Interview with Noel Clarke - Adulthood (plus transcript)

Interview with Noel Clarke – Adulthood

Interview transcript.

Interviewer: London’s Evening standard has voted Noel Clarke London’s one of London’s most influential person.

Noel Clark: The film is about a group of characters who have had to deal with a traumatic event in their lives and my character is the character coursed that event in their lives. And he comes out of prison and has to confront the people that he hurt. Not by choice but he has to deal with the fact that he hurt them and he has to come to terms with that and understand how your actions can affect other people and then be truly sorry for it.  

Interviewer: What was your motivation to do the sequel, write star and direct it?

Noel Clark: There was no plan to do a sequel but the first film did well and more importantly it touched a real nerve in society, it made a big splash in the Media and the fans enjoyed it. And I kind of thought that there was more to tell with the story tell. A lot of the press was saying it was just doom and gloom and I thought there was more to say actually just because a few teenagers do a bad things when they’re 16 doesn’t mean they’re going to be doing bad things when they’re 20/25 and I thought there would be more to show. And this film would show that there are clear-cut choices. For example some kids like Jay might go bad and then people like moony want to be good and do good things.

  

Interviewer: It is a hard film to watch, because you know these things are happening on the streets at the minute and you know that people who have grown up in the city have probably come across a few Sam’s and a few Jay’s. How did you manage to keep the realism but not glamourise it?

Noel Clark: It’s a movie so things are always going to be slightly exaggerated but generally so long as you are writing it from an authentic point of view, you can’t really glamourise it because for me seeing stuff like that or knowing about things that happen is not glamorous so you have to do it in a way that wasn’t gratuitous, or titillating or didn’t make it look cool but that actually it’s horrible the stuff that Jay does. Do you know what, and it’s horrible the stuff that Dabs does in the film and you kind of have to make it look horrible. Some people say that when you made it look horrible you glamorised it, but you didn’t you made it look real. In reality, in real live bad things happen and you have to show that and if you show that then it makes the good things that happen in real life and in film a lot more emotional a lot better, because you know that for every bad thing that happens there is probably about ten things.

Interviewer: So there have been mixed reactions. What was the most important thing for you that you wanted the audience to get from the film?

Noel Clark: The most important thing I think the audience should get from the film is that you have a choice, to not be involved in stuff and you have a choice to walk away but also that for me it was making sure that the audience could no longer have excuses for their behaviour. Young people are demonised press but at the same time a lot of them use it as an excuse. A lot of them say well you know I grew up in this environment and you know nothing about me and who understands me and because of that I’m going to be aggressive and I’m going to do this but you know I grew up in that environment; council estate, single mother, but if I’m making films then now you don’t have an excuse, so now you don’t have an excuse you need to get off your backside and do something positive. So it’s kind of a double-edged sword. It’s that reason but also for the reason that these people shouldn’t be demonised because for every one that’s bad there’s one or two or three or four ot ten that are good, and we need to focus on them.

Interviewer: Why did you cast a lot of hip-hop artists in there, I notice there’s plan B and Blaze.

Noel Clark: To start with Blaze Femi was in Kidaulthood before he was in Blaze. When he was in Kidulthood he was just Femi and what we did was. I wanted to get kids from my old college that I actually went to college with for the authenticity and he was one of the kids that went to my old college and what did was we went there and auditioned about 300 kids and he was the one that got through and got the part and he wasn’t blaze then he was just Femi and so he was always going to have a part in the next film but in between the two films he’s done a law degree and he’s become blaze and he’s doing all that kind of stuff. To me he’s just Femi and that was never like let’s put a hip-hop star in there, with ‘Shystie’ I did a cameo for her in dub plate drama and I said when we do the film I will do a little cameo in there for her and Ben Plan B he auditioned like everyone else. I met him at the Cheltenham literature festival because for some reason the kids wanted us down there so we could talk on a panel and I told him about the film and he came and auditioned. He wouldn’t have got the job if he wasn’t the best for the job.

Interviewer: He was very good. You hated him when you watched it. Which is testament to his performance. 

Noel Clark: He’s almost like my character in Kidulthood, there was nothing redeeming about him. He’s not like that in real life, he’s a nice guy.

Interviewer: The sound track is all UK Hip-Hop and Grime music was that intentional?

 

Noel Clark: It is partly for the realism of the movie, but also we have a real culture in this country of different backgrounds. We finally have and have done for years been influenced by Acid music, jungle came out and then Garage and Grime. We’ve got our own sound. If you’re going to make a British film about young people in this country you’ve got to use the right people you can’t slap on American music on it because it just doesn’t work, it doesn’t feel right.

Interviewer: You can’t have 50 cent pumping out.

Noel Clark: No. You could in someone’s bedroom. If they were listening to that but just for the sound track you want to keep it British and that’s what I’ve tried to do and you know it’s mostly that stuff but it’s not all that stuff, there’s Elisa Doolittle and kerry-Anne Leatham which is almost a folk song, The Clik Clik which are like Lilly Allen. So there are lots of different sounds. So people who think it’s just Grime and stuff should listen to it because there is some different sorts of tracks on there that people might like.

Interviewer: What’s next for Noel?

Noel Clark: I don’t know. I’ve just done a couple of movies. I’ve done ‘Heartless’, a thriller/horror film and I did comedy/horror with Danny Dyer and Steven Graham called ‘Doghouse’ and I am writing a lot of new projects which will hopefully be commissioned.

I like to do my work, work hard and when you need to hear about, you’ll hear about it.

Interviewer: The site’s called real.com. Now that you’re a successful actor, director and writer how does Noel keep it real?

Noel Clark: I still have my friends that I had from school; they’re my main buddies. I’m just interested in friends and family. I’m not interested in tumbling out of clubs and that nonsense. I just want to do my work. I’m not interested in being famous; I’m just interested in doing my work.