Denzel Washington and director Spike Lee, now 70 and 68 respectively, are working together for the fifth time on new film Highest 2 Lowest.Aude Guerrucci/Reuters
“I can’t go out like this, you know that!”
So says Denzel Washington’s character, an aging New York music-world mogul named David King, in the thick of Spike Lee’s new thriller Highest 2 Lowest. The line, which King bellows at his wife as he faces a dark reckoning of the soul – his best friend’s son having been kidnapped by an aspiring hip-hop star (played by real-life rapper A$AP Rocky) – could double as Washington and Lee’s collaborative motto.
Working for the fifth time together, the star and director seem determined to have Highest 2 Lowest stand not as a coda for their relationship, but a righteous and furious insistence that the pair, now 70 and 68 respectively, are only getting started.
Ahead of the film’s limited theatrical release this weekend, Washington and Lee spoke with The Globe and Mail about authenticity, partnership and how they pulled off one helluva only-in-New-York scene featuring a Puerto Rican Day parade, a motorcycle chase, and a subway confrontation that Major League Baseball fans will be thinking about for ages.
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I just want to congratulate you, Spike Lee, on making this film, which finally crystallizes the nightmare of riding a subway car full of Yankees fans.
Spike Lee: [Laughs] Oh, it’s all right, it’s all good! So long as you’re not a Red Sox fan.
You’re shooting in New York for the first time in more than a decade, though. How important was that for you?
Lee: I’m a New Yorker, and you have to shoot a film where a film takes place, so this was the first one where that’s happened in a while. But I was happy to sleep in my own bed.
Denzel Washington: I’m trying to remember the last one that I did in New York.
Lee: There was no way we’d do it anywhere else. New York’s a character. It was never discussed, even in somewhere like Toronto.
We’d love to have you here, but …
Washington: Are films coming up to Toronto like they used to?
Yes, but I feel it’s more television now, the streamers. They’ve built a lot of soundstages on the waterfront.
Washington: At the turn of the century, it felt like I was going to Montreal or Toronto every week.
We still have good tax credits, great infrastructure. But I feel maybe it’s more soundstage work now, less shooting on the streets of Toronto.
Washington: They’re not dressing it up any more.
Right. But that’s why I love the authenticity of this film, in particular its Puerto Rican Day parade sequence in the Bronx.
Lee: That’s a set piece, exactly.
Washington: Let me ask you, Spike, why did you decide to add that element?
Lee: It’s just being a New Yorker!
Washington: The script came to me first, and I knew there was only one guy to direct it. Only this guy would’ve thought to do that. But what made you think that?
Lee: I had to show, Mr. Washington, that [A$AP Rocky’s character] was not just some stupid hood. He’s smart. With this kidnapping, he had devised a plan that he wouldn’t get caught. He wanted chaos, mayhem! My favourite film, The French Connection, has a set piece with the subway chase. There’s this history of great New York films, Dog Day Afternoon, stuff like that. But then there’s also films like The Defiant Ones, where Tony Curtis wants to die between a train, right, but Sidney Poitier wouldn’t let him go. That’s where that scene comes from, too.
Washington: I’m so glad that I didn’t know all these things before I started shooting. The actor doesn’t need to know, but the filmmaker does.
If that doesn’t help you, then what do you need from a director?
Washington: There’s no answer for that. The time to worry about flying is when you’re on the ground.
Lee: Can I use that?
Washington: I’ve been at that a long time, and I trust the pilot. It allows me to walk up and down the aisle and do what I got to do. And when we land and where we land, yes, he’s flying. And I’m adding my whatever…
Lee: Can I ask you a question? Wasn’t there a film where you played a pilot?
Washington: And I wasn’t in charge! I’m in the hands of another great pilot. I’m going to tell [Flight director Robert] Zemeckis what to do? I get on the plane, I get onboard, and I don’t know what he’s going to do, but I’ll be ready with my part. That’s how it is with any great director.
But is it easier after five?
Washington: There’s a shorthand, yeah. He knows how I work, he moves stuff around because he knows I like to improvise. I don’t know what he knows about me, but he doesn’t know what I know about him. But I know that I can trust him, and he knows he can trust me.
Lee: The key word is trust.
Highest 2 Lowest is playing in select theatres starting Aug. 15, and will be available to stream on Apple TV+ starting Sept. 5.
