- Title: 'Fifty Shades' gets recolored by Marlon Wayans
- Date: 27th January 2016
- Summary: LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA, UNITED STATES (JANUARY 26, 2016) (REUTERS) (SOUNDIBTE) (English) ACTOR, WRITER, PRODUCER, MARLON WAYANS, SAYING: "I think we all have an inner Christian Grey in us, but mine is just a really clumsy one and I try to project that in the movie because Christian Grey is a way better lover than Christian Black. Even though Christian Grey is mediocre, Ch
- Embargoed: 11th February 2016 05:30
- Keywords: Parody Fifty Shades of Black Fifty Shades of Grey Marlon Wayans comedy premiere
- Location: LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA, UNITED STATES; UNIDENTIFIED FILMING LOCATIONS
- City: LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA, UNITED STATES; UNIDENTIFIED FILMING LOCATIONS
- Country: USA
- Topics: Film
- Reuters ID: LVA00341TQ5OT
- Aspect Ratio: 16:9
- Story Text: Less than a year after 'Fifty Shades of Grey' had its world premiere at the Berlin film festival, Marlon Wayans' parody of the film 'Fifty Shades of Black' held its world premiere in downtown Los Angeles on Tuesday (January 26).
Like his previous franchise 'Scary Movie', which parodied at first 'Scream' then all horror genres, 'Fifty Shades of Black' follows the storyline of the E.L. James adaptation; but in this, Dakota Johnson's Anastasia Steele is now Hannah, and her sadomasochistic lover Christian Grey is now Christian Black.
Wayans, who plays Black, said on the red carpet, "I think we all have an inner Christian Grey in us, but mine is just a really clumsy one and I try to project that in the movie because Christian Grey is a way better lover than Christian Black. Even though Christian Grey is mediocre, Christian Black is a little bit worse."
Hannah is played by Kali Hawk, who admitted to studying the original film before starting on set. "I thought Dakota Johnson was really great in the movie," she said, "So she gave me a lot to work with in terms of keeping the character as fully fleshed out as possible. Even though it's a parody, it's not a two-dimensional rendering of the original. We've put our own flavor into it and luckily the original film gave us a lot of great comedy moments which they sprinkled in there, and we just kind of took them and went to town."
Like the original, the film has numerous sex scenes. For Wayans, it wasn't a problem. He admitted at the premiere, "It's never difficult for me because I'm a fool and have a good time. I think for women it's a little harder, so trying to get Kali comfortable was a little harder. Actually Florence Henderson she was pretty game, so she was a good time but at the end of the day we're all comedians and you just rip it all up and put it aside and have a good time."
But for Hawk, it was a different matter. "Marlon is disgusting," she stated. "In this movie, there's an S&M theme throughout the film so I mean, there were times when he would spank me during the film and between takes, he'd be massaging my buttcheeks and I'd have to go 'Marlon, you can't do that! You've gone from action to cut, you can't try to like make out with me after they've yelled 'cut'.' And he'd be like 'I just wanted to throw in a couple of nice smooches'. There's no nice smooches, there's comedy on-screen and off."
'Fifty Shades of Grey' was based on the fan fiction of author E.L. James after she fell in love with the 'Twilight' movies, which were based on the novels by Stephenie Meyer. When asked if he'd thought about the fact that the film was a parody of a film based on fan fiction of a film based on a novel, Wayans replied "That's a lot of math. That's a conundrum isn't it? I didn't think about it all. I just did it. I'm glad you thought about it because if I'd thought about it I probably would have never made the movie because that's like quantum physics for high people. You have to be high just to understand what you said. Somebody's at home pulling at a blunt going 'he's deep!'"
Since the Oscar nominations, Hollywood has been at the center of a diversity row. Wayans believes that although his film is diverse, it's still able to reach a wide audience. "You know, laughs are colorless, so when I make movies I don't go, 'Let's make a movie for black laughs!'. I make a movie because I want to make everyone laugh and I'm an equal opportunity offender so I make fun of everybody because I don't want anybody feeling left out because I don't want to do that. Everybody gets it, the Kardashians, Kanye gets it too, Jay-Z and Beyonce, I hit everybody. But I just do it with kid's gloves so I think mockery is the best form of flattery, so hopefully E.L. James and the crew will love this as much as the rest of the audience," he said.
Wayans' parents in the film are played by Fred Willard and British actress Jane Seymour, who described her character as not very politically correct and said that people would be "pretty surprised." She then added as a caveat, "I just want to say that everything and anything that I say and do was done in humor, ok? Don't take me seriously. Please."
'Fifty Shades of Black' goes on release in North America on January 29. - Copyright Holder: REUTERS
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