you think of when people call you the next Denzel and that you might get an Oscar nomination?
TH: Im appreciative. I love what Denzel has done, but theres only one D in my name and thats in my middle name. I dont want to fill Denzels shoes. I just want to do what Terrence is supposed to be doing.
by Daniel Robert Epstein
SG Username: AndersWolleck
VIEW 10 of 10 COMMENTS
jena:
I just love him. This was a good read.
milloux:
I love that movie.