The Treat: Jordan Peele

0:00KCRW sponsors include Netflix presenting Remarkably Bright Creatures, now nominated for three Emmy Awards, including Outstanding Movie. Starring Emmy Award-nominated lead actress Sally Field, Screen Rant hails Remarkably Bright Creatures, a stunning, emotionally resonant film. Welcome to The Treat. I'm Elvis Mitchell. It wasn't enough that Jordan Peele co-created, acted, and wrote one of the most insightful comedy shows of all time, Key and Peele. He's also a writer and director whose work includes Us, Nope, and his Oscar-winning directorial debut, Get Out. He uses his work to bend genre and view race through the prism of shock, comedy, and horror.

0:43For The Treat, he talks about a film that also accomplishes all those things. I am Jordan Peele, and this is The Treat.

0:57When I was coming up with the inspiration for Nope, I became obsessed with Tornado videos online. And Wizard of Oz through Tornado videos. And King Kong, the original.

1:26I'd like to talk about King Kong for a moment because the original film is a true, true spectacle. The work that was put into this film was absolutely on a different level, even by today's standards. I can't imagine sort of recreating the efforts of this film. Every shot is a visual masterpiece, special effects, and different techniques used, and just enormous. What are you going to do? I build a raft to float him to the ship. Why, the whole world will pay to see this. No chains will ever hold that. We'll give him more than chains. He's always been king of his world, but we'll teach him fear. We're millionaires, boys.

2:12I'll share it with all of you. Why, in a few months, it'll be up in lights on Broadway. Kong! The eighth wonder of the world! And what I was most inspired by about this film that was powering my desire to shoot big and to go big was the film is marred by these really racist interpretations of these tribal folk.

2:49Holy mackerel, what a show. Hey, Skipper, come here and get a load of this. Ever seen anything like that before in your life?

3:02My art is obsessed with the absolute horror that is, you know, how this country has dealt with people and us. and black people and people of color and race in general. I don't understand it, and I'm always going to be trying to uncover something, even if my films aren't about race directly, you know. It's like, how do you take race out of the country? What is it anyhow? I hear it's a kind of a gorilla. Gee, we got enough of them in New York. We know what's up. This is not new. But the way the spectacleization of black people was connected to the exploitation and the erasure of the real black experience became the underlying motive.

4:06And so King Kong, in a way, is the spirit animal of noble.

4:23Oscar winner Jordan Peele on the power of the 1933 fantasy horror film King Kong. The Treat is produced by Rebecca Mooney and mixed by Katie Gilchrist. I'm Elvis Mitchell. It's The Treat.

4:53KCRW sponsors include Netflix, presenting Remarkably Bright Creatures. Now nominated for three Emmy Awards, including Outstanding Movie. Starring Emmy Award-nominated lead actress Sally Field, Screen Rant hails Remarkably Bright Creatures, a stunning, emotionally resonant film.