'The United States Vs. Billie Holiday' cast on Andra Day's role, the war on drugs and systemic oppression

The cast of The United States Vs. Billie Holiday talk about Andra Day's role of playing the legendary Billie Holiday. They also discuss the war on drugs and systemic oppression.

Video transcript

[VIDEO PLAYBACK]

- I cut "Strange Fruit."

- No, Joe. I want to sing the damn song, all right? The club advertises it. People pay good money to come here and hear me sing it.

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KEVIN POLOWY: You've said you were initially hesitant to the role. What was that process like for you? And what eventually brought you around?

ANDRA DAY: It was the fear of just not being good enough. You know what I mean? It was not just not being good enough, not being an actress. That was huge. And I'm such a huge Billie Holiday fan that like my worst nightmare was, oh, OK, great, we have Billie Holiday, amazing. We have Diana Ross, amazing. We have Audra McDonald on Broadway, amazing. And remember that time Andra Day tried to be Billie too? like that's the [BLEEP] that kept running through my head. I was like, oh, no this was terrible.

And I didn't want to remake "Lady Sings the Blues" because I'm like, it's perfect. Why would we approach that? But then I met with Lee, and similar as he said, we had such-- we connected. And I think we connected because neither of us thought I was right for this role. We just talked and he had a real desire to tell this story. I think it was revelatory for him. And I think it sat in him weird as a Black man that he did not know the true narrative of Billie Holiday. You know what I mean? He didn't know the true story.

And so there was a determination, I think I saw in him, to tell the truth and his ability to pull out performances, his dedication to her, and that we weren't remaking "Lady Sings the Blues." We were going to tell the story about how the FBI and the Federal Bureau of Narcotics and Harry J. Anslinger went after her for singing "Strange Fruit" under the guise of a war on drugs, you know? So not only are we showing that she is really the genesis, the great godmother of civil rights, we're also talking about the war on drugs actually started in the '40s, not as we know it.

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- It's a song about important things, you know, things that are going on in the country.

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KEVIN POLOWY: Lee, what did you see in Andra in the casting process or before where you went like, oh, yes, this is my Billie.

LEE DANIELS: I didn't at first. I think as we started talking, I watched an artist that was trying to figure out who Billie was, whether or not she'd be able to do justice to this woman, and just her questioning. She had so many questions about whether or not she was right for the role, which made me know that she took it seriously and I just don't want to jump into it to say I'm doing Billie Holiday. I fell in love with her because of that.

TYLER JAMES WILLIAMS: Watching Andra channel literally Billie, it just gave us the freedom to play the way we wanted to as well.

TREVANTE RHODES: It was a blessing, man. It really is a blessing to really just get in a space with people who are that dedicated to what they're doing. As she stepped in from the beginning, she was her.

EVAN ROSS: It takes a lot to pull from those places and give what she gave. And it was-- it was such a pleasure to watch on screen and off screen.

GARRETT HEDLUND: I loved every minute of seeing her on and off set, how she composed herself, how serious she was taking it. She did a tremendous job.

[VIDEO PLAYBACK]

- Pardon me for asking, but why is that song so important to us?

- Hoover says it's un-American.

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KEVIN POLOWY: The government sort of harassment of her was paraded as drug charges, but as this film posits, it's likely because she was calling attention to these lynchings with "Strange Fruit." How would you characterize the government's harassment of her? Was this purely a matter of systemic oppression and silencing her voice?

LEE DANIELS: He was a racist. Harry-- Harry Anslinger was a racist. And he was, I think, probably attracted to her in a very sick way. And he couldn't understand that this Beyonce, Cardi B, Rihanna of this generation, that she had this kind of power over-- over white America. And I think that that power combined with the song "Strange Fruit," that was like a Molotov cocktail. And it had to stop. He did everything he could in his power to stop her. You know, they hounded her until she died. They planted drugs on her. They paid off boyfriends to keep pumping her with drugs when she was trying to get off drugs. This is a woman that knew that she was an addict, knew that she needed help, and couldn't find it anywhere.

GARRETT HEDLUND: Anslinger didn't want her to activate and, in his mind, corrupt the minds of the youth to follow in her footsteps in a way that he couldn't control or contain. If he silenced her, he silenced anybody in America that would aspire to be her, which allowed him to remain in control, which is what's so powerful about this film.

TYLER JAMES WILLIAMS: We've seen the federal government find any reason to kind of attack the Black community as a whole. And you see that with a lot of other artists at the time. You know, Stan Getz had just as big of a drug issue as Lady did, but not nearly as much of a targeted assault. The federal government has a very bad history with loud and proud Black women. We can't not look at that.

- White actresses and singers at that time, like Judy Garland, who were doing the same stuff, if not more, and they turned a blind eye. That then lets me know just how powerful she was. She then truly was making an impact where a Judy Garland, who the world equally reveres and loves, wasn't a threat. Unfortunately, we've heard this before in many different and varying ways. And I'm just so grateful for her that she didn't stop. Because I don't think we would be here literally.

KEVIN POLOWY: And Miss Lawrence, how do you see this story as it relates to events that are still happening today, you know, 75 years later?

MISS LAWRENCE: Oh my God, turn on the TV, turn on the television, you know, we still-- I am still seeing brand new hashtags for my brothers and sisters that are killed in senseless hate crimes, my trans brothers and sisters that are still being killed in senseless hate crimes simply because people are just choosing to live. If you turned on the TV on January the 6 and saw right in your face what white privilege looks like and the fact that there was no mass amounts of bloodshed because a group of people chose to go and incite violence on our nation's-- in our nation's capital, that within itself let you know that we are not real, real, real far away from where we were back in the Billie Holiday era. Everything, again, it just shows up as a disguise.

So to answer your question, things that reminds me of that time, it would be those things I feel like that Billie Holiday lived with her singing the song "Strange Fruit." While it was a small movement back then, it was very powerful. And so when you look at the #MeToo movement of today, when you look at the Black Lives Matter movement of today, when you look at what the gay liberation movement was back in the '70s, you see the spirit and the power of people like Billie Holiday and those that were connected to her.

[VIDEO PLAYBACK]

- But it's a war on drugs, not on you, lady.

- Yeah, that's what they want you to believe.

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