"Art heals": Colman Domingo on why nurturing the incarcerated is in everybody's best interest

Oscar-nominated actor Colman Domingo is actively challenging men to be more tender through his new film “Sing Sing,” which follows a group of incarcerated men as they put on a theater production from the inside.

“The thing that's been very important to me is to deconstruct and smash tropes about masculinity, especially toxic masculinity — these things that have been held up in our communities and told us who we have to be in order to survive,” Domingo shared with me on "Salon Talks." Expectations to hold in emotions have been to "the demise of a lot of our mental health," Domingo added, because "brothers don't know that they can actually feel and be OK with that.” 

Talking to Domingo, who is known for “Rustin, “Euphoria” and “The Color Purple,” struck a nerve inside of me. I know how damaging the illusion of pretending to be the toughest guy in the world can be. As a boy who was raised in a family full of gangsters, I have countless stories of concealing tears at funerals, pretending that vulnerability doesn't exist, and acting like my father's drug use wasn't destroying me – all while wearing a big, fake smile.

A24's “Sing Sing,” in theaters now, features a cast of primarily non-actors who completed the Rehabilitation Through the Arts program while incarcerated. In addition to bringing humanity to those who are incarcerated and seeing them as full people, the film opens up a conversation for men about feelings and healing.

“There's a moment at the end of our film when my co-star embraces me in the biggest bear hug. I literally cry on his shoulders.” Domingo explained. “To see images like that I think is extremely important and potent right now.” 

Watch my "Salon Talks" episode with Colman Domingo on YouTube or read our conversation below to hear more about his early dreams of being a journalist, balancing creative work as a multi-hyphenate artist, and the new Netflix comedy he's working on with Tina Fey.

The following conversation has been lightly edited for clarity and length. 

“Sing Sing” feels like it's going to be one of the most important films this year. Can you introduce us to the film?

“Sing Sing” is a film that's about this Rehabilitation Through the Arts program at Sing Sing Prison. And it's a program that was started just doing plays and getting these inmates in touch with their feelings, finding different paths for healing and rehabilitation. And so far it's worked in an extraordinary way so much to the fact that there is a less than 3% recidivism rate amongst people who've gone through the program compared to 60% nationwide. It's a film that we created with my co-stars as well, my director and writer-producers. A good 90% of our cast are formerly incarcerated men who went through the program, and we created this and shot it in 18 days in upstate New York in decommissioned prisons. The intention is to show the human beings on their inside as they're doing the work to better themselves in the world and using arts as that parachute that will save them.

Tell us about your involvement. Someone just dropped this script on your desk?

There was no script.

Wow.

Nobody dropped anything. What happened was Greg Kwedar and Clint Bentley, my co-writers and director, they had an idea. They've been working as teaching artists in Sing Sing for years, and they really thought as they got to know these men, they really wanted to tell their story in some way, shape or form, and they kept trying to figure out what the story was. For a good six years they were trying different drafts of it and then [would] put it away. Then this idea came back up again. Greg Kwedar, my director, he wrote a treatment. He spent about a good half hour on it, and at the end of it, he wrote my name down. He said, "I think it'd be great to have Coleman involved in this and see if he would help us figure out what this is."

Through circumstances I met them and they just seemed very earnest. And you almost feel like, "Is that real? Are you really, really that true in the way you want to tell other people's stories and make sure that their stories are cared for?" And they were, and I thought, "I'd like to see what this is. Do you have a script?" They said, "No, we don't have a script, but here's an article from Esquire Magazine that was written a few years ago about this program." I said, "Great, send it to me." I read the article and I thought it was fantastic, and I thought, "Well, these stories are fantastic. If we can tell a simple story about these men and how they do this work, basically it becomes a story about brotherhood more than anything. It becomes less of a prison drama. The container is a prison, but it's about human beings inside of it."

So we started to create this thing together. We started to get on Zooms with my castmate, Clarence "Divine Eye" Maclin and we started to talk about what we were interested in as Black men, talking about this work and what moves us and what images we want to see. And our writer and director would go back and write and do the work and come back and present it to us, and we'd read it and we realized, "Oh, we have a script." By the time we had a script, then they wanted time [to shoot the film], and I was like, "I don't know when we could do this. I'm busy. I have things going on right now."

I could just see the look in their eyes, and everybody was so fired up by it believing that this is a story, and it was oppression, and we have to do it now. And so I took that in. I was doing “The Color Purple” and I was doing pickups for my movie “Rustin” and I thought, "Well, I have 18 days in between." And my director, Greg Kwedar said, "We'll take them." I was like, "Wait, we can't do this movie in 18 days,” especially during COVID, it all felt so wild. And I thought, "If you believe we can do it, I think we can get it done."

Sometimes you create the best art when there’s a project that’s pulling at you, but you know you don’t have the bandwidth to do it.

You don't have the bandwidth, but there’s something that's pulling on you like, "I feel like I have to take care of this story. I don't have time, but I want to do it right." Because more than anything, I love to research and take my time. I'm a very patient person when it comes to work and process, but this felt like, "OK, I have to get outside of my comfort zone and make the work happen." It felt like a great, divine opportunity.

You took us in a time capsule with “Rustin,” your role as Ali Muhammad in "Euphoria" sent all kinds of people to rehab, best sponsor ever. Tell our viewers about Divine G from “Sing Sing.”

Divine G is based on a real man, John "Divine G" Whitfield. He's a good guy. A good guy who was wrongly accused of a crime and incarcerated for 25 years. While he was on the inside, he really attached himself to programs that were about wellness and healing and art. He wrote plays and books and was an actor and a director, all that. He was one of the founding members of the RTA program. He was really just doing good work. 

He was also advocating for other inmates on the inside, for their parole board hearings or you name it, because he was, as he says, a jailhouse lawyer. He was always in the law library learning everything he could.

When I started to understand that this is a man who believed that the system could actually work by doing the work as a lawyer, but the system did not work for him, but he still had hope and faith in the system, I felt like I understood everything I needed to know about this guy. I thought, "Here's somebody who's incredibly still hopeful and has wisdom upon wisdom." As I get to know him even moreso now, I think he's a very wise guy and he's really kind. His spirit didn't diminish while he was on the inside in many ways as it could have with any of these other inmates, but it actually thrived because he found purpose and drive and healing. So that's John Divine G.

What are some of the things you learned about your castmates while working on the film?

How can I say this? You’re put together with your cast, everyone has their experience from whatever way, and you establish a brain trust with each other. You establish this baseline of getting to know each other and just knowing their lived experience. I take people as they are, I'm not going to look at somebody as an anthropological study and be like, "Tell me about this and how it is to be incarcerated." I'm just not that person.

I will sit and have a conversation with you and download information as you tell me who you are, tell me what you want me to know about you and vice versa. We just really got to know each other, which is beautiful. Then what they didn't know when it comes to crafting a film, I was able to share. And what I didn't know about, I'm trying to think of some specifics, like, oh, when I had to drop down in the yard when the bell rang, you have to put your whole body down so you don't look like a threat at all. You have to be limp. Learning simple things like that because that's somebody who had the lived experience and they know exactly what you need to do to make sure that you're not a threat.

There's this powerful scene where your character, Divine, goes in front of the parole board and is just disrespected and crushed. There are so many people in the system who go to those meetings and are denied. What do you hope people watching this scene — whether they’re familiar with parole or not —  to walk away with?

I don't know about that, to be honest. The parole board officer was played by Sharon Washington, who is a phenomenal New York actress, and there was a reason why we cast her in particular because that role was open. It could have been a male, probably a white male, and I thought what's more interesting is for it to be a Black woman, because [of] the pressures on a Black woman to be even more by the book. And I think the moment you see her, you think, "Oh, maybe there's going to be some grace given because a sister [is] looking at this brother."

A brother who's performing well.

He's doing well, but also she has to discern all the information that she has. That's why I'm like, "She's just going by the facts more than anything rather than the emotion." She's questioning everything as she should.

I don't know what to say when it comes to people. Everyone's going to be in a situation where something will work out or not work out, but it's about how do you recover from it. In the film, in what we did in 100 minutes was showing [Divine G] did have frustration, you have heartbreak, you have heartache, you could just fall apart and go to darkness. Or you have a choice, you go even further, you keep building and keep trying to find hope because that's also part of your humanity and your lifeline. That's what I know Divine G Whitfield did.

I believe it's going to be one of the most powerful films this year because it is optimistic, but in a very, very real way. There's so much humanity that you are stripped of when you go behind those walls, and I think you do a great job of showing life.

I think the point is that we want to take these brothers as we meet them as human beings, not as a number or not about the thing that got them in there, but now you get to know them, who they are, what they're seeking, what they're trying to do now, and how they're trying to transform. I think that's what the power of our film is. Showing people [as] actually who they are.

What do you look for emotionally in a script? You're so good in every film. Do you have a cheat code for selecting the best films?

I think I have to be committed to something that I think I have questions about. I like complicated characters and characters you can't discern very quickly. Whether it's Rustin, or X in “Zola,” it's the same thing where I'm like, "I'm not exactly sure how to play this person, but I want to find what their wants and needs are and what happens when they don't get it." If it's well-written, first of all, I'm on board. It's got to be well-written. And it's got to be complicated. And if it's not complicated, I want to dig in there and get underneath the hood and find out.

With “The Color Purple,” [Domingo’s character is] written as the villain. He's an abuser in many ways. My job was to love him and to find out what made him the way he is, to unpack his psyche in many ways. And I think that's a great journey. I love anything where I'm like, "I have to take a journey to actually find grace for this character [that] I'm about to play, so I can love him." For me, it's like that human thing that I get to do. That's what I'm attracted to.

Everyone's human. Even the most f***ed up people.

Exactly. And everyone's got a story. And even if they're f***ed up, I'm like, "Who's not f***ed up?" You know what I mean? But you also have to do the work to just make them human, not make them a caricature or just look at the way they're viewed from the outside. Go on the inside and see their journey. That's what I like to do, I like to do that deep dive. I think maybe that's the barometer for a good script for me. And it could be comedy, it could be drama, it could be a hero, it could be a villain.

What did you learn about the justice system while working on this film?

The thing I did learn when working at a decommissioned prison that was only decommissioned two weeks before, was that the spaces where they house humans are not meant for humans. That's what I learned. 

If it's about rehabilitation, really doing the work, being a place of corrections in some way, it didn't feel like it's set up in that way. You know what I mean? How do we want to do the work [so] that we don't railroad the same system of people coming [out] and going back in? How do we make a change? I feel like for me, I was like, "Many things need to change. There's a myriad of things that needs to change." But first we’ve got to get on board with what is true rehabilitation and doing the work.

My best friends, some of my family members, they've been incarcerated for 16, 17 years. One just came home, but some are still sitting. And I was just thinking about how easy it is for a lot of us to forget our friends and families when they get hit with time like that.

They largely get forgotten about.

I think it's dangerous.

It is, because that doesn't help our communities, doesn't help our families. One of my castmates, Clarence, said in a couple Q&As, "Just imagine if you pour more love and hope into somebody and see what can flower there, what can become of them." And I think in this film that's what you see these Black and brown men did for themselves. The system was set up to do what it's going to do, but they took responsibility and [said], "No, we're going to belong to this art because we found that it works and it helps us do the thing that we need done to work on past trauma."

It's like doing trauma therapy with theater as well, you know what I mean? It's also like resurrecting something new in you and helping you move through and move past things so you can actually become better. They've decided to hold each other responsible to this work, and that's where that starts. It is a personal thing. That's another thing I've learned. I'm like, "Yeah, you can't depend on the system to do anything." But I've never believed that just as an artist, I have to build from within and that's where you gain your power.

It does seem like society may be moving in a better direction when it comes to the conversation around reentry. Do you feel like we're moving to a better space, where there's more opportunity?

I hope that films like this help make a difference. I think the more that we all understand that we need society to help, it is not just about a small few, it affects every single one of us actually. That's the thing I've also learned, when somebody believes they don't know anybody incarcerated, it has nothing to do with them – no, it has everything to do with them. It's a part of our society and we have to really find [better] ways of reentry and helping them do the work.

You touched on the healing power of art. Could you speak to that?

The healing power of art, that's something . . . if I don't know anything, I know that art heals. Maybe that's why I jumped on board with this whole idea of [this film] because I was like, "Oh, they have a program that helps people do the real deep work that I know works for me." I've been a theater practitioner for over 30 years and I know the gifts that it's given me: holding my head up in a different way, understanding I have something to say and knowing how to articulate that, knowing that I can be as completely vulnerable as possible and there's no judgment as well. All that possibility is exceptional and we need more of that.

And I'll say this, you didn't even ask this yet, but I think that the thing that's been very important to me is to deconstruct and smash tropes about masculinity, especially toxic masculinity. These things that have been held up in our communities and told us who we have to be in order to survive. It's been, of course, to the demise of a lot of our mental health because brothers don't know that they can actually feel and be okay with that.

And it has nothing to do with sexuality, it's just about you honoring your feelings. And understanding when you're hurt or when you feel a certain way, that actually makes you a whole human being. When there's images of tenderness, that is very important in the film, about looking at brothers holding another brother's hand and all it is holding, and just saying, "I got you, brother." There's a moment at the end of our film when my co-star embraces me in the biggest bear hug and I literally cry on his shoulders. To see images like that I think is extremely important and potent right now. I think we need more of those to show how we can be vulnerable and we can unpack this stuff and not be attached to the stuff, the idea of what we're supposed to be as Black and brown men.

Coming from West Philly, were you into the arts as a kid? I know you got into acting when you were in college.

No, I wasn't into the arts. I was a nerd. I was in student newspaper and stuff like that. I was not artistic at all. I think maybe I was an observer. That was the greatest gift that I received when I was in school.

But the images of you pop-locking on the internet . . .

Oh, I pop-lock now. I wasn't pop-locking in high school or nothing. I wasn't invited to the parties or nothing like that. I was an observer. I feel like that's maybe that's why I do everything that I do because I've been watching people for a long time, so I know how to play people because I've been watching them.

Beyond acting you write and direct, what is your creative life like? How do you find space and time to be able to balance these different forms of expression?

I like always switching hats. The moment I'm acting in something, I'm always preparing to direct something or to write something. I don't know why, it just works for me. I feel like one thing does help support another. You're like, "Wow, I've never thought about that story. Let me go write that thing." People always know if they come and knock on my dressing room door, my trailer door, what am I doing? I'm usually writing something there. I'm writing a screenplay or play or a new idea for something. I'm always using some creative space, which is why even when I take a vacation, people are like, "Do you just put your computer away?" I'm like, "No, because my computer I need to create with."

That's a vacation too though.

I can sit on a beach or something, but I need to be writing a play.

I heard you're playing Joe Jackson next, you ready for that?

I did it already. I shot it, it's in the can. It's being edited right now. I think the world will be ready for it. I think it's going to be cool.

What can we expect from you next?

I'm doing this series with Tina Fey and Steve Carell called “The Four Seasons.” I get to flex my comedy chops a little bit. And then, the Michael movie will be out in April next year and “The Madness” will be coming out this fall. “The Madness” is a series on Netflix where I play a CNN analyst who gets wrongly accused of a crime and then I have to go through different sects of society to find out what's going on.

When you play the heavy stuff versus playing in a comedy, do you take that heavy stuff home?

No, I don't take it. There's all this thought of people taking this stuff with you. And I'm like, "No, you have to have a process." I feel like I know how, when we call cut, to take care of myself. There are times when I'm working, I stay closer to the world of the film or the series. I may have dinner with my castmates and I may not fly home a lot or something like that, I'll stay close, but I know how to let that stuff go.

You need it for your mental health. Especially going to these deep dark places that I'm expected to, whether it's “Fear of the Walking Dead” or “The Color Purple,” “Zola.” Usually I'll get an apartment that has a lot of light and I'll buy myself flowers and I'll always take myself for a good steak dinner somewhere. I have to take care of myself so I can go back in the next day and do the deep dive of the deep work.