Given the quality of his work in recent releases likeIt Comes at Night,Monsters and Menand then some, there’s a chance you’re familiar with the nameKelvin Harrison Jr.But if that’s not the case, it’s our honor to put the Collider Spotlight on this downright phenomenal performer.
Harrison Jr. has kept quite busy since scoring some background work onEnder’s Game, but 2019 looks to be a banner year for the young actor. He’ll add a handful of new titles to his resume, but the one I suspect could put Harrison Jr. on the map in a new, big way is the upcoming release,Luce. He leads as the title character, a high school student who appears to be living the American Dream. His parents, played byNaomi WattsandTim Roth, adopted him from a war-torn country a decade earlier and now Luce has it all - he’s popular, a stellar athlete, skilled debater and an all-around exemplary student. However, when one of Luce’s teachers (Octavia Spencer) finds something alarming in his locker, the incident runs the risk of drastically tarnishing his model student status.
If you’ve seen the poster forLuce, you likely caught the pull quote from its Sundance debut; “The most provocative film of the 2019 Sundance Film Festival.” I couldn’t agree more with that statement. Not only isLucea downright riveting watch but it’s also a film with the power to seep in to such an extent that it’ll frequently challenge one to reassess certain assumptions, especially those tied to identity.
“If you want to be great then you need to work hard at it … things don’t just come to us, you know?”
It’s not much of a surprise that Harrison Jr. was attracted to such ambitious material when you find out what movie he credits with sparking it all:Imitation of Life. He explained that his mother made him watch the Academy Award-nominated film when he was young and even though he hasn’t seen it in a good while, certain details are still on his mind. “I just remember weeping at the complexity of, you know, it’s about this actress who has this young daughter and her daughter meets another girl and they become friends. And her mom is black and she’s the help but because of who she had a baby with, the baby looks white.” He continued, “She’s like, ‘I look white, but I’m being judged. There’s a lot of prejudice against me, and I can’t be in the same classroom.’ So she’s trying to deal with this in her relationship with her mom and this little girl and it’s just a lot. And I was just like, ‘What is this movie? This is so complicated. Why am I crying?’”
In addition to that inspiration, Harrison Jr. also had the benefit of coming from a family of performers. “My dad is a classically trained saxophonist and he studied with some of the best musicians out there.” At a young age, Harrison Jr.’s schedule consisted of school in addition to a creative arts school, jazz camps every summer, and hours of practice. “It was a very strict schedule. It was about discipline. It was about, if you want to be great then you need to work hard at it, and so that kind of helped me approach prepping for a role, and just giving myself time to prepare and doing the research and not just being lazy and thinking things will come because things don’t just come to us, you know?”
The tricky thing then becomes managing the power of that inspiration and work ethic. It isn’t easy to say no in this industry, but Harrison Jr. has enjoyed the luxury of filling his resume with projects that are on another level with standout filmmakers attached to stories that have something important to say. Harrison Jr. laughed and recalled, “We were having this conversation yesterday. [They] were like, ‘When you gonna take a break?’ And I was like, ‘Not this year.’” Speaking of himself and his team, he also added, “We’ve been very fortunate and very blessed to have the path we’ve had because things have kind of come that way. But I also seek out things that kind of parallel where I’m growing in my life. And I think that because the timing has just been great of, you know, race is a huge topic so then a young black kid or young black actor who comes into the big mix at the right time, things just sort of work out.”
“I remember I was acting, but it was also more so to pay off my student debt because I was like, it’s the easiest way …”
But, of course, before picking up projects likeLuce,Harrison Jr. had to start somewhere and for him, Hollywood gig number one was on a giant production with an ensemble filled with top tier talent, the big screen adaptation ofEnder’s Game. “I went to the audition with my friend who actually wanted to audition, and I was like, ‘Okay, cool. I’ll go with you.’” Harrison Jr. went through with the audition himself and scored a callback for a featured extra role. For that next step of the process, he walked into a room with directorGavin Hoodand a whole bunch of people from Summit Entertainment. He recalled, “I had this one line; ‘Nightmare’s launching. Keep ‘em to yourself.’ And I said it like 10 times and then they were like, ‘You got the part!’” Before he knew it, Harrison Jr. was on the set of a $110 million movie, bumping into icons likeSir Ben Kingsleyin the restroom and running lines withHarrison Ford.
“I shot that movie for like four months. I didn’t go to high school. It was my senior year, and I didn’t go to school.” As Harrison Jr. further explained, the Battle School Armies ofEnder’s Gameare key throughout the story, so even though he was cast as a featured extra, he had to be on set often. “I was in the Salamander army. The extras always had to be there every time the actors were there because the army had to be there.” In addition to that, Harrison Jr. scored another exciting gig on the film; “I ended up being Dink’s (Khylin Rhambo) photo double and stand-in so if he had to go to school and Harrison [Ford] had to do his scenes, I would run lines with Harrison, which was insane.”
So one great opportunity in the books withEnder’s Game, but Harrison Jr. still needed to take another big step forward to go from then mentality of making a quick buck to making acting his career. “I remember I was acting, but it was also more so to pay off my student debt because I was like, it’s the easiest way …” He laughed and added, “It sounds so bad, but it’s the truth. I can make $800 a day if I just get this one line.”
“To see a strong young man at 17 - a strong young black man at 17, was like, that’s exciting.”
The other thought holding Harrison Jr. back a bit was how rare it is to be that lucky individual to hit it big and make it in Hollywood. “I was like, ‘I don’t know if I’m any good, but there’s a market in New Orleans and no one from New Orleans is ever gonna come out of it.’ And everyone’s like, ‘Well,Anthony Mackie.’ I was like, ‘An anomaly. Who’s gonna be another Anthony Mackie?’” However, that sentiment changed thanks to the movieTheBirth of a Nation. Though the film’s eventual release was engulfed in controversy surrounding resurfaced allegations against directorNate Parker, the opportunity was a game-changer for Harrison Jr..
He scored an audition for that film and drove all the way to Savannah, Georgia where he auditioned for Parker. “The way he talked about acting, the way he talked about the craft, and how passionate he was about that particular story was so moving to me because he was a bit younger than most of the people I had met, and he was black,” He continued, “It was one of those representation things! It was like, he looked like me so I was like, ‘Whoa.’ It was exciting to hear it and it made it feel more tangible again for me, and it made me feel like I had a purpose, because the whole movie was about purpose. It was about following your heart and about having something greater than you that brought you here. And I was like, ‘Whoa, that’s why I’m here.’”
And the directors Harrison Jr. has worked with since continue to inspire and motivate him as an actor, leading up toLucedirectorJulius Onah. “It’s in his bones and the words are his, and his thoughts are so full and profound, and I feel like I was learning as I was talking to him. I was like, ‘Open my eyes. Open up the way I view the world,’ you know what I mean? I want to understand other people’s walks of life better than my own as well, and I think that’s the whole point of the movie.” Harrison Jr. continued, “[Julius] fed me as a human being and as an actor. I mean, I’m not acting just to act, you know? I want something, too.” He laughed and added, “I think that was the beauty of working with Julius and just creating this character that was so specific and so nuanced and so troubled in a lot of ways, but so strong. And to see a strong young man at 17 - a strong young black man at 17, was like, that’s exciting.”
Exciting for sure, but I can’t even begin to wrap my mind around the challenge of bringing such a complex character piece to screen, especially when you’re not filming a story like this in sequence. When asked how he’d get himself in the appropriate mind frame for a specific scene, Harrison Jr. went straight to one of his favorite movies,Closer. “Natalie Portman, I saw an interview and she talked about howMike Nicholslikes to name the moment. So, this is the moment when this happens, this is the moment when she falls out of love with him,” and that’s exactly what Harrison Jr. does now. “So what I started doing is I take every scene and I was like, ‘This is the moment when this happened. This is the moment when my mom betrays me.’” After that part of the process is complete and he gives these moments nicknames, up on the wall they go. “So I automatically know when I’m about to start a scene, say we’re doing something that’s like third act of the movie, I’m like, ‘Okay, this is that moment,’ and I know everything that lead up to that, and I do a day breakdown. It’s very detailed.”
“I sometimes psych myself out and go, ‘Oh my god, Naomi Watts is in the room. Whoa. Octavia Spencer’s here today.'”
So he’s prepped to a tee, but what happens when an industry heavyweight likeNaomi WattsandOctavia Spencerwalk in? Harrison Jr. is human so yes, his nerves do get rattled, but that’s when he turns to mint tea. “I always have to have a cup of mint tea when I’m doing a drama because something about it settles me and it makes me feel a little bit awake, but it also makes me feel calm because I get anxious sometimes.” He continued, “I sometimes psych myself out and go, ‘Oh my god, Naomi Watts is in the room. Whoa. Octavia Spencer’s here today. They’re all here today. Do you know your lines, Kelvin?’ So the tea kind of helps me relax. I sit down, I look over my sides, I just meditate and breathe and stretch, and then it’s like, I got to start the day.”
Another tactic Harrison Jr. turns to actually comes fromAlicia Vikander. “I didn’t go to Juilliard or anything like that for acting. I went to a private acting school, so a lot of it’s just been learning from other actors and experiences.” He watches a lot of interviews and roundtables, and one that really stuck with him was one Vikander did aboutThe Danish Girl, specificallywhen she spoke about an especially intimidating scene of the film. Harrison Jr. recalled, “She was like, ‘I had a calendar and I knew the big day was when I had the big crying scene.’ She said, ‘It was kind of giving me anxiety, so I just blacked it out.’ And she said, ‘I only focused on what was coming up in that week.’” Now Harrison Jr. takes a similar approach with his own work. In the case ofLuce, when it comes to a more high-pressure moment, like perhaps a full ensemble scene, he explained, “I just kind of ignore those cards and I just show up and I just go, ‘Okay, this is happening today? Cool. I already know the lines because I learned the lines before we started filming, so I don’t have anything to worry about,’ and I just do it. Because if I think about it too much then I’m screwed.”
At this point in our conversation Harrison Jr. had brought up two different interviews that made a huge impression on him and, given where I was sitting, it felt like a must to ask him this: what’s a question you’d like to hear an actor you admire answer? He told me, “I would love to hear actors talk more about, how do they balance the relationship between directors and co-stars, and how to, I guess, how to be a lead?” He further explained, “You know, there’s the vision and they’re at the helm, but then there’s also the big powerhouse names around you. And I guess what I’ve always had a hard time trying to figure out is, how do I find a balance to be a leader, to set the tone for someone who already knows?” Given the fact that filmmaking is a highly collaborative process where a director has a vision and, like Harrison Jr. said, a lead might be trying to set the tone while surrounded by very experienced co-stars, this is a great question that I’m certainly pocketing for a future interview! But in the meantime, Harrison Jr. has great examples to follow thanks to Spencer and Watts.
“It was meant to be. I was supposed to meet Naomi, and I was supposed to do this movie, and I was supposed to do that movie.”
While shootingLuce, Watts approached Harrison Jr. for another project she was working on,The Wolf Hour, which actually also premiered at the 2019 Sundance Film Festival. And the funny thing about that project is, directorAlistair Banks Griffinis also from New Orleans and he happened to have attended the same high school as Harrison Jr. “It was meant to be. I was supposed to meet Naomi, and I was supposed to do this movie, and I was supposed to do that movie.,” He continued, “She’s just so wonderful for even thinking of me, and that’s how you know that someone’s really present and connected to themselves, and the people around them because I feel like it could have been missed otherwise, and I think that’s what makes her so wonderful. She’s very here.”
Looping Spencer into the conversation, Harrison Jr. pointed out that both were very maternal towards him, and that’s something that paired well with their roles in the film. Watts, of course, plays Luce’s adoptive mother, but when it came to Spencer as his teacher, Harriet, Harrison Jr. pointed out, “I do think Harriet, in her own way, becomes maybe a second mom in a different setting for Luce.” He continued, “So I think naturally as actors, when we’re diving into the material, we assume the roles that we’re taking on, and so I think that was just a shock. I was like, ‘Wow, they’re really gonna give me their phone numbers,’ and, ‘They’re really gonna invite me out!’”
During our conversation it became abundantly clear that Harrison Jr. is a person who greatly values collaboration and support on a set, and that might have a little something to do with a short film he directed back when he was 17-years-old. “It’s really weird because the movie I made was likeLuce. It’s calledBehind Blue Eyes.” He further explained, “It’s about this kid who was abandoned by his mother when he was seven and he was adopted by this younger couple.” This whole concept actually grew from a single trip to McDonald’s! Harrison Jr. continued, “I saw this young black woman and this young white guy and they had this little black kid with them. And they had brought their vegan food or something to the McDonald’s, but the kid didn’t eat that clearly because then he wanted french fries and a Big Mac and a large Coke. I was like, ‘This is the strangest thing.’ And then I just walked away [and] I was like, ‘Either they’ve kidnapped this child or that’s a family.’ And then I was like, ‘Okay, I want to explore what that’s like in mixed race families and adoption,’ and then I end up making this thriller about this kid who had killed his little brother to get the love from his family.”
“I want to do everything. I want to at least try, you know? And then decide.”
Harrison Jr. never did releaseBehind Blue Eyesbut he certainly took a lot from the experience of getting behind the lens for the first time. “Seeing it from the other side was like, ‘Whoa, there’s so much here.’ There’s so many other players in the room. Everyone’s trying to support and elevate this one vision.” He added, “And so it makes me excited to come to work to be like, ‘Okay, what has this person brought to the table today?’ And, ‘How can I use this and how can I play? What am I bringing to the table to complement these wonderful artists?’ It just made me appreciate the craft more.”
Whether you’ve seenLuceyet or not, hopefully at this point you’re getting the sense that Harrison Jr. is on the cusp of very big things. And perhaps now more than ever, we associate “big things in Hollywood” with scoring a coveted superhero role. Admittedly, I drop Harrison Jr.’s name during just about any fan casting opportunity I get so during our chat, I had to ask, should Marvel or a similar major player come knocking on his door, would he be interested? Harrison Jr. told me, “At first I was like, ‘No, I don’t want to do that. I want to do my indies.’” He continued, “That just seems scary and a lot of pressure, but now I’m like, ‘Let’s try it all!’ I want to do all of it. I mean, I’m too old to play Spider-Man now, but …” Harrison Jr. continued, “I want to do [a] thriller. I want to do theI Am Legends.” He also added, “I want to do everything. I want to at least try, you know? And then decide.”
What better attitude for someone to have with a downright radiant future ahead of him?
you’re able to catch Harrison Jr. inLuce, which hits select theaters on August 2nd.
