![]() So we changed the location to Eat-a-Burger down by the Crenshaw Mall. “Ice Cube came up to him and said, ‘John listen to Steve man, let’s do this smart,’” Nicolaides recalled. Think about that.” Singleton cared so much about authenticity that it took a plea from one of his stars to change his mind. “So if some 14-year-old thinks he’s going to get his stripes by busting a cap in Ice Cube, that might happen. “I don’t give a fuck about your little movie, but I can’t control everybody,” Bone told Nicolaides, a producer of the film. Arriving to pre-publicity involving riots, looting sprees and a body count, its easy to suppose Boyz N The Hoods appeal lies in an easily-accessed. Well-acted and thematically rich, Boyz N the Hood observes Black America with far more depth and compassion than many of the like-minded films its success inspired. Singleton was keeping it a bit too real for Sloan’s comfort. But when word of that plan reached Bone, he offered a bit of advice to Nicolaides. At the director’s insistence, the scene was to be shot across from the Jungles, a neighborhood that belonged to the Bloods. “I’m going to do what I fucking want.” A night earlier, movie executive Steve Nicolaides met with Cle Shaheed Sloan, a member of the Anthem Park Bloods known on the street as Bone, who sensed the potential for trouble regarding one of the final scenes in Singleton’s classic film, “Boyz N the Hood.” Ice Cube’s character, Doughboy, was going to kill three members of the Bloods to avenge the killing of his brother. “Fuck that, fuck him,” Singleton said at the time. So it shouldn’t have been a surprise that when he received word the streets were watching and had words of caution, the ambitious director responded with the bravado of youth. He was doing so while still figuring out life himself. The themes embodied by Chestnut’s character, including life as a teen father, young Black athletes using sports as a means of escape from poverty through a college scholarship, and Black athletes being senselessly killed in violent communities before they make it to college, all continue to exist.John Singleton was undaunted as a recent graduate of USC’s film school while making a coming-of-age film unique to South Central Los Angeles. “So I think that, combined with the themes of the movie still being relevant today, and obviously John doing a great job with the execution of the script and directing, I think that is why it’s prevailed.”Ĭhestnut played Ricky Baker, a high school football star tragically killed in a drive-by shooting. In addition to that, I think John had a great eye for talent, where many of us that were in the movie are still working pretty much on a regular basis to this very day. “I think John Singleton wrote a very timeless script. The cultural honesty in Singleton’s films provide an educational message through an urban experience. “I think first and foremost, it still resonates today because some of the issues still exist that we experienced in that movie,” Chestnut said. Boyz n the Hood will forever be a classic for the realness of the lived experiences of many in the black community from the 1980s to now. ![]() ![]() The younger versions of Tre, Doughboy, Ricky and Chris in "Boyz n the Hood." ![]()
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