“It's been ten years since Amy and Peter Edgar (Naomi Watts and Tim Roth) adopted their son from war-torn Eritrea, and they thought the worst was behind them. Luce Edgar (Kelvin Harrison Jr.) has become an all-star student beloved by his community in Arlington, Virginia. His African American teacher, Harriet Wilson (Octavia Spencer), believes he is a symbol of black excellence that sets a positive example for his peers. But when he is assigned to write an essay in the voice of a historical twentieth-century figure, Luce turns in a paper that makes an alarming statement about political violence. Worried about how this assignment reflects upon her star pupil, Harriet searches his locker and finds something that confirms her worst fears.” (rottentomatoes)
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Recently, I had the opportunity to have a conversation with JC Lee, an alumnus of Bloomsburg University and Juilliard who recently showed his move Luce on campus. We talked about his movie, his career, his methods for how he got from point A to point B in his life, and advice he had for anyone trying to do the same.
The inspiration for the original play came from multiple places and facets of his life, including how he himself is mixed race, and how he’s had to code-switch to fit in with different groups of people in his life, a theme prevalent in his play-turned-movie. He also drew a little bit from his love of superheroes and their own alter egos, and the idea that everyone has a mask that they put on for others.
The movie Luce was originally as play, as we know. Lee has been involved in the theater for basically his entire life, especially during his undergrad at Bloomsburg University, and his time at Julliard. During our conversation, he told me that he’d been writing a bunch of comic stories with superheroes at Juilliard for a while. Near the end of his time there, he was told that he had to write a “grown-up” story. “I thought, “What does that even mean?” he joked with me, and told me he’d ended up returning to an idea that he’d jotted down in a notebook years ago and written in “Come back to this when you’re 35.” That idea ended up becoming Luce.
The play debuted in 2013, and it was due to the encouragement, prompting and pushing of a friend that it became the movie it is today.
How he got to where he is, Lee told me, is basically through hard work. You have to have a drive, and it’s something people are born with or not. “I have no doubt that there are a lot of talented people in LA,” he said, “but you have to have the drive to go after your goals.” He’s had to support himself for much of his life, and his suggestion on “making it” was to go for it.
Currently, Lee is working on another play, a short movie based on a short story by Stephen King, and series for Apple TV. When I asked him why he took on so many varied forms of media, he told me that working on different genres and forms of media helped to hone his skills.
Following that, his advice is to hone your skills by working on different things, and also to take in everything. Every form of media, books and TV shows and movies and plays, and to take in the bad as well as the good.
Thanks to JC Lee for letting me pick your brain and share your thoughts with the masses.
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