Delroy Lindo is claiming victory

This is Fresh Air, I'm Tanya Mosley,

and my guest today is Delroy Lindo,

an actor whose presence has shaped film and theater

for more than 50 years.

From West Indian Archie and Spike Lee's Malcolm X,

to the charming and cruel drug kingpin and clockers,

to a father guarding an unspeakable secret

in the Cider House rules.

For me, Delroy's characters often feel lived in,

complicated, and hard to shake.

In Ryan Kugler's latest film, Sinners,

Lindo plays Delta Slim,

a hard-drinking, deeply-knowing blues harmonica player

in 1930's Mississippi.

No!

Please,

run first on us like that religion.

No, sir.

We brought this with us, ma'am.

Just magic what we do.

It's sacred and big.

Delroy Lindo is nominated

for Best Supporting Actor for his role as Delta Slim,

his first Oscar nomination in a 50-year career.

Sinners leads all films this year with 16 nominations.

Lindo trained at the American Conservatory Theatre

in San Francisco and made his name in the theater,

Broadway, Yale Rep, and the Kennedy Center,

performing August Wilson and Lorraine Hansberry

before Spike Lee brought him to film audiences.

Over the decades, he's moved between stage film and television,

from Get Shorty and Ransom to his turn

as the razor sharp attorney in the good fight.

In 2020, he reunited with Spike Lee for the five floods,

playing a traumatized Vietnam vet,

returning to the jungle to recover buried gold,

and the remains of a fallen soldier.

Delroy Lindo, welcome to Fresh Air.

Thank you, thank you for having me, thank you.

I wanna set up Sinners for those who have not seen it

and to remind those who have seen the film.

So Sinners is this haunting Southern epic

set in 1932, Mississippi, and twin brothers,

stack and smoke, both played by Michael B. Jordan,

and they return home from Chicago to open a juke joint,

only to find that their plans are overtaken

by the supernatural evil as vampires,

and who do, and there's buried trauma,

and it all converges into this single horror-filled night.

And I wanna play the scene where we first meet

your character, Delta Slim.

In this scene, stack approaches you at a train station

where you're busking, and tries to convince you

to play at the juke joints opening night,

and your hesitant at first, until Michael as stack

wins you over, and stack speaks first.

I'll give you $20 to come play at our juke tonight.

Yeah, I wish I could.

I'm gonna be a mess next tonight.

Sinners I am every Saturday night.

I ain't paying you $20 a night, I know that.

You ain't paying no $20 a night.

You paying $20, maybe, two nights, tomorrow night,

but we got the deck.

Nah, I've been a mess in this every Saturday night

for the last 10 years.

Messing gonna be that another 10 years after that, at least.

I play, and I get as much corn,

liquor as I can drink.

Sinner like me, I can't answer more than that.

That's my guest today, Delroy Lindo,

as Delta Slim and Sinners.

You know, there's kind of a rhinist to your character.

There's a little bit of humor there.

You know, he knows exactly what he's worth,

and he kind of is not gonna settle for

what he feels like could be a flash in the pan, you know.

I read that in the first draft of the film,

as it was written, your character kind of begins and ends there,

and you kind of told the director, Ryan Kugler,

like he needs to be built out more.

He's rich, and I wanna see him more in the film, as I true.

So, no, it wasn't that my character began

and ended with that first scene.

What it was was that the introduction was so dynamic,

that what happened in the second half of the screenplay,

I was not as present.

I was there, but I was not as present.

And since Ryan had introduced the character,

my character Delta, Delta Slim, so dynamically,

I spoke with Ryan and I said how can we enhance

my presence in the second act of the film?

And Ryan understood that, and he assured me

that we would work on enhancing my presence

in the second act, and he did.

Talk to me a little bit about your preparation

for this man, because there is a knowing,

there's a scene that I love so much.

It's where you and Stack, Michael B. Jordan,

and Preacher Boy are driving through,

you're in the car, you know exactly the one I'm talking about,

you're driving through the cotton fields,

and you start to talk about a lynching,

and there's so much in that that feels so real,

there's a knowing in you, you're starting to tell the story,

and then you just break out in humming.

And that reminded me so much of my grandfather

and hearing him sometimes he'd talk,

and then he'd just start humming.

And I want to know where that comes from from you,

that knowing, you know, that you brought to that character.

First of all, thank you for what you just said

about your grandfather, because various people

have mentioned to me that that scene

in my presence reminds them of an uncle

or their grandfather, somebody that they knew,

that they knew from their families,

and that is a huge compliment,

but more importantly than being a compliment,

it's an affirmation for the work.

To answer your question, it started my preparation

for this, started with Ryan sending me two books,

Blues People by Mary Baraka,

who was the Roy Jones when he wrote the book,

and Dee Blues by Robert Palmer.

And I read those books.

That was my intro into the world of sinners.

And in reading those books,

and then referencing those books throughout production,

I was given an entree into the world's,

the lifestyles of these musicians.

There was a certain kind of itinerant quality

that they moved around a lot.

The constant for them is their music.

So that there is this deep-seated connection to the music

and because they are following where the music takes them,

that then becomes an intrinsic part of their lifestyles.

I've heard you say that for characters,

you first look at maybe those similarities

and then you look at the differences

and then you work from there.

That's exactly right.

That particular scene, though,

where you're talking about the lynching

and then you just go into humming.

It's almost, it also signifies something else for me,

like sometimes when there are no words for something.

There are no words.

And when there are no words,

that's where the blues comes in.

There's where the music comes in.

That's exactly where the music comes from.

And yet another affirmation for me in Tanya,

in terms of how people have received this work,

it's incredibly affirming that audiences,

many audiences have made the connection between

the pain of what I was experiencing

and the birth of the music.

And I certainly was not thinking about that in the moment.

Was it scripted?

No.

The humming, the humming, no, it was not scripted.

It happened organically on probably the six or seven take.

And what is so beautiful about that moment

and its retention in the film,

it was born of a company of people all working together.

And what I mean by that is,

we had a very specific distance to get the same.

We had to find out a matter of real estate,

to get the scene in.

We started at point A and by the time we got to point B

or point Z, I had to have finished the monologue.

It was a three page monologue.

Within a certain amount of time.

Within a certain amount of time.

And then we had to turn the car around

to all the equipment around

and go in the opposite direction and do it again.

And then turn around and come back

and go in the opposite direction and do it again.

Unprobably the sixth take

and I'm forever indebted to Mike playing stack.

Mike didn't stop the car.

We got to the, what was supposed to be the end point.

And he veered off into the underbrush and kept going.

Ryan kept the cameras rolling,

autumn, derolled,

archipal, brilliant cinematographer.

She was right there.

We continued filming.

And as a result of that,

it gave the scene more time to breathe

and for us extra time, more time to be in that moment.

And it's important for me to articulate this

every single time I talk about that aspect of the scene.

We were very much working in concert.

We were very much working as an ensemble at that point.

I may have been the conduit

for what happened,

but Michael B. Jordan was right there, a stack,

Miles Caden as preacher boy was right there.

We were all in the car together.

Ryan kept the cameras rolling.

Autumn was right there and the DP.

We were all working together.

And that is what captured that moment.

Now I want to turn to something that happened last week

when Linda went to London to celebrate the film at the Baptist.

So they'll write, you've been on a roll.

Can I, can I, can I stop you one second with all due respect?

With all due respect.

I'm actually not going to talk about this.

No, you're not going to talk about it.

And why are you laughing?

I'm laughing because in the intro,

when you said, oh, yes, we'll be talking about what happened

with that. I saw you chuckle a little bit

because I said, no, we're not.

Tell me why.

I have made two comments about what happened.

And I feel that for me, that is all I need to say.

And the comments that I have made,

which I will repeat for you,

can I first tell people what we're talking about?

Absolutely, no, absolutely, please.

So while you and Michael B. Jordan were on stage

presenting an award for the Baptist,

which is basically the UK's version of the Oscars,

very high honors, a man in the audience

named John Davidson shouted a racial slur.

And Davidson has Tourette's syndrome

and has said the outburst was involuntary

and he's apologized.

And you have made some comments about it.

And I want to hear what you have to say about it.

The only thing that I've said is that

at the NWCP Awards, Ryan and I were presenting an award.

And right before we went on stage,

I said to Ryan that I wanted to just say something.

He didn't know what I was going.

I said, let me just, before we start reading the teleprompter,

I have something I want to just say.

And what I said to the audience were words to the effect

that Mike and I, sinners,

company of people appreciate all the love and support

that we have received as a result of what happened

at BAFTA and the fact that I could stand there

in a room predominantly of our people.

Of black people, because it's at the NWCP Awards.

The NWCP Awards, I could stand there and feel safe,

feel loved, feel supported and just simply affirm

the love and the support that they have given us.

And I just wanted to officially formally say thank you

to our people and to all of the people who have supported us

as a result of that incident.

And then the second thing I was at the AFTHA party,

the BAFTAs, and I don't know what I was thinking,

but a gentleman came up to me at the AFTHA party

and said he introduced himself and said,

I'm with Vanity Fair.

And that should have told me, this is a journalist right here.

He said, I'm with Vanity Fair.

It didn't occur to me, this is a journalist.

But what I said to him was, look,

it would have been nice if somebody from BAFTA

had spoken to Mike and I.

And that's all I said.

And that's all I am going to say.

Oh, I'm sorry, there was one other thing that I said,

I'm sorry.

I said it was an example of something that could have been

that started out negatively becoming a positive

from the standpoint of the love and support that we had received.

And I received a text, a biblical text

that I want to just share with you.

On the verse of the day is my wife sends verses,

affirmations to various people.

Being not overcome evil, but overcome evil with good,

Romans 12, 21, a negative turned into a positive,

which essentially is what I didn't quote that Bible passage.

I wish, I told her that when she sent me that's God,

I wish I'd have said that.

Dora, I feel like that's an answer to my question.

When I saw the clip of that, I think like a lot of people

because I've had quite a few conversations about this with people,

we immediately looked to your face and we were searching your face.

And of course, we're searching your face,

we're searching Michael B. Jordan's face, but we're searching your face

because you are a renowned actor who's been around for a long time.

And so so many of us kind of look to you on how

what I respond to that and how is this man who is an elder,

who we look up to, how is he responding to it?

Sure. And I wanted to know what you told Michael B. Jordan afterwards.

When you guys are one on one and you're talking about this thing,

that's a very real thing.

Yes, to have someone with Tourette syndrome,

blur that out. That's a whole nother thing.

But in general, your relationship with that word,

Mike and I spoke on, this is Tuesday,

Mike and I spoke on Sunday for the first time just amongst that sales.

After it happened. Yeah. After it happened.

This past Sunday, Mike and I spoke and it was interesting

because we both had a similar individually.

We both had similar responses because you have to understand.

We had jobs to do.

We were the first presences of the evening.

And we had to read that teleprompter.

And we both did exactly that.

Now my wife says that I adjusted my glasses.

And she said, she went, when I adjusted my glasses,

something was happening internally.

I was not aware that I had adjusted my glasses, but there was

a nanosecond, a nano of a nano of a nanosecond when I'm thinking,

wait, did I just see what I thought I heard?

But then, and it truly was a nanosecond.

One had to read the teleprompter and get on with

presenting the award.

So you know, there was no time at all.

I processed in the way that I processed in a nanosecond.

Mike did similarly, and we went on and did our jobs.

So. Yeah. That makes sense. Yeah.

You know, what's also kind of ironic is the connection to the word

because of the character that you played on the good fight.

Oh, how about that? Sure. Yeah.

It's power, this word, the in word, who gets to say it, what happens

when it's used for a long time?

And I actually want to play a clip that went viral even before the bath does.

So this has been a way before the bath. Yes. Yeah.

It's of you as your character, Adrian Boseman, on the good fight.

And you're encouraging a white television host to say the in word on air.

Let's listen.

I see racism against whites every day, every single day.

Yet I'm a racist for pointing that out. Adrian, what's your take?

Take on what? What Chuck just said, is racism just a one way street?

I think that's his opinion. Look at your firm, Adrian,

you get the benefit of no bid contracts because you're an African-American firm.

Now, as a white lawyer, what am I supposed to think of that?

I don't know. I think Chuck is pointing out a double standard here, Adrian.

Take hip hop. We talked about this on the show before.

You have African-American rappers saying inward this and inward that,

but a Caucasian can't. So say it, say what?

Say the word you want to say. I'm not saying that I want to say it.

I'm just saying that I can't. So you can't say it, say it right now.

I will say it which this is hypocritical. You know we can't.

Sure you can. This is America. Both of them say it.

All right. I think we can move on. Why?

Why move on when you want to say it, both of you want to say it?

Okay, this makes you laugh. The funny thing about it is people really thought this was real

for a very long time. It's gone around. I remember singing, thinking I need to know what

context that was in, but it's actually from a show.

TV show. Why do you think, I mean, first off, there's something about watching a black man

who's like saying, just say the thing that we're all thinking and we know that you're thinking.

You want to say, say it, but what was going through your mind in that scene?

And why do you think it has taken such hold?

It's taken hold because the sentiments contained in the scene are real, which is to say that

as a black person, I know we all know, I assume that behind closed doors, there's not

such decorum that is exercised behind closed doors. It is said.

It is probably said liberally. And there is this hypocritical, what I was pointing out,

rather than me being the hypocrit. They were the hypocrites because the fact of matters,

you know you want to say it and you say it behind closed doors. You know you do.

So I think that the reason that it took hold, as you say, is because the sentiments

in the scene are very, very real.

Our guest today is actor Delroy Lindo. We'll be right back after a break.

I'm Tonya Mosley. And this is Fresh Air.

This is Fresh Air. I'm Tonya Mosley. And my guest today is actor Delroy Lindo.

He's nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his role as Delta Slim

in Ryan Kugler's Centers. He's also known for his collaborations with Spike Lee and Malcolm X,

Crooklin, Clockers, and the Five Bloods. And for his role as Adrian Boseman on the CBS series

The Good Fight. Before the break, we were talking about a racel slur shouted at Lindo and Michael

B. Jordan at this year's BAFTAs and the weight of that word in his life and work.

Do you remember the first time you someone called you the inward?

I don't, but I do remember the first time I was

other because of the color of my skin. And interestingly, I'm writing a memoir right now.

Plug, plug, plug. That will be out in 2027. And I referenced this incident in the book.

I do remember very, very clearly what happened. And my other confusion.

How old were you? Five. Oh. So I was born in England. And my mom was a nurse.

And I'm Jamaican. My mom went to England as part of a movement of Caribbean peoples from the

Caribbean to England. And they became known as the Windrush generation as a result of the boat

called the Empire Windrush that transported approximately 300 Jamaican, mostly Jamaican men

from the Caribbean to England in June of 1948. My mom arrived into England in 1951. So very, very

the beginning of the Windrush movement. I was born very soon thereafter. And because my mom was

studying to be a nurse, they would not allow her to have an infant child with her on campus.

So as a result of that, I was sent to live with a white family in a white working class area of London.

And this wasn't just daycare or babysitter? No, no, I lived with them. I lived with them.

Very loving family. By the way, I was loved. I was cared for.

But as a result of living with this family in this all-white

neighborhood, I went to an all-white elementary or primary school. And I was literally,

I mean, literally the only black child in an all-white school. So one afternoon, after school

had ended, I was playing with one of my playmates. I thought he was a playmate.

And we had exchanged garments. I was wearing like his sweater. I had it tied around my neck,

and he was wearing my sweater on my jacket tied around his neck. And we were pretending to be

superheroes, right? And we were on this patch of grass, and we had our hands out. Like,

Superman, we were flying. And having great fun. And at a certain point, in our game,

a car pulls up. And this kid that I was playing with goes over to the car and has a very short

conversation with whomever was in the car, which I now know was his parent, his father. He comes back

and he tears. He throws my garment that he had been wearing around his neck. He throws it at me

and grabs what I'm wearing, his garment that I'm wearing around my neck and grabs it from me. He

throws my garment at me, grabs my garment for me and says, I can't play with you.

And that was the end of the game. That was the end of the game, but you know, this thing about

that story and the fact that you were so young, five years old, you couldn't have known like

the full weight of that. It took you time, but it's a story that is stuck with you because you knew

that that that was a signal of something. Well, it was a signal of my undesirability, right?

So the answer to your question was not necessarily specific to being called the end word,

but it was very specific to being racially othered. These are imprints.

Big time. How's the writing for the memoir going? Because you know, I'm so fascinated. I'm deeply

obsessed with memoir and I love reading them. But one of the things that like I know about it is

that it breaks you wide open. You're able to see parts of yourself that you through the process.

How was that process been for you and how do you hold these stories? Because you said it's going

to open your book, for instance, that means that that was an imprint that has carried you throughout

your life, you know? Yep. It's been healing actually. I'm not denying that it has opened me up.

I've been compelled to scrutinize myself. And that's, I'm using that word very advisedly,

scrutinize. It's a scrutiny. It's an examination of oneself. But in my case, because of very,

very, very significant part of what I'm writing has to do with re-examining my relationship with my mom.

And so my mom is a protagonist in my memoir. It's not, and I'm told by my editor and by my publisher

that one of the attractions to what I'm writing is that it is not a classic quote-unquote

celebrity memoir. I'm examining history. I'm examining culture. I'm taking a, I'm looking at certain

passages of history through the lens of the Windrush experience.

Let's take a short break. My guest is Delroy Lindo, nominated for his first Academy Award for his

role as a blues musician, Delta Slim, and Ryan Kugler's Centers. We'll continue our conversation

after a short break. This is Fresh Air. This is Fresh Air, and today I'm talking with actor Del

Roy Lindo. He's nominated for an Oscar for his performance in Centers, which leads all films

this year with 16 Academy Award nominations. Before the break, we were talking about his life

growing up in the UK with his mother as part of the Windrush generation.

You went to get a master's degree. I did. I did. This was that, and that wasn't that long ago,

right? No, 2014. I got a master's from NYU in 2014. I came to formal education late. I got

a my undergrad degree in 2004 from San Francisco State University, and I got my master's from NYU in

2014. I wanted to delve deep into your mother's experience in the Windrush. I had to. I had to. I had to.

I had to, because it's interesting. I heard myself say that, and I didn't know I was going to say

that. I had to. I had to do that. You had to, because my mom deserved it. Not only is my mom

deserving, all by extension, all the people of the Windrush generation are deserving, because

that is a story. Stories about Windrush are not part of

global, cultural, lexicon commensurate with its impact. The people of Windrush changed the

definition of what it means to be British. There are all these black and brown people.

There are two four members of what used to be called the British Commonwealth, and they were

invited by the British government to come to England, the United Kingdom, to help rebuild the

United Kingdom in the aftermath of the destruction of World War II. My mom was part of that movement.

They helped rebuild construction, construction industry, transportation industry,

critically the health industry, the NHS, the National Health Service. My mom was a nurse.

And when I was going into the reason that I went into NYU, was because my original intention

was to write a screenplay about my mom. I wanted to write a screenplay about my mom

because I looked around and I thought, where are the feature films

that have as protagonist, a Caribbean female, a black female? Where are they?

Now, there may be some out there, and I've seen one, not directed by a black person,

but I wanted to address that. I wanted to correct that in what I see as being an imbalance.

What's your mom's name? My mom's name is Anna Cynthia Moncreefe. Sometimes she would go by Luna

Moncreefe, and that's all of the story.

But my answer to your question is why do I need to do this?

Is because my answer is my mom deserves a story about her.

My editor said to me last week, I'm pretty certain it was in the aftermath of what happened

at BAFTA's and the various stories had surfaced on the internet. Essentially, people could

just give me love. My editor sent me a text and she said, your mom would be so proud.

And I know she's proud. I know she is.

When did she pass? 1996. I was in New York. I was at the four seasons hotel on 57th Street

doing a junket for a film that I had done called, I think it was ransom.

I'm digressing. The answer to your question is my mom passed in 1996. That's the answer to your question.

I talk a lot. You, well, I'm talking to you. So you're answering the things that I'm asking you,

but you know one thing I noticed about you, what did you want to say?

I want to say that five bloods when I was doing, and I don't want you to forget your question,

I was doing a round of press for the five bloods, which was doing COVID.

So therefore a lot of the most all of the interviews and interactions with the

with journalists and press were virtual. And I had done an interview with a journalist

up in San Francisco. And when the article came out, and I'm saying this for a very particular reason,

when the article came out, she referred to me as the gariolus delirium endo.

I didn't know what gariolus meant. You had to look it up.

I had to look it up. I had to look it up. So I looked it up and it said excessively talkative.

Well, that's so funny, because the thing that I think about you is you're very intentional with

your word and language that you use. And I want to know where that comes from. I noticed that

when I hear you talk every time. I said, oh yeah, he's taking the moment to make sure he's finding

the right words. I hope so. I hope so. Ironically, it is a result of

how I was educated. And the irony is, I was educated in England.

I don't know, four or five, six years ago, I found a notepad in my garage,

an essay book that I had written when I was probably 13 or 14 years old. I was in high school.

And I looked at what I had written. This was decent writing for 13 years.

And so even at that age, I apparently had a relationship to language.

An English language was always one of my favorite subjects in school, in high school.

So I think it probably comes in the way that I was educated and then having become an actor

and my domain is words. So I try to be careful. And you want to be understood.

Really be careful to be understood. That's so interesting about finding your 13-year-old

self and your writing and saying, okay, this was really kind of cool. This wasn't bad.

You spent a significant amount of time, the first few years of your life in the UK,

and then you lived in Canada for a while, then you all moved to the Bay Area.

I went to San Francisco to study at the American Conservatory Theatre.

Yes. You don't have an English accent, did you ever?

Of course I did. Yeah. And somebody, you know, I get asked this fairly frequently,

you don't have an English accent. And then somebody, I was recently asked,

well, could you do it? Could you do it if you asked to? And I have this joke and I say,

my mantra, yeah, I can do it if they pay me. But yes, I had an English accent and yes,

I could still pull it out right now if you needed me to. I'm not going to.

There's a part of me that's waiting for, and I have no clue if this will ever happen,

if it doesn't happen, it's fine. It really and truly is fine. But there's a part of me that's waiting

to be offered a piece of work that will permit me to use that London accent.

The other thing is, similarly to, you know, I don't speak with a Jamaican accent,

but I am able to speak with a Jamaican accent. You know, anybody who saw West Indian R.G.

I was using a Jamaican accent there. And I did a film called Wondrous Oblivion in London

2001. And I was playing Jamaican man in that. And that actually is when I discovered Wondrous

in during their rehearsals for that film. But I remember one of the people from the office,

from the production office, came on set one day and she was watching the work. And I overheard her say,

because I was speaking with it, you make an accent in that film. And I overheard her say,

oh my God, he can do it. My guest is Delroy Lindo, nominated for his first Academy Award for his

role as a blues musician, Delta Slim, and Ryan Kugler's Centers. We'll continue our conversation

after short break. This is Fresh Air. This is Fresh Air. And today I'm talking with actor Delroy

Lindo. He's nominated for an Oscar for his performance in Centers, which leads all films this year

with 16 Academy Award nominations. Okay, let's talk about the Oscars now. And I'm actually going

to get into it. I want to talk about this conversation by first talking about the Five Bluts,

because it's one of, I will say it's one of my favorite movies. I mean, gosh, if I want to release

to cry, I will turn on that film. One of your most celebrated roles was Paul, a traumatized

Vietnam that unraveling in the jungle, a man carrying decades of rage and grief. When the

nominations came out for the Five Bluts, and your name wasn't there, I've heard you say that you

were deeply disappointed. That might qualify as the understatement of the year. Okay.

Actually, my representatives at the time called me the morning, and I thought they were joking.

When they said your name wasn't on. Yeah, the guy said it didn't happen, man. You were so certain.

I had been made to feel certain because of all of the talk outside of me was, you're going to get

a nomination, you're going to get a nomination, you're going to get a nomination, you're going to get

a nomination. So I got drawn into that. And I remember the gentleman said, no, it didn't happen,

man. And I thought he was kidding. I thought he was filling my leg. I was going that morning to get

a COVID shot. I was in New York. I was in New York. I went to this facility on 96th Street.

And I got my shot. I came out and my phone rang and it was spike. And we talked and we commiserated.

I've said this in the past, but I'll say it now, just officially, spike, if you hear this, man,

it meant the world to me that you called me. And then we had that conversation, it meant like

everything, bro, because I was, I was reeling. So yes, I was, I was disappointed. Because I mean,

you put your foot in that role. I mean, like, you know, you went by. When he's my big toe,

I put my foot in that thing. Well, you, you, you're now nominated for an Oscar for Best Supporting

Actor for Centers for Stoff Congratulations. Thank you very much. I appreciate it. You know,

it's the highest honor for an actor. And yet, it sometimes is, it's like a biggest curse for a

black actor. How do you, how do you hold that very true tension? And I'll say it's a curse,

because oftentimes many black actors have said things dry up after this. It's like you've hit the

ceiling. I worked with, with Lou, Lou Gossett some years ago. And Lou, for me, was one of the greats.

Lou Gossett, Jr. was one of the great actors with a capital G. And he won an Oscar in 1983.

I told him, yes, an officer in a gentleman. And I think he told me he didn't work for a year

after that. I've heard Halle Berry speak about her disappointment after she won the things

her career. And I don't want to miss quote, because I do not know Halle Berry. No, but she has said

that. She said this even on the show. She didn't quite. Things didn't happen for her the way she

thought. But what I will say, and this is important, I am not, and I will not view it as a curse.

Because I am claiming the victory in this process, no matter what happens. And what does that mean?

It means that just as after the disappointment of the five bloods, I had to pick myself up and

keep going. And that was something that Spike and I talked about. You got to keep working, man.

Something that I said to my son after he suffers a disappointment on the basketball court,

because my son is very similar to me. He likes to win. He does not like to lose.

Hey, man, you got to pick yourself up. You got to pick your head. Keep your head up, bro.

There's always the next game. And what I had to tell myself on the heels of five bloods was,

I got to keep working. So in terms of this moment, absolutely, I'm claiming as much as I can,

the joy of this moment. I'm not saying I don't have trepidation. I do. It's the reason I was not

listening to the broadcast this year when the nominations were announced. I did not want to set

myself up. Oh, wow. Yeah. But I'm claiming the victory, Tonya. What that means for me is

attempting as much as I can to fortify myself and know in my heart that I will

continue working as an actor. I absolutely will. I have never taken my marbles and gone home as a

result of whatever disappointments the vicissitudes of the industry. And I want to believe and I want to

claim that I will not do that now. I will continue working. And I pray to God, this doesn't. That is

something that I would tell any, any young person, young actor, young practitioner of any craft

in the face of disappointment. Yes, you have the choice of taking your marbles and going home if

you want to. What will that get you? You have to keep moving forward. And that is what I will do.

Doha Rilindo, this has been such a pleasure to talk about you. Thank you so much.

I really appreciate it. Thanks for having me. God bless you. Thank you. Thank you very much.

Delroy Lindo, he's a veteran actor with a 50 year career. And he's just received his first

Academy Award nomination for Ryan Kugler's sinners. If you'd like to catch up on interviews you've

missed, like our conversation with Jesse Buckley, the star of the film Hamnet, who's nominated for an

Oscar for her performance, or with legal scholar Rick Hassan on Trump's plan to push legislation

that would change how every American citizen registers to vote and votes. Check out our podcast.

You'll find lots of fresh air interviews. And to find out what's happening behind the scenes of

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Fresh air is executive producer is Sam Brigger. Our technical director and engineer is Audrey

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They a challenger directed today's show. With Terry Gross, I'm Tonya Musley.

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