In the new thriller The Suspect, Mekhi Phifer stars as one of a pair of social scientists who pose
as bank robbers in an effort to understand the racial dynamics of small-town
law enforcement. As police attempt to work through the case, the experiment
takes an unexpected and deadly turn.

Phifer, who’s also an
executive producer of The Suspect,
spoke with Shadow And Act about making the film as it comes to DVD and Blu
Ray this week.

JAI TIGGETT: With the racial
dynamics in the film, the tone seems similar to In The Heat of the Night.

MEKHI PHIFER: Yes! I was just thinking that. That
film’s one of my favorites of all time.

JT: Is
that one of the things that attracted you to the project?

MP: To be honest, a lot of times you get locked
into maybe about six different themes that Hollywood portrays. And so when I
read it, it was just something so different. It’s a small, independent film,
but you get to portray what’s really going on in the world. It spoke to
so many different themes, different walks of life, and so much about human
character that it just felt good. It felt different.

JT: You’ve
done both, independent films and larger studio projects. What keeps you going
back to smaller films like this one?

MP: As an artist it’s almost like doing Broadway,
to be able to pour your heart out on the screen in a very unassuming situation.
It’s challenging, there’s not a lot of money that you get, so the reward is the
work and being able to have the freedom of working on something that’s totally
different than most of the stuff that’s going to come down your pipeline.

JT: The
movie deals with some of the preconceived notions based on race. And
it‘s a white writer-director, Stuart Connelly, who’s raising these
issues.

MP: I think in any artist’s mind, you can’t just
be into yourself. You have to look at the world in an objective view. And I
think Stuart has a very keen insight into how people innately see other people. There’s a stereotype – whether it’s with
African-Americans or with Arabs getting profiled when they want to board a
plane – there’s this innate fear of not knowing. And I think the unknown is
what causes this fear.

I think that Stuart is very astute in his
thinking when it comes to these things, and he’s open to discovering. That’s what
I loved about the script. In the beginning you kind of get thrown for a loop as
to who these people are. But then you
see it’s much more intricate, and that helps to dispel some stereotypes I
think.

JT: With
the film taking place in a small town, it seems a lot like stepping back in
time. Being from a big city yourself, what was your experience like as an actor
going into that environment?

MP: I’m a big road trip guy. I’m the guy who gets
in the RV and drives across country. And when you do that, you really get to
see small-town America. Being from New York, living in LA, being in Chicago,
you kind of get more of the big city melting pot sort of thing. But when you
drive through the country there’s so many small pockets of people that don’t
experience people of different backgrounds. So what they’ve seen on television
is their baseline. They don’t know.

When we were shooting The Suspect, Sterling K. Brown – who is a very accomplished actor,
makes money, has been on television, all that stuff – when we were shooting at a
store, he just went to sit outside and got harassed by the store owner. He was
there to shoot the movie and the guy asked him for ID, it was a whole thing. So
this is a real prevalent thing that is still going on. It’s still a real issue
that we have to deal with, all of us. Not just black, but white, everybody. We
all have our preconceived notions of who people are.

JT: The film has screened at a few different film festivals at this point. What kind of response has it gotten?

MP: The different times it went to film festivals I was working, so it was hard for me to attend, but I corresponded with Stuart and Sterling. The reaction was always that it really evokes dialogue. When you leave the film you have things to talk about, and that’s what I miss about modern film. I miss walking out of the film and talking about the real issues that were portrayed in it, whether it be racial, socioeconomic, political. I’ve heard from a lot of people that it evokes conversation, which is good.

JT: For those who haven’t seen The
Suspect, what do you want them to know about it going in?

MP: I just want people to have a good time. I
think it’s entertaining in its own way, but it’s not a popcorn movie where you
just sit down and already know what’s going to happen. It reminds me of In The Heat of the Night mixed with The Usual Suspects. You have to watch
it all the way to the end to really know what’s going on. You’ve got to sit
down and think, and really hear the dialogue. It doesn’t rely on explosions and
all of that stuff.

JT: You’re an EP of this film, and you’ve produced other
projects as well. When Salli Richardson-Whitfield spoke with us recently,
she mentioned directing a project that you produced.

MP: Salli’s
great. This was a pilot presentation that myself and a business partner got the
money together and had Salli direct. It’s kind of like a Friday Night Lights, but
dealing with basketball.

JT: So you’re juggling acting and producing. You’ve done film, TV, and stage.
Are there any particular projects that stick out in your mind as
having shaped your career?

MP: Of course it started out with Clockers.
I get asked that sometimes and I think each project sort of propelled me to the
next one. Work begets work, but doing good work begets more good work. And I
always try to pick and choose projects that will be impactful to someone. From
films like Clockers to playing a
doctor on ER, to doing 8 Mile where I’m in charge of the
hip-hop battles, I think it affects all kinds of different audiences. And I
just try to keep that in mind, to keep people entertained.

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