CinemaBlend sat down with the cast of “The Woman King” including Viola Davis, Thuso Mbedu, Lashana Lynch, Sheila Atim, John Boyega, and Director Gina Prince-Bythewood. They discuss how Viola Davis acted as a mentor on- and off-screen, training for their epic fight sequences, how the pandemic affected filming, and much more!
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00:00 Well, with me, you know, I'm over 50,
00:01 so I said, "Make this ground smooth
00:03 so I don't trip over these rocks."
00:06 And then when, you know, when the bullet came at me,
00:08 I was the first time, I mean, I just ducked.
00:11 I'm not gonna lie.
00:12 (upbeat music)
00:15 - Miss Davis, there's a very powerful scene
00:25 where Anuska is pointing out the scars that she has
00:29 and how they're almost an emotional reminder
00:33 of the journey she took to get to that point.
00:34 I'm just curious if you gave stories
00:36 to the presence of those scars
00:38 and what they might've meant to her
00:39 getting up to that point.
00:40 - I think the scars were a badge of honor
00:42 because it showed that she lived a life and she survived.
00:48 You know, and I think that a lot of people
00:52 feel like you're not your scars.
00:54 I believe that you are your scars.
00:57 I do.
00:58 Um, and not just the scars on her body,
01:03 the scars that were even inside her
01:06 from being a rape survivor.
01:08 And that's one of the things that I wanted to pass on
01:15 to Naui in that moment,
01:17 is that your scars are your pride.
01:20 They're your badge.
01:21 They're your sword.
01:23 You use them, you use them as warrior fuel.
01:28 You know, and I think that's a great message
01:30 for women today,
01:32 because I think sometimes we want it so easy,
01:34 we don't want the scars.
01:37 But I think that by the time, you know,
01:39 I say God, you know, takes me from this earth,
01:43 I want a lot of battle scars.
01:45 That means that I fought and I fought to win
01:48 and I was brave enough to fight.
01:50 - And you know, I think with Naui in that moment,
01:53 she thinks the scars are cool,
01:56 but doesn't fully comprehend the pain
01:58 or what it means to have actual scars.
02:01 And that's women today or people today,
02:04 where it's like, yeah, I am this, I've achieved this,
02:07 but they don't actually fully comprehend
02:09 what it takes to be that which they aspire to be.
02:12 - Exactly.
02:13 - And that you have to kind of go through it to be that.
02:17 - Yes.
02:18 - To be an Iniska.
02:19 - Absolutely.
02:19 - There are battles to be fought.
02:20 - I got scared to death
02:22 that we were not gonna be able to come back.
02:25 Omicron hit us three weeks into shooting
02:27 and hit us hard.
02:30 And I just didn't know, did we shoot enough
02:33 where the studio would say, well, we have to come back,
02:35 or was it not enough where they said,
02:37 let's just cut our losses?
02:39 I did not know, would the actors come back?
02:42 You know, there was so much unknown at that moment,
02:45 but for us, South Africa handled everything beautifully.
02:49 Everyone wore masks, everybody stayed sanitized,
02:52 and it dissipated very quickly.
02:54 So that was huge.
02:57 And the second, when you're shooting a film like this
02:59 with a scope, you need a lot of background.
03:02 With the stunts, you have people fighting face-to-face.
03:05 How could we still do that safely,
03:08 keep our actors safe, keep the background safe?
03:10 And so we had to cut down the numbers significantly.
03:13 That was tough to have to switch my mindset
03:16 of where the camera can go to hide the fact
03:18 that instead of having 300, I've got 150.
03:23 And just having tricks of, okay,
03:26 let's bubble all the actors in the hotel
03:27 that are gonna be face-to-face with the actors.
03:29 But we had to keep everyone safe.
03:31 - 'Cause one of the film's strongest themes
03:34 is that of mentorship and of training the next level,
03:37 the next generation and that generation
03:39 kind of living up to the expectations of their teachers.
03:41 And I'm just curious if that happened to be the vibe on set
03:44 when working with someone like Viola,
03:46 whether you consider her a mentor
03:47 and wanted to almost act to make her proud.
03:51 - Viola is absolutely a mentor,
03:54 even when she doesn't realize she's being one.
03:57 She doesn't position herself as that as well.
04:00 She's not somebody who forces that upon you
04:02 or imposes this sense of leadership.
04:04 She just is.
04:06 And actually, much of her leadership
04:08 comes through her compassion and her gentle side
04:12 and her maternal side,
04:15 somebody who's always encouraging us to be ourselves,
04:19 to be authentic, to listen to ourselves,
04:21 to engage with our vulnerability as well,
04:24 which isn't an easy thing to do as a black person,
04:27 as a black woman, as an actor as well.
04:30 I think there's lots that's expected of us
04:32 in terms of the role that we should fulfill
04:36 and the way that we should,
04:37 the image that we should project outwards
04:40 of how we're feeling, how we are.
04:41 And Viola was instrumental in supporting us through that.
04:46 And she's also really funny.
04:48 And that's, but that's massive
04:50 when you're looking at somebody who you've looked up to
04:52 and you're just like, I just hope they're really nice.
04:54 And then she's jokes.
04:55 And you're like, it's just easy, man.
04:57 So yeah, love Viola.
04:59 - It's literally a case of I'm learning from her,
05:03 just from her existing,
05:05 just because of who she is as a person.
05:07 I learned from Sheila, I learned from Lashana,
05:09 I learned from every single person who was on set
05:12 because they all had something to give
05:14 from Polly, the DOP, Gina, the director.
05:18 - Viola has been with me since, you know,
05:22 pre-production training where we were fighting,
05:26 struggling, sweating, crying together, muscles aching.
05:31 And it was just her humanity that I felt most drawn to.
05:38 And that made me feel safe enough
05:42 to be able to take the risks
05:44 that I did with Naui in the moment.
05:47 - Naui is an incredible character.
05:49 Who can I find to embody her?
05:52 Underground hadn't come out yet.
05:53 I just knew that Barry, who I trust implicitly,
05:56 had cast this young woman, Tuso.
05:58 And she auditioned, it was over Zoom.
06:01 And the moment her face popped up on my screen,
06:03 I just cared about her.
06:06 And I kind of like, is this her?
06:09 And then she started to read.
06:11 Tuso is an absolute generational talent.
06:14 She is that good.
06:16 And knowing I needed someone who could go toe to toe
06:18 with Viola Davis, I believed her immediately.
06:22 Then I needed her to meet with Viola.
06:25 And that conversation between those two was magical.
06:29 And Viola after said, "I don't even know her,
06:31 "but I feel maternal towards her."
06:33 And then the last step though was,
06:36 Tuso had never done anything athletic in her life.
06:39 And I needed her to meet with Danny Hernandez,
06:44 our stunt and fight coordinator.
06:45 So we put her through some paces for about an hour.
06:48 It was supposed to be an hour.
06:50 And it ended up being two hours
06:51 'cause she didn't wanna stop.
06:53 And when we saw that mentality of wanting to be great,
06:57 wanting to put in the work, I said, "I can trust her."
07:00 She had enough that we could build on.
07:02 And Tuso, from the moment she got cast in April,
07:05 started training in May,
07:07 all the way through the following March,
07:10 six days a week, two times a day.
07:12 It was incredible, her work ethic.
07:13 And she's incredible in the movie.
07:16 - LaShonna, the fight choreography obviously is insane.
07:18 There's a moment in the middle of the battle
07:20 where Viola blocks a bullet with her sword
07:23 and then you hand her another one.
07:24 (all laughing)
07:27 - Yeah, yeah, yeah.
07:28 - Oh my God.
07:29 - It's so badass.
07:31 Can you talk about actually filming that moment?
07:33 - That's funny, that moment was a blur for me.
07:35 'Cause firstly, me and Viola Davis
07:37 are just casually walking through a battle
07:39 and she gets disarmed and I'm like,
07:41 "Don't worry about it, I got you."
07:43 That's insane to even think about.
07:46 I mean, like Gina was saying,
07:47 like you watch people that you admire for so long
07:50 and you're like, "Gosh, I really hope
07:51 "I get the opportunity to work with them."
07:53 And then you have these really special moments
07:55 that you share with them on screen
07:57 that you could never conjure up on your own.
07:59 And I'm so glad that Gina was able to,
08:01 Gina and our stunt coordinator, Danny Hernandez,
08:04 were able to carve out these moments for these characters
08:08 that showed their character within the choreography.
08:12 That was really important.
08:13 And even the fact that she's doing it,
08:15 the fact that she is blocking a bullet
08:16 with her machete is insane.
08:18 And how Ozogi is able to think so quickly
08:21 and protect her general in the way that she does.
08:23 And then go off and have their own individual fights
08:25 and then come back.
08:26 - Yeah, that was hard.
08:28 - And then disarm them and then they,
08:29 "Bah, bah, bah, bah, bah."
08:29 - Yeah, yeah.
08:30 - And then the guy.
08:31 - I call that the ready for war.
08:33 - Yeah.
08:33 - That's what I call it, it's the ready for war.
08:35 - I'll take it, I'll take it.
08:36 Yeah, yeah, yeah.
08:37 All of it, man.
08:38 Among all the chaos, like you mentioned,
08:41 there's so much going on all the time.
08:43 We, you know, actors, editors make it look very easy
08:47 when we're able to make moments come by really fast.
08:51 But that took a lot of studying, actually.
08:55 We rehearsed it and then we got on set
08:58 and had to change a lot of things.
09:00 And there was a lot of switching out
09:02 and how's the angle gonna work
09:04 and how do I even feel doing that that quickly?
09:08 I've never put a machete up straight like that
09:10 and given it to someone.
09:11 That's not a move that Azoge does anywhere else.
09:13 So I feel, yeah, I feel really honored
09:16 to have been able to share that moment with her.
09:18 - Well, with me, you know, I'm over 50,
09:20 so I said, "Make this ground smooth
09:22 so I don't trip over these rocks."
09:25 And then when the bullet came at me,
09:27 I was the first time, I mean, I just ducked.
09:30 I'm not gonna lie.
09:31 I think we had so many takes where I just ducked
09:33 and I just let that sword right on that field.
09:36 I said, "I need a break."
09:39 I love the battle scene.
09:41 I really, I love taking down the dudes.
09:43 I'm not gonna lie.
09:45 I love taking down the dudes.
09:46 - Special shout out to Danny Hernandez.
09:48 - Danny Hernandez, yes.
09:50 Janelle, Stevens.
09:52 - Brilliant mind, beautiful choreographer.
09:55 Always made us feel safe.
09:57 We look cool, we look badass.
09:59 We look like we're taking risks,
10:01 but we're always safe.
10:02 - Yes.
10:03 - It's just the thing with me.
10:04 I like to, I know as me as a moviegoer,
10:07 when I sit down in that seat and the lights go down,
10:10 I just wanna be enveloped and I just wanna start.
10:13 And I want people to forget that you're watching a movie
10:17 and that I hope that you're just enveloped
10:19 and feel like you're watching real life.
10:21 And for me, starting with credits and the song
10:23 and all that, I feel kind of takes you out of that
10:25 for a moment, like, "Oh, I'm watching a movie."
10:27 I just want you to go.
10:29 - John, I'm out of time, but I love you also.
10:31 But I had these two, I had to ask them.
10:33 - Hey, my question's me.
10:35 I wanted some of the answers tonight.
10:36 - Thank you.
10:36 (laughing)
10:37 - Thank you so much.
10:38 - Thank you.
10:39 - I'm blessed.
10:40 - All right guys, appreciate your time.
10:41 - Thanks.
10:41 (upbeat music)