Vibe (December 1998 – January 1999) p.130-134
BELLY OF THE BEAST
Regrets? He's had a few. But when hotshot video director Hype
Williams made BELLY, his first Hollywood film, he did it his way—sort
of.
by Jeannine Amber
You can't help but feel bad for the guy. The way he looks, slouched in
an armchair in the quiet lobby of a midtown Manhattan hotel, his braids
all mussed like they shoulda been redid yesterday, head propped in his
hands, eyes half-closed. He's the picture of sheer exhaustion. And if
you ask superstar video director Hype Williams about his long-awaited
feature debut, Belly, he just sighs and shakes his head. "I don't even
want to talk about it," he says. "It's like rubbing salt in a wound.
Not what you'd expect from a guy who makes his living behind a camera.
And definitely not what you'd expect from someone who's been wanting to
make this film for most of his life. "it's been a long, long time
coming," Williams says.
Hype Williams has built a reputation as the man who can make everyone
from Babyface to Ol' Dirty Bastard shine on the small screen. But since
high school, Williams's real dream has been to direct a feature film
that would knock people's socks off. And he didn't want tit to be all
happy and fun like his videos either. It would be a serious flick, he
says, "like a painting of some young people who just take the wrong
road in life." He had it all planned out: He'd write and direct the
project himself, and instead of casting Hollywood actors, he'd use
MC's. But from the word go, Belly--starring Nasir "Nas" Jones and Earl
"DMX" Simmons as a pair of gun-slinging, drug-pushing hustlers--was
beset by so many problems that, by mid-May 1998, on what was supposed
to be the last day of shooting, the film's future looked bleak. No
ending had been shot, the money had run out, and big hunks of the
movie--including several action montages set to music--had been axed.
Williams and Artisan Entertainment, the studio that backed his big-
screen dream, were at each other's throats. Kiki Turner, Williams's
fiancee and co-owner of Big Dog Films, summed up the situation: "It's
really about whose dick is bigger. And who's going to listen to whom."
Most of the time, Hype Williams, 29, is a happy-happy guy. You can see
it in his videos. The way he made Missy Elliot jiggle on the big green
hill against a bright blue sky. Or the way he danced Busta Rhymes with
elephants. Or shot Puffy and Mase into space.
It has been only five years since Williams broke into the game,
directing the Bitches With Problems video "Two Minute Brother," when
film companies began offering him projects like Booty Call and Money
Talks. But he didn't want to make just any film; he wanted to make
Belly, a real-life drama based on the lives of his childhood friends.
"[Films like Booty Call] aren't going to advance our culture," he says.
"I had a game plan. I knew that when it was time to do a movie, if it
wasn't Belly, I probably wouldn't do one."
Williams finished writing Belly in the winter of '96. He says that he
went to New Line Cinema, but they didn't like the idea of nonactors
starring in his project. Then he turned to Artisan Entertainment
(formerly Live Entertainment), a small film company currently producing
Roman Polanski's forthcoming The Ninth Gate.
No doubt Artisan coveted Williams on the strength of his video career--
MTV stalwart Brett Ratner (Money Talks, 1997 and Rush Hour, 1998) made
major loot for New Line Cinema, and other video directors have made it
in Hollywood. Artisan reportedly offered Williams an $8 million budget.
The figure was low for a feature (New Line's budget for Money Talks was
$25 million), but Williams signed on, figuring he could find ways to
stretch a buck. "Like, I might say an extra day of shooting montage
scenes might be worth more than this truck," says Williams, gesturing
toward a half-empty equipment vehicle. "It's cheatin' basically. But if
I have to cheat to get people a better movie, then I will."
But that's not the way Hollywood works. After Williams signed on to do
Belly, Artisan appointed a production company, the Shooting Gallery
(Sling Blade, 1996), to oversee the money. That's when all of
Williams's troubles began.
"From the jump it was an impossible situation," says Belly
cinematographer Malik Hassan Sayeed (who shot Spike Lee's Clockers,
Girl 6, and He Got Game). Every time Williams tried to do something
that wasn't in the script, like throwing neighborhood kids in as
extras, the production company had a problem. "And little deviation,
and they would say, 'Okay, the solution to this problem is to cut
scenes.'"
For months, Williams was rewriting the script daily to accommodate the
cuts. There were other problems too: locations were secured for the
wrong times; extras brought to play crackheads showed up looking like
track stars. One afternoon, an equipment truck knocked down a tree.
"I knew that [studios] give it to young filmmakers--black or white,"
says Williams. "I just didn't know how fucked up I was going to get it.
I'm going out on a limb investigating just to make sure I was getting
it in the normal fashion, and the overwhelming consensus has been that
this is the most roasting that they've ever seen anybody do to a
filmmaker."
Even the talent felt the strain. "[Artisan] was trying to shut it
down," growls DMX. "Fuckin' homos! Like I got nothing better to do with
my schedule than go back and film more. We wrapped like three times!
Hype was the only reason I stayed."
Bob Salerno, the Shooting Gallery executive producer whom Artisan
appointed to work on Belly, insists that complaints have been blown way
out of proportion. "All movies have problems. I don't think anything
ever really went wrong. It was an exciting process."
Though the studio execs gush about Belly being a "spectacular thing
that people are really going to want to see," it can't possibly be what
they had in mind when they signed on with Williams. The film looks
nothing like his flashy video work; Belly is a dark and gritty saga of
a morally bankrupt hoodlum (convincingly played by DMX) and his
thoughtful partner in crime (portrayed by a soft-spoken Nas). Instead
of flying through space in silvery light, Nas and DMX push weight and
shoot up night clubs, with Nas struggling for spiritual salvation amid
the carnage. Belly is not what you'd call a feel-good click. But it was
the movie Williams wanted to make.
And so, in mid-May, with his script cut, characters nixed, and
important scenes in Jamaica and Africa axed, Williams was still duking
it out with the studio. Then, almost overnight, everything changed. Out
of nowhere DMX's debut album, It's Dark and Hell Is Hot (DefJam, 1998),
blew up like fireworks. It's Dark entered Billboard's Top 200 and R&B
charts at No.1. In less than a month, it had gone platinum.
The box office potential was not lost on Artisan. "I cast this dude six
months ago," Williams says sarcastically. "Now I'm looking like a whiz
kid, and everyone is super 'Hype, you're a genius!'"
In June, the studio agreed to pump more money into the film (some peg
the figure at about $2 million), and by early August, Williams had won
a few key battles. He'd shot some pivotal scenes in New Jersey; did a
nice exterior at the Tunnel, New York's infamous hip hop nightclub. He
even put up some of his own loot to finance several grimy scenes with
DMX in Kingston, Jamaica. Through the struggle, the cast had become
like family.
"We were just happy to see us doing it and not a bunch of cornball guys
trying to portray us onscreen," says Nas, who laughs about how Williams
would coax performances out of his cast. "Sometimes, to get our
adrenaline going, we would run around a building. Hype would lead the
way. It was crazy because D would be having asthma and he would still
be running around the building."
"He just told us to go with it," says Method Man, "He was like,
'Whatever you fell, let it happen.' That was the bottom line; it was
like shooting one big video."
The son of an Oklahoman father and Honduran mom, Harold Williams grew
up in Queens, New York in a tight-knit, Brady Bunch-type family. "He
was the good kid among a lot of bad seeds," recalls Anthony Bodden, a
childhood friend who inspired Sincere, the character Nas plays in
Belly.
For two years, Williams went to Long Island's Adelphi University but
dropped out in '89 to push brooms on video shoots. He quickly graduated
to working the smoke machine and then was promoted to art director.
"When I met Hype [in '91], he was doing all the graffiti on 'Ain't 2
Proud 2 Beg,'" remembers TLC's T-Boz, who plays Nas's round-the-way
girlfriend in Belly. "And he was telling me, 'Yeah, one day I'm going
to start directing.'"
First came Bitches With Problems and Cash Money Click, then K7's
infectious 1993 "Come Baby Come" (Tommy Boy), and most of the videos
for Brandy's first album. He did Craig Mack's white-on-white "Flava in
Your Ear (Remix)," (Bad Boy, 1994) and Jodeci's "Feenin'" (Uptown/MCA,
1993). Eric Sermon hired him, so did L.L. Cool J, Mary J. Blige, Nas,
Jay-Z, Wu-Tang Clan, and on and on. Williams's artistic vision gave
black pop a whole new look. "He single-handedly changed the face of R&B
and rap videos," says long time MTV producer Jack Benson. "He made R.
Kelly's visual work look as incredible and amazing as Madonna's." IN
'97 Williams won MTV's Best R&B Video Award for Puffy's blockbuster
"I'll Be Missing You." This year his clip for Will Smith's "Gettin'
Jiggy Wit' It" (Sony, 1998) won Best Rap Video honors, and Williams's
videos bagged 10 more nominations.
Although Williams is lauded for his creativity, his video productions
don't always run smoothly. "Sometimes Hype kicks and screams when he
doesn't get his way," says an industry insider. "If you and me did the
same things he did, we'd be fired."
And last year, Will Smith paid crew members who worked on Jiggy himself
after they were not paid through Williams's production company. "They
didn't know where else to go," said Ann Carli, president of Will Smith
Enterprises. "It's been like a big nightmare."
"Being a small production company, it sometimes takes longer than
normal to take care of things," says Connie Orlando, Big Dog's
executive producer. "So Will did take it upon himself to take care of
certain items, but he has been reimbursed in full."
Though Williams is not alone in making the leap from video to film,
going head to head with your movie studio every day is hardly the norm.
Most video makers, explains Brett Ratner, first break into Hollywood by
directing other people's projects.
According to Ratner, whose Rush Hour brought New Line Cinema $33
million its opening weekend, Williams's biggest mistake was taking the
path of most resistance. Letting a first-time director work with his
own script is a risk most studios are reluctant to take. "And it's not
like he put Mariah Carey in his film," Ratner adds. "Maybe [the studio]
just didn't get it. Maybe because they're white or they're suits or
they're corny... I heard Hype was going to do Fat Albert at one point.
He should have done that first and then said, 'Okay, here's my project.
Now put up the money 'cause Fat Albert was the bomb.'"
But Williams had Belly on his mind. "The idea wasn't just to do
movies," he insists, "it's to do this movie."
On August 17, Williams stood in the lobby of New York's Magno screening
room, where he'd been working on his film. Belly was finished, and
Williams wanted to show his flick to the folks at VIBE. "Thursday," he
said, beaming. "We're showing Belly; you have to come." With his film
in the can, Williams thought the worst of his wranglings with the
studio were over. He was wrong.
"He invited you, and I am officially uninviting you," a senior vice
president of marketing snapped into the phone two days later. "It was
completely inappropriate for him to invite you! We've invested $40,000
into this focus group screening, and it is beyond me how Hype could
have invited you. I can only attribute it to his being naive. Hype
doesn't understand the politics."
Maybe not, but clearly Hollywood doesn't understand hip hop networking.
A week later, a handful of journalists snuck into a research screening
at a Long Island shopping mall with a bunch of noisy kids.
Onscreen, Nas and DMX crept through the Tunnel, and the kids went nuts.
Reggae vet Louie Rankin (playing a Jamaican drug lord) took on a team
of assassins, and the theater erupted. Characters got shot, girls were
terrorized; and Taral Hicks (who plays DMX's girl) flattened Meth with
a boot to the face. The $40,000 research audience were dazzled.
Still, it's hard to know exactly what the kids were screaming at. No
doubt they loved seeing hip hop icons doing all the dirt they rhyme
about on the big screen. But as a film, Belly's disperate narrative
elements--the soul searching, the hustling, the FBI plot--never quite
gel. "Hype's a great visualist," says one young director, "but he's no
storyteller."
Ready or not, after almost a year of Hollywood strife, Belly is finally
set to open on November 4. Posters have been made, and trailers are in
the theaters. But given all the stress it took to get them there,
Williams is far from satisfied.
Such is the paradox of his success. People love him for doing things
his way, but they're just as quick to shut him down for the exact same
reason. If he wants to continue making films, Williams has two choices:
He can learn to cajole the big wigs, amending his dreams where
necessary, or he can get out of the Hollywood rat race entirely.
As it is, he's so fed up, he swears next time he's going to do things
on his own. "I can see this is the way things work, and I don't want
any part of it," he says. "I'm planning on restructuring to make films
independently so they are more closely related to thought and writing
and creativity and less related to money and commerce. I'm not
interested in being Hollywood's baby boy. I'm only interested in
communicating with my people. This Hollywood thing has got to change."
(
geocities.com/hypepaul)