Luhrmann goes back to the start
Baz Luhrmann takes a vivid journey back in ‘The Get Down’
Follow the early steps of hip-hop’s pioneers
The Get Down might be subtitled A Culture Grows in the Bronx.
Australian film director Baz Luhrmann ( Moulin Rouge, The
Great Gatsby) has long been fascinated by the turbulent, decaying yet creatively fertile 1970s in New York, where disco ruled, fires burned and hip-hop germinated in troubled neighborhoods.
“How did a pure new idea get born from a time when there was so little?” Luhrmann asks in an interview with USA TODAY. “That singular question has led me on this odyssey,” a decadelong quest with ballooning budgets and delays that culminates Friday with the release on Netflix of the first half of the 12-episode music-filled drama’s first season.
The Get Down, an early phrase that described what would later be called hiphop, focuses on South Bronx teens — poet Ezekiel “Books” Figuero (Justice Smith), fleet-footed DJ Shaolin Fantastic (Shameik Moore) and aspiring singer Mylene Cruz (Herizen Guardiola) — who nurture hopes despite the drugs, death and destruction around them.
Jaden Smith plays a young graffiti artist and Jimmy Smits a corrupt political boss who looks out for his neighborhood in a newcomer-filled cast.
“To get this production greenlit with African-American and Latino youth, most of whom no one’s ever heard of, and the need to do (a musical production) in a big way, that is why I had to expend my capital,” says Luhrmann. “Classical music pieces and newly written music” that tell the story contributed to the cost.
Smith and Moore, born years after The Get Down era, learned
about the times through hiphop’s Grandmaster Flash, an associate producer; rappers Kurtis Blow and Raheim; and graffiti artist Lady Pink.
The Get Down veers between a gritty, realistic portrait of the South Bronx and a more romantic take on youth that carries a
West Side Story flavor.. Despite the time gap, Moore says the characters are relevant for today’s youth. “It reflects our lives right now. They can connect with any character on this show, but definitely the Get Down brothers. Especially (in) our community, there are Shaolin Fantastics of 2016 and Books of 2016,” he says.
“It’s kids trying to make something of themselves, trying to overcome something, trying to make a life in the art they love to do,” adds Smith, whose Books is in love with Mylene. “That’s important to show today. There’s a lot of negativity happening right now, especially for young minorities and people of color. It’s im- portant to have a show that’s not just focusing on the hardship. It’s also focusing on family life, friendships, the art and the passion.”
Yahya Abdul-Mateen II, who plays disco dazzler Cadillac, a rival for Mylene’s affections, says the brash, colorful fashions helped him get a feel for the times.
“You come out of the ’60s and African-Americans and minorities are just beginning to get civil liberties and freedoms. The ’ 70s come, and there’s this whole explosion of expression. The collars are pointing far in opposition directions, the Afros are really big and the chest is out, so there’s something about pride that I just love,” he says. “You have marginalized people using their own resources to create small sparks. They have no idea these small sparks would go on to change the world, change music, and become this global phenomenon we know as hip-hop.”