Complex recently chopped it up with people that have worked with Lil Wayne on set of his commercials to see what it was like working with him.
Sara Gilbert, who is the Public Relations Manager for Sovereign Brands, talked about how Weezy acted as his own director to improve the scenes while on set of the Bumbu ads and the “A Word With Wayne” series:
“It must be from his experience being a professional for all of his adult life. He can hear something and put his own spin to it instantaneously. He might hear something upstairs or down the hallway-[maybe] someone shifted their weight and they have their keys in their pocket. He’ll stop and wait for the noise to clear and then he’ll resume or we’ll take it from the top. He doesn’t miss a stride, it doesn’t throw him off his game. The fact that he self-corrects, he’s directing himself, is amazing.”
Matt Aselton, who directed Tunechi in the commercials for Samsung, spoke on how his crew were unconvinced at first if Tune would be able to act the scenes, as well as how he reminds him of an athlete:
“Everyone was like: ‘I hope he can do it.’ I was like: ‘He’s a rapper, that’s what they do, they remember lines.’ He nailed it the first time. I figured out pretty early that I didn’t need to over-explain the idea. Everything I said, he would always say: ‘Gotchu.’ Once he said ‘Gotchu,’ it meant stop talking. I kind of got used to that.”
“I do a lot of commercials with athletes. Athletes want a coach to say: ‘Don’t do this, do this. Go there,’ as opposed to: ‘This is the mise-en-scene. This is the beat behind it.’ They don’t really want to know. They want to know exactly what they’re supposed to do and where they’re supposed to go, and they want to please. I felt like Lil Wayne was a little bit that way, too. He reacted more like an athlete. I guess he’s a terribly good tennis player and he’s a very good skater, so I think he has that athletic mind.”
Eif Rivera, who directed Bumbu’s “GOAT” advertisement starring Wayne, also said something similar to Aselton:
“You may think he isn’t listening or he’s in his own little world not even looking your direction, but Wayne is very aware of everything around him. He’s a very intelligent, focused individual. Brett said: ‘He should be sitting up because it looks like he just kind of doesn’t give a shit.’ And I’m like: ‘Brett, that’s Wayne. That’s how Wayne is. Let him do his thing.’ The guy’s a superstar. He’s been doing it so long he knows how to make it his own, but also stay within the guidelines of what we’re trying to accomplish.”
