PRODUCTION NOTES

A Note from the Director

The seed of Small Axe was sown 11 years ago, soon after my first film, Hunger. Initially, I had conceived of it as a TV series, but as it developed, I realized these stories had to stand alone as original films yet at the same time be part of a collective. After all, Small Axe refers to an African proverb that means together we are strong. The anthology, anchored in the West Indian experience in London, is a celebration of all that that community has succeeded in achieving against the odds. To me, it is a love letter to Black resilience, triumph, hope, music, joy and love as well as to friendship and family. Oh, and let’s not forget about food too!

I recall each of these stories being told to me either by my parents, my aunt, and by experiencing racial discrimination myself growing up in the 70s and 80s. These are all our stories. I feel personally touched by each and every one of them. My five senses were awoken writing with Courttia Newland and Alastair Siddons. Images, smells, textures and old customs came flooding back.

All five films take place between the late 60s and mid 80s. They are just as much a comment on the present moment as they were then. Although they are about the past, they are very much concerned with the present. A commentary on where we were, where we are and where we want to go.

When the Cannes Film Festival selected Mangrove and Lovers Rock earlier this year, I dedicated both to George Floyd and all the other Black people that have been murdered, seen or unseen, because of who they are in the US, UK and elsewhere. As the proverb goes, “If you are the big tree, we are the small axe." Black Lives Matter.

Steve McQueen

PRODUCTION INFORMATION

Alex Wheatle is part of the Small Axe anthology series, which comprises five original films by Academy Award, BAFTA, and Golden Globe-winning filmmaker Steve McQueen (Hunger, Shame, 12 Years A Slave, Widows). Set from the late 1960s to the mid-1980s, the films each tell a different story involving London's West Indian community, whose lives have been shaped by their own force of will, despite rampant racism and discrimination. Even though this collection of films is set some decades ago, the stories are as vital and timely today as they were for the West Indian community in London at the time. Small Axe is a celebration of Black joy, beauty, love, friendship, family, music and even food; each one, in its own unique way, conveys hard-won successes, bringing hope and optimism for 2020.

Alex Wheatle follows the true story of award-winning writer, Alex Wheatle (Sheyi Cole), from a young boy through his early adult years. Having spent his childhood in a mostly white institutional care home with no love or family, he finally finds not only a sense of community for the first time in Brixton, but his identity and ability to grow his passion for music and DJ’ing. When he is thrown in prison during the Brixton Uprising of 1981, he confronts his past and finds a path to healing. Sheyi Cole stars opposite Jonathan Jules and Robbie Gee (Snatch, Paddington 2). Steve McQueen for Lammas Park and Tracey Scoffield and David Tanner of Turbine Studios executive produce along with Lucy Richer for BBC One and Rose Garnett for BBC Film. Amazon Studios co-produces in the US. The series is distributed internationally by BBC Studios. The production team includes director of photography Shabier Kirchner (Bull, Skate Kitchen), production designer Helen Scott (A Very English Scandal, Fish Tank), Academy Award-winning costume designer Jacqueline Durran (Little Women, 1917, Darkest Hour), hair and makeup designer Jojo Williams (Yardie, Broadchurch) and co-editors, Academy Award-winning editor Chris Dickens (Slumdog Millionaire, Les Miserables) and Steve McQueen. Alex Wheatle was co-written by Alastair Siddons (Tomb Raider) and Steve McQueen.

ABOUT THE PRODUCTION

Award winning novelist, Alex Wheatle, started his journey on Small Axe in the writers’ room. Little did he or Steve McQueen know that Alex’s story would become the fourth installment of the collection of five standalone films.

McQueen’s co-writer, Alastair Siddons, explains, “Alex is a world class novelist in his own right, but the Brixton Bard is also a very generous, humble and funny human being. I loved him as soon as I met him in the writer's room, where his wealth of knowledge and experience as well as his fantastic kung fu dancing played a huge role in shaping all of the films we were working on. I'll never forget the day he shared his own life story, about growing up in care. But when Alex shared his unbelievably callous Social Services file, it broke all of our hearts. Steve very quickly decided that Alex Wheatle was to become part of the Small Axe series, and I was genuinely thrilled to be given the opportunity to co-write the script with Steve.”

McQueen knew soon into the process that Alex Wheatle was an indispensable story in the series.

He says, “Early on in our writer’s room, Alex touched upon his past. It soon became apparent to me that his story had to be a feature film.”

Siddons goes on, “I spent many mornings talking to Alex, laughing and crying about his extraordinary childhood and formative years. What soon emerged was the story of a man who, against all odds, transcends real suffering to find his own path toward a spiritual and political awakening into Black consciousness. Luckily for me, many of Alex's brilliant novels are semi-autobiographical, and proved a major resource in writing the script.”

McQueen continues, “Working on the script with Alastair was as much about structure as it was about the growth of Alex Wheatle as a character. Portraying his evolution was more than a task for both us but the fact that Alex was there at hand to guide us at any stage was a luxury. There were many things and situations for Alex that were unlocked that hadn’t come to the surface for some time and with retrospect he saw in a new light.”

Finding lead actor, Sheyi Cole, to play the complex titular role proved easy due to Cole’s natural sense of character.

Says McQueen, “Sheyi came into the audition room with two guns blazing. His nuances and understanding of Alex Wheatle were so on point. For such a young man he had so much depth.”

Executive producer Tracey Scoffield adds, “When Sheyi came to meet Steve with Gary Davy our casting director, we knew he was at drama school and would have to ask for a special dispensation to be in the film. And he knew that the day after we wrapped, having been immersed in Alex’s world of the early 80’s with the Brixton Uprising and prison life, he would be back at college and flung into the world of 17th century Restoration Drama.”

Belonging is a recurring theme in Alex Wheatle, as Alex’s overwhelmed Jamaican father gives him up at the age of three. Alex certainly does not have any sense of belonging at the Shirley Oaks children’s home, where he and other youngsters suffer physical and emotional abuse. The film shows Alex’s harrowing time at the predominately white home and his eventual arrival at a social services hostel in Brixton as a teenager. It is in Brixton that he develops a sense of identity and community with other Black youths.

Before Alex goes on to become the award-winning novelist he is today with an MBE from the Queen for his services to literature, he finds himself through music. At sixteen years old, under his DJ name, Yardman Irie, Alex co-founds the Crucial Rocker sound system and writes lyrics about everyday life in Brixton, soon feeling a sense of home and camaraderie, thanks to his friend Dennis Isaacs (Jonathan Jules) and his burgeoning music career. However, when thirteen young Black Britons aged 14 to 22 are killed in the now infamous New Cross Fire (also known as the Deptford fire), which the community believe is racially motivated, Alex is devastated.

The New Cross Fire wasn’t the only factor that led to the Brixton Uprising. High unemployment rates among young Black men also contributed to growing tensions as did the community’s worsening relationship with police due to constant harassment and an ever-increasing Stop and Search policy, allowing officers to frisk and question anyone they deemed suspicious.

Tensions rise when the police fail to make any arrests in the case, leading to the Brixton Uprising (aka the Brixton Riots) three months later in April 1981. Alongside his friends, Alex participates in the protests and is arrested and ultimately imprisoned for four months.

Wheatle says seeing McQueen’s recreation of the Uprising was frighteningly accurate.

“I was observing those scenes in the director’s tent, and as I was watching the monitor it all brought it back right home for me,” says Wheatle, who is now a husband and father. “Not just the excitement, but the fear as well. The panic, the pounding heart. That was all captured so beautifully.”

Conveying how frustrated members of the Black community had become was also crucial.

“And the rage as well,” Wheatle says. “That was very important for Steve to capture. And he caught that beautifully, I felt, because there was a lot of rage, a lot of anger. People sometimes forget that this was so shortly after what happened in Deptford, where 13 young Black people passed away and died – you know, a terrible fire – that has never really been resolved.”

In prison, Alex shares a cell with the erudite and more mature Simeon (Robbie Gee, Paddington 2). At first, the two are at odds with the young and brash Alex finding fault with Simeon’s quirks. Over time, the cellmates develop a mentor/mentee relationship and Simeon teaches Alex the importance of literacy, education and self-awareness. Under Simeon’s guidance, Alex begins reading everything from The Black Jacobins by C.L.R. James to Homer.

“As a society, we’re not used to seeing the likes of Simeon, or have his views, have his advice,” says Wheatle. “We’re not used to seeing strong Black men who can advise the young and help them along and introduce them to their culture.”

Robbie Gee, who plays Simeon, concurs. “That I’ve had the opportunity now to recreate something that was based on somebody real, is beautiful,” he says. “I’d loved to have known what the guy was about. I tried to find as much history about him. I read up on him in books and articles.”

Just as Simeon helped Wheatle, who went on to pen novels such as Brixton Rock and Straight Out of Crongton, Wheatle assisted Cole in shaping an authentic portrayal.

“The small nuances are what make characters,” Cole says. “Give them that depth and that detail that you really need to know to bring something to life.”

Cole says Wheatle even taught him how to do a Jamaican-inspired dance called skanking.

“It was definitely a bonding part,” Wheatle says. “Sheyi’s got the moves. He’s got the confidence. I wouldn’t say I had the swagger at all, but he at least got my sensibilities, if you like. That kind of fresh guy coming to Brixton and finding everything very exciting. Sheyi nailed that. I’m honored that he captured that and that he took time to actually observe and ask me questions about my favorite artists, and how I moved, how I danced.”

Cole goes on to explain, “There was a lot of preparation to play Alex. Months and months of prep, from the accent to the physicality and also just dipping into the world of 1970s England as a Black Caribbean man. And thinking how they lived, how they felt being in England at that time.”

Dialects of the Caribbean

The range of accents of the characters in this story authentically illustrates how West Indians were defined as one assimilated group by the British, but in fact their culture, language and identity vary. Accurately capturing the characters’ distinct West Indian accents mattered a great deal.

Dialect coach Hazel Holder was an essential part of ensuring this authenticity in Small Axe.

McQueen says, “Hazel was fantastic. We couldn’t have done this series without her. Her authenticity and attention to detail was amazing … and sometimes drove me nuts. But for me it’s always been about the detail, so I thank her so much for it.”

He continues, “A Trinidadian accent is different from a Grenadian, which is different from a Jamaican. People might think the West Indies is one place, but it’s built up of many different islands with very different personalities.”

Wardrobe

Academy Award-winning costume designer Jacqueline Durran (Little Women, 1917, Darkest Hour) also informs Alex Wheatle’s character by showing how his wardrobe had to drastically improve when he moves from the children’s home to Brixton. Upon arriving at the hostel, his new friend Dennis wastes little time taking him to the shops and to a Black barbershop to teach Alex what it means to be young and Black in Brixton. He even teaches Alex how to improve his gait so that it too has more swagger. The scenes also bring much levity.

“That’s how I got through those traumatic days, and there were incredibly hard times for me to get through,” Wheatle says. “And sometimes the way you cope with that, you build some kind of coping mechanism, and that was humor. There had to be humor, otherwise I don’t think I’d be sitting here today. If it was all grim, all bleak, I really don’t think I would have become a

writer. I survived through those funny episodes, if you like, of me coming to Brixton. And that really helped me abridge, obviously, my traumatic early childhood. So that helped me survive in a way.”

Durran also worked closely with Wheatle in recreating his story. “The first step in working on the costumes was to meet Alex and find out as much as I could about his world and his style. He has an amazing memory and talked me through his story in music and clothes. Tying this together with the script, we set about looking for the costumes. Everything that Alex wore was vintage – some hired, and some bought – it was really important to be as accurate as possible as we were representing someone’s personal story,” Durran explains. “One of the tricky things was the length of time that passed in the script – from young childhood to adulthood – if he changed every time, when we saw him it would seem like he had an enormous wardrobe, so Steve and I made the decision to compact the story visually into three stages – three looks that showed how Alex’s style transformed as he settled into Brixton in the late 70s.”

For Jonathan Jules, who plays Alex’s friend Dennis, every leather coat, beret and Brixton market loafer helped tell the story of who Alex and Dennis were in that space and time.

“Every day when you’re on set, and you have the supporting artists in their costumes and the set is designed like you’re in the 80s, you get to feel something that you can’t really explain,” Jules says. “And it’s like, ‘OK, wow, this is what this scene’s about.’ This is our time now; our stories are getting told now. So, this is not only for me, but for my grandparents, for my mum, for my dad. It’s our time.” Shooting on Digital

To capture Alex becoming a man in and around Brixton market, cinematographer Shabier Kirchner and director Steve McQueen relied on a Sony Venice Cinema Camera.

“We decided to shoot Alex Wheatle digitally,” Kirchner says. “Actually, we shot it large format, Venice, which was a new format that was being introduced. Alex’s story was quite a personal story. But it had the backdrop of his community and the backdrop of his tribe of people, and we thought of sort of keeping those focal lengths, you know? The great thing with large format is you have your focal lengths.”

Kirchner says those focal lengths give the audience a stronger feeling of time and place.

“With a wider lens, you still have the depth of field and personal closeness than you would have on a regular 35mm sensor,” Kirchner adds. “But you feel a lot more of the world, the field of view is a lot larger without losing that depth. That was really, really great, and it was a story that, in certain areas, was a lot lighter and almost, you know, quite funny in certain areas. Alex and his posse, were so alive and had such great energy, we wanted to keep something a little bit more intimate.”

McQueen felt shooting digitally helped to capture a sense of growth genuine to the main character’s experience.

“Working with Shabier on Alex Wheatle was a joy. I felt like we needed to shoot digitally to keep up with our character quickly changing and evolving. This allowed us to shoot quicker and in spurts just as a young man would grow. We could react and grab and capture things to emulate his development. Shabier is just a very talented DP and in a way, he reflects Alex Wheatle. He is at the beginning of his career and finding his feet extremely quickly.”

Recreating confined spaces and early 80s Brixton

Many of the places Alex inhabits are cramped spaces. The small room at the social services hostel and the prison cell, for instance, personify how confined the young writer was figuratively and literally.

Production designer Helen Scott (A Very English Scandal) captures the confinement perfectly.

“This was probably the most epic of all our stories, moving fast through time and place, culminating with the Brixton uprising and Alex’s subsequent transformation,” Scott explains. “As usual, we did masses of visual research, which Steve could respond to and from which we could establish our themes.”

McQueen adds, “Helen had a mammoth task working with five different time periods in such a tight schedule. I don’t think I have to say anything more because once people see the films the evidence of her labor will be apparent. It is quite the achievement.”

Scott continues, “It felt important to shoot wide, living streets, but of course we couldn’t have control of them, nor could we afford to take modern Brixton back to 1980. It was very undeveloped back then and even the iconic places looked different from now. We did as much as we could there and did the rest in Deptford. I think there is enough range and people were really willing to help facilitate us. I suppose the emotional thread was the idea of an untethered young man living in a kind of chaos, and I felt free to clash colors and dis-arrange the furniture. After all, Alex was never comfortable or settled.”

Seeing his physical surroundings from his youth created a profound reaction in Wheatle, who visited set.

“The production value on this was incredible,” Wheatle says. “It was like I was walking back into time. I almost broke down on set, when I first saw the room that I stayed in, in the hostel. It all came home to me. The UB40 unemployment cards, the bed that was tilted, the paintings, the music, the flyers. It was so authentic, so real.” For Gee, who plays Alex’s cellmate, Simeon, all of his scenes were shot in the confines of a prison cell. Spatial awareness was key.

McQueen explains, “Working with Robbie and Sheyi in such a tight space had its challenges. So much needed to be said and done in that compressed environment. How were we going to shoot it? How were we going to make limitations within the space our freedom? How to capture these explosive performances from both these actors?”

“I was in a cell for the duration of each day, which can be very draining,” Gee says. “When we were doing some of the scenes, Steve gave me the freedom to just incorporate whatever I wanted and to use the space as I needed.”

Even at his most enraged, Alex is hurting, and those feelings come through in Cole’s performance, conveying a highly vulnerable inner struggle.

“As a Black community, all that we see on TV are stereotypes,” Cole says. “It’s nice to have something fresh. This is a story about a normal human being that has gone through his life and his journey and has come out on the bright side. It’s like the redemption and the journey, which is the most important thing.”

Wheatle says pursuing the character’s weaknesses makes the story stronger.

“It’s so rare for young Black men to be portrayed to be vulnerable,” Wheatle adds. “And that’s where I’ve got to applaud everyone involved in this production, especially Steve McQueen who committed himself to telling stories it’s very rare to see on screen. I remember watching Moonlight and we could see the vulnerability of a young Black man there. But on British TV screens, that vulnerability is so rare to be portrayed for a young Black man. So, it’s going to be something fresh and new for all the viewers out there.”

ALEX WHEATLE CAST LIST

Alex Wheatle Sheyi Cole

Simeon Robbie Gee

Dennis Isaacs Jonathan Jules

Valentine Golding (Valin) Elliot Edusah

Dawn Fumilayo Brown-Olateju

Cook Ashley McGuire

Alex Wheatle (8) Asad-Shareef Muhammad

Beverley Leah Walker

Cutlass Rankin Johann Myers

Rankin’s Dread Louis J. Rhone

Terry (11) Riley Burgin

Barber Dread Zakiyyah Deen

Badger Khali Best

Floyd Dexter Flanders

Jerry Xavien Russell

Mrs. Isaacs Cecilia Noble

Perry Ross Cahill

Lincoln Lennox Tuitt

Gloria Isaacs Shanelle Young

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ADDITIONAL SYNOPSES FOR THE SMALL AXE ANTHOLOGY COLLECTION

Mangrove centers on Frank Crichlow (Shaun Parkes), the owner of Notting Hill’s Caribbean restaurant, Mangrove, a lively community base for locals, intellectuals and activists. In a reign of racist terror, the local police raid Mangrove time after time, making Frank and the local community take to the streets in peaceful protest in 1970. When nine men and women, including Frank and leader of the British Black Panther Movement Altheia Jones-LeCointe (Letitia Wright), and activist Darcus Howe (Malachi Kirby), are wrongly arrested and charged with incitement to riot, a highly publicized trial ensues, leading to hard-fought win for those fighting against discrimination. Letitia Wright (Black Panther), Shaun Parkes (Lost in Space), and Malachi Kirby (Curfew) star alongside Rochenda Sandall (Line of Duty), Jack Lowden (The Long Song), Sam Spruell (Snow White and the Huntsmen), Gershwyn Eustache (The Gentleman), Nathaniel Martello-White (Collateral), Richie Campbell (Liar), Jumayn Hunter (Les Miserables), and Gary Beadle (Summer of Rockets). Mangrove was co-written by Alastair Siddons and Steve McQueen.

Lovers Rock tells a fictional story of young love at a Blues party in 1980. The film is an ode to the romantic reggae genre called "Lovers Rock” and to the Black youth who found freedom and love in its sound in London house parties, when they were unwelcome in white nightclubs. Amarah-Jae St. Aubyn makes her screen debut opposite the BAFTAs 2020 Rising Star award recipient Micheal Ward (Top Boy). Shaniqua Okwok (Boys), Kedar Williams-Stirling (Sex Education), Ellis George (Dr Who), Alexander James-Blake (Top Boy), and Kadeem Ramsay (Blue Story) also star, as well as Francis Lovehall and Daniel Francis-Swaby who make their screen debuts. Lovers Rock was co-written by Courttia Newland and Steve McQueen.

Red, White and Blue tells the true story of Leroy Logan, a young forensic scientist with a yearning to do more than his solitary laboratory work. Soon after he sees his father assaulted by two policemen, he applies to become a police officer; an ambition borne from the hope of wanting to change racist attitudes from within. First, Leroy has to face the consequences of his father’s disapproval, then the blatant racism he finds in his new role as a despised yet exemplary Constable in the Metropolitan Police Force. John Boyega (Star Wars: The Force Awakens) and Steve Toussaint (Prince of Persia) star with newcomers Tyrone Huntley, Nathan Vidal and Jaden Oshenye. Red, White and Blue was co-written by Courttia Newland and Steve McQueen.

Education is the coming of age story of 12-year-old Kingsley, a boy with a fascination for astronauts and rockets. When Kingsley is called to the Headmaster’s office for disruptive behavior in class, he is shocked to discover his transfer to a school for those with “special needs.” Distracted by working two jobs, his parents are unaware of what was an unofficial segregation policy at play, preventing many Black children from having the education they deserve until a group of West Indian women take matters into their own hands. Newcomer Kenyah Sandy stars opposite Sharlene Whyte (We Hunt Together, Casualty), Daniel Francis (Once Upon A Time, Homefront), Tamara Lawrance (The Long Song, Kindred) and Josette Simon (Wonder Woman, Silent Witness, Law & Order: UK). Education was co-written by Alastair Siddons and Steve McQueen.