‘Eve’s Bayou’: Kasi Lemmons On Her Classic Southern Gothic Breakout Now On Criterion [Interview]

Between this and “The Caveman’s Valentine,” you’re one of the few directors to really understand the sensuality of Samuel L Jackson.
That’s how I got him. Sam’s a character actor in many ways. And yet, I could see him as a leading man. I had known him for a long time, and I could see that in him. He is big and tall and handsome and has that charisma and charm that I was looking for in that character. Sam saw the film “Dr. Hugo,” and he was like, Okay, I haven’t played that before, that kind of magnetic sexy man. And so it was very important to the conversation that I could see him like that. Because he was huge from “Pulp Fiction,” and I could see past that because I knew him. 

I think he can do anything, But I think that in some ways “Eve’s Bayou” really did challenge him and push him in directions that I don’t think he was that used to playing. Because Louis Batiste is flawed, but he still maintains his charm. You hate him, and you love him, you know? That was something that was very important. It was very important to me. I wanted him not to just be a complete snake. I was interested in him being this flawed hero. That’s really what I wanted. I wanted him to be heroic and deeply, deeply flawed, as so many heroes are. 

The way Eve’s visions are shot is so unique. Could you go into the thought process behind that style?
That’s something Amy and I talked about a great deal. Just on a technical and artistic level in terms of if you have flashbacks and dreams and visions and memories, you know, ghosts, how do you differentiate that language? We talked a lot about how not to make it muddled, how to make it distinct, so that we knew where we were and what we were experiencing. 

We decided on this very dramatic black and white for the visions. Beyond that, when I have experienced visions, often they’re in black and white. We always wanted Eve’s visions to be distinct from Mozelle’s vision. Mozelle’s are more sophisticated and refined because of her maturity. Eve’s are more confusing and childlike. So we talked about that language. What is a vision? What are a 10-year-old’s visions as opposed to a grown, mature woman’s visions, you know?

Yes, certainly. I’m also intrigued by the costuming here. It’s so refined, and the regality of Black people, here, was very much ahead of its time when you consider earlier Black period pieces. Do you think it’s a trailblazer in that arena?
I mean, it was something that I was going for because I was missing it. I remembered my parents and my parents’ parties and how they were very up in a key. They had their own little hierarchies and everybody was glamorous. That’s what I didn’t see in movies. That’s what I was missing as an audience. So I wanted to bring that and our language. I thought there was something very mundane about it, but also I could give it a mythic quality as well.

Yes, and films have changed greatly in that regard. Even this year, with “Till,” the costumes in that are so resplendent, so bold and striking and beautiful. 
Because it is beautiful. And it was beautiful. And we were so beautiful. You see Black people in church and we had to find the beauty all the time, going back to the 1920s and even before that. I have a picture of my grandmother. She’s in a long dress. I mean, it’s a gorgeous photograph. This is a woman who had her college degree signed by Booker T Washington. And she is beautiful. You saw that a lot in Black middle-class life, even from reconstruction on.

This was something that is important if it’s missing. I always look at film as a time capsule of who we are and who we were. It has to be realistic. But we went through a period where, as I said, everybody we saw was sweaty or very noble or nobly sweaty. It’s like, wait a minute. Where’s the reality that I know is inherently us?

What has it been like working with Criterion, especially on this gorgeous 4k restoration?
What a wonderful honor and a wonderful opportunity. I’m deeply grateful for it. I mean, it was a very moving experience. To be able to reconnect with Amy Vincent, our DP, who’s just a genius, and go back through with a wonderful color timer, Walter Volpado, who I just worked with on this last movie, to be able to go through and take the care with it and try and get it close to the way it looked to our eyes and recapture that richness—that was just a really beautiful experience.

I would be remiss if I didn’t ask about your upcoming film, the Whitney Houston biopic, “I Wanna Dance With Somebody.” How has that experience been?
It’s great. It was also an honor to be able to pay tribute to somebody that meant a lot to me, who I knew, you know, I knew her. To really do what I feel is celebrating her, that was amazing. 

I also had a blast with these actors. Naomi Ackie is wonderful; I worked with my best friend Tamara Tunie, she plays Cissy Houston, and Clark Peters, who was in “Harriet” as the father, and he plays Whitney’s father, and Ashton Sanders and Nefessa Williams, and Stanley Tucci, who was just great playing Clive Davis. I mean, it was a really fun cast. We had a really great crew. 

The post-production was much longer than any that I had been through. And very complex. One of the things that I’m the most proud of, and there are a lot of ’em, but one of them that I’m most proud of is I worked with a Black woman editor—Daysha Broadway—and a Black woman composer—Shonda Dance. We think that’s a first for a studio film. When you get a chance to do something and say, Hey, look at this, we’re black women and we’re making this movie together, that is incredible. It’s something that I experienced on “Harriet” as well because it was produced by two women. One of them was a Black woman and the film starred Black women and was directed by a Black woman. There’s a lot of power in that.

What has working with Naomie and Ashton Sanders been like?
I came late to the film. I came on in prep, so it had been softly prepping. Naomi had the part for a year. So when I came on, Naomi had been working on being Whitney Houston. The rest of the movie wasn’t cast. We had a very short amount of time to pull a lot of things together. So casting was imperative, especially since we needed to build costumes. 

I came on August 1, or something like that, and by the end of September, we were shooting. So it was a lot to pull together. To pull together the cast quickly, I just made a dream list. And then we did some auditions. I saw a chemistry read between Ashton and Naomi, and as soon as they read together, it’s like, oh, they have chemistry. That’s a beautiful thing. That’s magic. It’s like lightning in a bottle. I found the same thing with Stanley. Stan turned it down a couple times and then when I came on we were able to get him. The chemistry and the lived-in relationship that he and Naomi managed to create, you know, it’s just magic. 

And then, for Sissy Houston, which is a really important part, I called my best friend Tunie, who’s the voiceover in “Eve’s Bayou” and Sam’s wife in “The Caveman’s Valentine.” She’s my dear friend. She’s wonderful and they’re all great.

“Eve’s Bayou” is available on the Criterion Collection now.