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May 2004
Soul Plane: An Interview with Snoop Dogg

By Wilson Morales

Soul Plane: An Interview with Snoop Dogg

If there's any rapper who is working hard to gain credibility in this Hollywood game, it's Snoop Dogg. Sure, he's been seen on the big screen these few years and yes, he's even had his own film, but the films were either small or his part was. Lately, Snoop is making a splash on the films he's in. He's already conquered the music industry as well as unsanctioned areas but with the film business, he's taking it one step at a time until he gets Tom Cruise money. Earlier this year, he played Huggy Bear in "Starsky and Hutch" and now he gets to play the part of a pilot in the hilarious new comedy, "Soul Plane". Snoop recently spoke to blackfilm.com at the Four Seasons in Los Angeles while promoting and gave us his take on his character, the music industry, and the vibe on this movie.


What motivated you to take this film?

SD: Jesse is a friend of mine. I respect him. I love his work. This is his first movie in Hollywood and I wanted to make a splash for him. I wanted to get in on it cause I know he's going to be something special in Hollywood.


I heard that you wanted specifically to be the pilot in this film?

SD: Yeah, why not. Fly the friendly skies with DOGGY


Folks are still commenting about your performance on Saturday Night Live and how it was one of the best shows this year.

SD: Thank You. I appreciate it. I thank SNL for giving me the opportunity to be the host. I'm look at for the musical guest slot. For them to give my people the respect of having me host, I appreciate it. I'm glad I made everyone happy.


Besides being funny, you were able to show some acting muscles you haven't shown before?

SD: Yeah, it was range. I came in the room and put it out there like that. That's the good thing about Saturday Night Live. You can showcase more than one style because they are so funny and so open to whatever you are trying to do.


With so many things that you are currently doing, what do you do on your offtime?

SD: Listen to old school music, watch old movies, play video games, hang out with kids, and try to get my sons tight with football, cause that's my dream; try to have my sons make something of themselves and know the fun of sports and academics at the same time.


So many kids look up to you. What were you like as a kid? Did you get into trouble and grounded a lot?

SD: I was hardheaded, bad, and always got whipped. Me and my cousin probably got a thousand whoopins. One time, me and my cousin painted our white house with mud, and when my mother came home, she laid us by bed side by side and beat our asses.


How do you feel when you are reading the scripts that come to you, you find that your role is getting bigger and bigger. That seems to be the case with the last few films you have done.

SD: I think that Hollywood is starting to appreciate Snoop Dogg. They see that by putting me in the movie with one scene, people are leaving the theater wanting more of me. I have no control over that. They screen the movie, and when they me on screen, they clap and when the next man comes on screen, they don't. So they are starting to figure that I need more screen time cause I can deliver.


Speaking of screen time, do you ever want to produce or direct a film where you can control what goes out?

SD: Oh definitely, but I really want to master this acting thing first. That's what I have always been good at. I'm trying to take it one step at a time. When I started as a rapper with Dr.Dre, my thing was to be the dopest rapper in the game, and once I mastered that, it was to become the best guy in the world cause it's called "show business". I had the show but I didn't have the business and now I've mastered them both. Now I'm trying to take this acting thing the way I did this music thing. Once I get that locked, then the producing and directing thing will fall in place.


In terms of acting, are you going for roles or is your agent calling you up for parts?

SD: Well, sometimes we'll have a movie script sent to us. Somebody may have me in mind to play a character, andmy agents will go out and search for a role for me. As of now, I ain't trying to search for nothing. I want to tell them want I to do. They are going to give it to me or they will not. They know what time it is. They know I can deliver. I will become the black "Tom Cruise". Cruise doesn't sit back and ask. He just tells the motherfucker what he wants and they get it done.


Did you have a favorite line in the film?

SD: My favorite scene was when me and Method Man was sitting up front and smoking and we had the mic listening to our conservation and I said that my baby mamma was trying to get me for some money and I said, "If I just fly this plane into a motherfucker hill right now, she won't get nothing, and just drop the plane." That was live for me cause I would have really done that.


So do you think that when you are flying on a plane, they might ask you to come to the cockpit and hang out?

SD: I fly private planes, O.G, and I don't want to be in the cockpit. Me and the pilot have a great understanding. We trying to get home.


With all the movies that you are acting in, when I can pick your CD?

SD: My music? Don't trip. We have the 213 coming out in August. Me, Warren G, and Nate (Dogg). We decided to put our group back together. That's we started from. It's a hot record. It's super hot. It's going to put the west coast back where it's supposed to be.


What do you think about the state of the music industry, specifically rap music?

SD: I think that it's not fair to the west coast. The way the business treats us, especially East coast radio, we don't get no airplay on the East coast, but East coast artists get kinds of play on the West coast. We are just perceived totally different. They are always stealing our style, our slang, stealing our looks, stealing everything about us, and then getting paid off it, and we don't anything and get pushed out the door. It's like this on the West coast, "If you ain't with Dr.Dre and Snoop Dogg, we ain't letting you in." and that ain't fair. They should be given the opportunity just as well.


What's your worst airline experience and do you think you were caught up in some profiling before? Was this movie too real for you?

SD: I had a lot of horrible experiences on the plane. My plane dropped a few hundred feet because of ad weather, but none like "Soul Plane". "Soul Plane" was fun for me.


Was there when you read the script that you thought the jokes was too much? Did you feel it went overboard?

SD: No such thing as too much in comedy as far as I'm concerned. I grew up listening to Richard Pryor. That motherfucker went all the way. You know what I'm saying. America loved him and I loved him. I'm going to say something about older black people. They get on my motherfucking nerves cause hey're quick to criticize and bring down a bunch of young blacks trying to do something that we are doing for our generation. They did it plenty of times during their time. We're doing the same shit. We are talking about ourselves and having fun, but it's all in good taste. It's only a movie so people should really appreciate the fact that all of us are doing something positive with our lives. We're not out there stealing or killing. We're playing characters. We're having fun and talking jokes.


And they were listening to Redd Foxx records when no one was looking,

SD: And Rudy Ray Moore; and those guys made some of the dirtiest kinds of records you ever want to hear. You know what I'm saying. We don't this from out the sky. We get this from the people who did it before us. And we're trying to emulate them and go further where they couldn't go cause if they could do what we are doing, believe you me, they be doing it, but they could go as far as they could go, so it's job to over the top.


Coming from Compton, what influence do you feel mainstream media has the black community?

SD: Umm. Mainstream media, I don't think it has any influence in the black community because it don't pick what goes down there but when you have someone like myself who comes from that community, they can water down what's real and what's fake. They won't never bring the fact that if Snoor someop Dogg is helping some folks from Compton, or LA or Englewood and giving them a shot, they will never broadcast that. But if something happened where Snoop Dogg got caught with some weed one got shot, they would be quick to run with the cameras for something like that. They don't bring the right stories across. There's a lot of good thing going on these communities that people don't see. When I coach foot ball, I get a chance to see a lot of kids, a lot of adults who would have been gangbanging, who would been selling drugs, and give that up to coach these kids and when you're coaching, you don't make any money. So when I look across the field and see another coach in the black community, I love him that much more because I know that he's doing this for the love of the game.


Are you going to go on the Howard Stern show and promote this movie?

SD: I don't think I have to. You know the FCC, they don't let you say what you say and I'm not with holding mouth.


What do you think about this film being out there already on the bootleg market?

SD: I don't the bootleg is going to stop anything. I think people will want to see more of this because to me, a bootleg is like a buzz. A buzz will get you feedback and the feedback on the bootleg is that it's dope. So those who didn't see it are going off the feedback of the bootleg and are going to go see it.


What sort of roles have you received that you would like to see come your way?

SD: Action films like James Bond type of characters.


I've seen other rappers like Mac 10 do action films and they go straight to video.

SD: Not that type of action. I'm talking about real kind of action films where you have $50 million dollars behind the movie and a real movie company behind the movie. The Mac 10 film started with me and him. We were going to do it but when I signed with No Limit (Records), I couldn't it, so he just shot it and put it out himself, which is like us black filmmakers saying, "Fuck y'all" We're going to put our own movies out and give them to our people. Y'all don't want to put on the big screen, cool. Every nigger in the world know me so if I made a movie and throw it in Blockbuster warehouses, they're going to buy it. So fuck y'all cause that what you're going to do anyway if I was in a big movie, blow me up and put me on DVD and I don't make any money. So why not cut them out and get all the money.


How do you stay focus with what you do between the music, the AVN (Adult Video News) award and being a coach.

SD: You head about the AVN thing. (Laughs) Well, my sign is Libra and if you know anything about Libras, we are basically scales. That means we can balance very well. I don't how to juggle, but I know how to bounce.


Where you a fan of the original Airplane?

SD: The only thing I remember about Airplane is Kareem Abdul Jabbar.


Who would you like to work with?

SD: Halle Berry on the female tip, and Brad Pitt or Tom Cruise.


Would you do a physical change for a role?

SD: Definitely!


Would you cut you cut your hair?

SD: Hell no! I would gain weight but I would never cut my hair cause James Brown told me, "Snoopy I'm going to tell you something. Your hair is your strength" With everything you do, you always keep that laid back Snoop style.


Do you think that's one of the reasons you are so successful?

SD: I think it's me and I know how to be me. I'm not trying to be anyone else. That's my demeanor. I'm not loud and screaming. Even when I'm performing on stage, the songs that I get rowdy on, I have to immediately calm down cause I can't stay there. I've always been like that. My uncle told me I was nosy when I was a kid cause I used to always lay in the grass.

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