The truth about Jordan Peele

Brut America

His love for impersonations. Why he majored in puppetry. Whether or not he thinks horror and comedy are the same genres. Here's the truth about Jordan Peele.

Transcript

00:00I watch reality television, like a fiend.

00:05And yes, I hate it.

00:16Yes, that is true.

00:18I put together a bunch of classes,

00:21and my favorite was the puppetry class.

00:23And I was like, look, let's build a curriculum around this

00:27because, you know, maybe I can be the best puppeteer around.

00:43No, I can't call myself a master of impersonation.

00:46I would call myself an old, retired impersonator.

00:52I'm a ham, and if you bring up impressions,

00:55you're only going to be counting the seconds before you get one,

01:00because I'm a glutton for the attention.

01:06No, I started earlier than that,

01:09but I think I had an awakening at 12,

01:12where from that point forward,

01:15sequence of movies, Glory, Edward Scissorhands,

01:19Elman Louise, Aliens.

01:22I knew I wanted to be a director.

01:27Okay, complicated.

01:30I watch reality television, like a fiend.

01:35And yes, I hate it.

01:38Love Island.

01:40Just the worst.

01:42I'm just a sucker for the spectacle, just like all of us.

01:46Much prop to the people who give up their souls

01:50so that we vultures can picket the remains in front of the world,

01:57do a service.

01:58I don't know how you do it.

02:03Yes, that is how I work.

02:06I'll never turn down an opportunity to make the script better

02:12if it presents itself.

02:14Part of this comes from my many years on Sketch, on TMPO,

02:18where you really are having to make so many decisions all the day

02:21and be really scrappy.

02:23But basically, what I find is good ideas don't stop coming.

02:32Yeah, nah, nah, nah.

02:34You only stop trying to attain them at a certain point

02:38if you get too comfortable.

02:44You know, I think horror and comedy are so connected.

02:47The same moment can play a very different way

02:49depending on what music is involved.

02:52And to be honest, with the types of movies that I make,

02:56I need both things to be able to play off of each other.

03:00Oh, my girl.

03:02Oh, they get you every time.

03:06So I really think of them as the same thing

03:11with slightly different flavor.

03:15No, no, no, no, no, no.

03:18See, I don't know where people are getting it,

03:21but I want to play it now.

03:23If you took out some dice

03:27and talked about drawing up a character,

03:29we'd be doing that right now.

03:33For the Haywood Ranch,

03:35as the only Black-owned horse trainers in Hollywood,

03:37we like to say, since the moment pitches could move...

03:40Yeah, skin in a game.

03:43True.

03:44It's kind of like a meta allegory, I guess you could put it,

03:48because it's so much about the act of making the film,

03:52but it's also about the industry of spectacle.

04:02No.

04:03I've been 100% honest.

04:06You can tell because there's absolutely nothing...

04:10No, I haven't looked good at any juncture,

04:13at any point in the year.

04:15I haven't come off well.

04:16So you know I'm telling the truth.

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