Memory Lane with Kerry Godliman and Jen Brister - S01 E02: Lennie James (Kerry only)

Episode Date: August 4, 2020

"We were in on the Tuesday doing costumes and then filming on the Saturday..." Kerry chats with writer and actor Lennie James about his five favourite photos while he's on lockdown in Austin, Texas. Photo 01 - Lennie in Great Yarmouth as a teenager Photo 02 - Lennie with all the stars of Snatch Photo 03 - Lennie's wedding day Photo 04 - Lennie on the set of The Walking Dead Photo 05 - Kerry and Lennie in Save Me PICS & MORE - https://www.instagram.com/memory_lane_podcast/ A Dot Dot Dot Production produced by Joel Porter Hosted by Jen Brister & Kerry Godliman Distributed by Keep It Light Media Sales and advertising enquiries: [e-mail] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hungry now. Now. What about now? Whenever it hits you, wherever you are, grab an O. Henry bar to satisfy your hunger. With its delicious combination of big, crunchy, salty peanuts covered in creamy caramel and chewy fudge with a chocolatey coating. Swing by a gas station and get an O'Henry today.

Oh hungry, oh Henry. Hello and welcome to Memory Lane. Each episode, I take a trip down memory lane with a very special guest as they bring in four photos from their lives to talk about. To check out the photos that we're talking about, they're all on the episode image and you can also see them a bit more clearly on our Instagram page. So have a little look at Memory Lane podcast.

Come on, we can all be nosy together. Thank you for the pictures. They weren't easy to get, were they? Because you're not at home. I'm not. No, I'm in Austin and I got in the attic. photo albums or anything like that so it's literally and it's a relatively new phone and not everything not all the photos have come over to it so I had to do a little bit of detecting so this one of you this is the youngest one you could find for us you're 14 I think in it is that me on the roller

skates oh I couldn't see the roller skates I just thought you needed a piss and you were standing with me that's that's actually how I stood when I was 14 well they are tight shorts they're very The tightest tie-died short. We really need to talk about the short. That is me at maybe 13, 14. And it's Great Yarmouth and it's roller skates. And it's kind of, it is the youngest I had on me. And that was only because my brother quite recently sent it to me.

Oh, okay. And it's, it is, we used to go, it's really, I got a very odd relationship with Great Yarmouth. I had a very, very, well, have a very, very good friend who was like a big brother to me and my brother, who was a police officer in Great Yarmouth. And we would go and spend a portion of the summer holidays with him and his family when we were at home with our mum. Okay. And then when we lost our mum, we went into a children's home and coincidentally, one of the caravan parks that the children's home would go on summer holiday to was also in Great Yarmouth.

Oh, so you could see him? So we would see him, yeah, and hang out with him and his mum and his brother and his, you know, his dad when his dad was alive. And so we've got a very weird affinity with Great Yarmouth and it was, it was a very weird thing because it was one of the few places, particularly when we were growing up with my mum, it was one of the few places, what the only one of the few places, what the only place I'd gone to where there were white people who didn't know black people. We were a novelty. The local, where Steve's mum, Steve is my friend who's a police officer, where his mum used to live was right opposite the pleasure beach.

So it was right opposite, you know, where the, right opposite the sea and where the roller coasters and the donuts and the, you know, the duck thing, hook in the duck thing. were along the pleasure beach. They lived right opposite and all of the houses had these really big alleyways behind them and that's where all the local kids used to play. And when we were there

and they knew as they would call it then that the coloured boys were back in the house and back at Steve's month place they would come and knock on the door and go are the black boys coming out to play and my brother who just

was like when I was growing up, if you had asked, looked at us and gone, which one of those is going to be an actor? It would have been my brother, nonstop. He was, yeah, he took all, he took up all the space in the room. And I was, I barely spoke from one day to the next. Right. I used to just stand behind him and follow behind him.

And they would come and knock on the door. My brother would go, yeah, yeah, sure, let's go on, let's go and have a look at that. Okay. And he would go running out and I would kind of tentatively go out. They literally invented this game in the alleyway, which was, it was like a race, but it would, they would, we, me and my brother would set off and then all of the local white kids would race to see who could get to one or other of us first and touch our hair. And that's how they won the game. And that was, that was a vast majority of lots of days in my summer growing up. Yeah.

Well, at the time, it was, it was, I was. was as fascinated by them as I think on one level that they were by me they had funny accents funny kind of Norfolk suffolk accents and I've never really heard it before we know we were full on London boys when we were going roller skating there were always at least between 10 and 13 of us right with our own skates skating down the main road of in Great Yama from the caravan park from the caravan park to the roller rink and you know

they had never seen anything like it partly because there were quite a few black kids in the kids home and mixed race kids and white kids that I grew up with and we would just bomb it down there and we were remarkably confident and I have very strong memories of kind of

of skating down or skating we must have looked like a bit of a gang because you can see what I'm wearing. Oh, that is a statement outfit, mate. I wasn't the least regret. Yeah, so what year would that be? So we can just sort of put that fashion in a context?

Late 70s, early 80s. Yeah. We lived in a grade two listed Georgian mansion. Where was it? Tooting. On the edge of Tooting Beck Common, right opposite the common. And we all had bikes and we all, you know, when I first formed,

a band we would rehearse in the basement of the of the kids home and and it was uh you know it was I would have much preferred not to have ended up living in a kid's home but if you end up living in one you know I would hope that you that the kids home you end up in is one that looks like the one I grew up in because it was a yeah it was a good example of how it can be done so you were 10 were you 10 when your mum died I was 11 closer, I was 11 closer to turn 12. Right. Yeah, just my first year of secondary school.

And it was me and my brother and brother was two and a half years older. Yeah. And, you know, firstly, the good thing that people did was they kept me and my brother together. Right. Which was really important. The other thing was is that we were able to stay in our neighbourhood. So we were kept in contact with... our friends and our community, but also we were able to still keep going to our school.

Right. So the consistency. Yeah, it was consistency. And is it still there? No, they closed it down during, it's partly why I ended up getting fostered, but they closed it down during when Wonsworth, because it was in the borough of Wonsworth, where Wonsworth was famous for having a zero poll tax. and part of the way that they managed to bring the poll tax and the community charge right down

was by basically relinquishing their responsibility for things like council run children's homes and they moved into foster care and the house that we were living in and this was in I got fostered in maybe 81, 82, something like that. Is that right? Could that be right? When you were how old? 79 when I was 15 just about to turn 16 right 16 I was and I got I got fostered and at that point in which was must have been 80 81 the house we were living in was worth over three million quid on the on the open market and so they closed it down in order to sell it off to fill the coffers basically and we ended up getting fostered. Bloody hell.

I mean, it should be a template for other children's homes, not shut down. It should be, you know, it sounds, like you say, for the context, it's a good model. So when did the acting get you? Acting got me not long after I was kind of fostered, really, and a group of school friends that I was hanging around with, girls happened, you know.

It was that, I went to an all-boys, comprehensive in Tooting Broadway, Tooting Beck. Yeah. And there were a group of boys that I kind of got, they were in my year and I knew and I played football with and rugby with. And then we all went on a French exchange together and we got a little bit closer. And then all of a sudden some of the girls who went on the French exchange from the local girls school started, you know, mixing in with our group.

Right. And one of them wanted to be an actress. And I really liked this girl. And so she said she was going to go down and audition for this play at the cockpit theatre in Marlebone, which was going to take her away for the whole summer if she got it. And I was like, unbeknownst to her, I kind of, you know, found out and kind of went down to, I didn't even know what fucking auditioning was.

I'm just going to go where she's going. I'm just going where she's going. So your next picture, if we were to do a screen swipe, it would be, and then he was a movie star. Is that the jump-off? Yeah, because that is a great picture of you with an amazing group of people. I suppose this is snatch, is it, is it to do with... This was the premiere.

Stevie G, there's Robbie G's in there. It's Vinny Jones, Brad Pitt. Mike Reed. Guy Ritchie. Mike Reed, because he was... the jeweller in Snatch a guy who played gorgeous George is in there as well

I mean it was It was You all look really happy Is this happy times It was a I tell you Snatch was one of those It's a weird one because I was already a working actor

Yeah that's a big jump from you Leaving drama school to Snatch I know you've done a lot I'm sure you've you have these moments where you do a gig and when you walk into, the gig comes out and is received however it's received, but when you walk into a meeting or an audition

the next time, something shifted. And there are a couple of those that kind of dotted through my career, Line of Duty was one of those. But Snatch was also really one. It suddenly everything was happening and then we got these scripts for Snatch. And I remember it was a Wednesday morning.

and we got these scripts and my agent found out and said these scripts have come in they want to see you tomorrow because they're really close to production and and I was like oh okay so I read it and Lockstock had already been out so I knew what to kind of expect and I read it and the parts were really good and I went and so we got the scripts Wednesday morning we read for it actually the scripts arises on Wednesday and the meeting was at four o'clock that afternoon. Why was it all so quick? That's mad.

Well, I'll tell you, it's because there was just a room, and there was just a room full of blackfellas, of all ages. It was everybody, everybody was in everybody, basically, who thought of themselves as an actor

and was black or close to it was in that fucking room. Wow. And everybody, everybody wanted this gig, particularly after kind of lockstock. Yeah. And they just started pairing people,

off they just you know everybody was going to go in as a double and they just started pairing people off and they paired me off with Robbie G and and I'd known Robbie from theatre and hanging around but I'd never work with him and so it was me and Robbie and we were the first ones in so we kind of went in and we kind of did our stuff and then we went out and we got the phone call the next day that we've been got it and we were chuffed Robbie phones me up and when It's really good. And so we got the script Wednesday, audition Wednesday afternoon, got it on Thursday.

That's mad. And then we were in to do costumes and read-throughs and all of that on the Friday. And then we were filming on the Saturday. That's just not heard of, is it, really? Yeah. Usually protracted, you know, waiting. Yeah. Yeah.

And it was because Guy had written it and he had, I think I can say this now it's been a number of it's been 20 years he had had two other people playing our roles all the way through it guy at that point unless you were Hollywood guy at that point had a thing

about trained actors or about professional actors he wanted it authentic like he wanted real games and and so he had two other guys playing those parts and all the way through it and I subsequently learn having a conversation with a couple of the producers

that almost every day they would go to Guy and go, because he would keep rewriting and these parts were getting bigger and bigger and bigger and they kept going back to him and going script's fantastic, but you've got to get actors for those parts. You've got to get actors for those parts. You've got to get actors for those parts and he was like, nah, nah, my mates.

One of them was his mate and one of them was a face and they were doing it and they were taking acting classes and all of that and they were you know and the producers kept coming back and going you've got to get actors for that part that's mad!

Yeah and also because after Lockstock and particularly when it went to America everybody and their aunt phoned up guy or reached out to guy saying whatever you were going to whatever you're doing next I want to be a partner right so the original cast list or the people

that it went out to snatch went out to, Swartzenegger were supposed to be in it, Pacino was supposed to be in it, Brad Pitt was supposed to be in it, De Niro was supposed to be, they were all, I mean, it was just ridiculous. And what, he was just overwhelmed? So he was like, right, I want non-actors, I can't, I can't. Yeah, no, I mean, if I'm having all of these people, because it whittled itself down and actually the big star was obviously Brad Pitt.

Yeah. And so they got, they got, they got Brad, and he was like, I just wanted to keep me real, and whatever his reasons, I never really had that conversation with him. but he wasn't doing it, he wasn't doing it and then he woke up on the Tuesday and went, all right, get me actors. Shit, I do need actors, actually. Apparently what happened, I found out later,

is that Statham, Statham, Jace Fleming, and I think Stevie G had already been kind of cast. When they did all the auditions, guy went, come in here, come in here, Tell me what you think of all of these geysers that we've got kind of

because he was Cockney back in those days. He said, come in there, put it, show me what you, show me what you think of it. And they saw me and Robbie up and they went those two. You got to have those two. It's got to be those two. Those are the guys. And so we ended up kind of being it. And the two actors, two guys who were playing those parts,

were shifted onto other parts. Oh, really? the film, which was really, I'm not going to name names, but was really, really uncomfortable, particularly as one of them took it really personally. And for a bit kind of was telling anybody that would listen, what a mess he was going to make of me. Oh, God. Should he come across me? That fits the whole sort of brand of the whole, do you know what I mean?

Like someone's pissed off, he's all going to kick off, there's a bit of drama around it. You know what I mean? It's a lot of testosterone in a Guy Ritchie production. Yeah. I mean, it was very weird because the first time I met Vinnie Jones was I was coming off my trailer and he spotted me and he went, it's Lenny in it? And I went, yeah, it is.

And he went, listen, mate, says, there's any trouble. Don't worry about it because I got you back, right? There's nothing to worry about. And I went, to be honest, Vinny, I wasn't worried. But I really am now. Yeah, that is... I really am now. That isn't a normal hello, is it?

on a set yeah yeah but it was you know it was a it was a phenomenon and you know um we i remember getting a telephone call me and robbie just kept phoning each other every time something would happen which phone each other and go mate have you heard about this and we go yeah they're putting us up at the Dorchester in a suite and then they said and then they said to us they said and they're giving us another suite just to hang out in when we're doing the interviews so we don't even have to go back to our home room and and I remember two really I mean then we got a telephone call going

saying Gucci would like to dress you for the premiere and I was like yeah no you're you're alright I got I got my own I got my own suit and then I phoned up then I got a telephone call from Robbie and he went Gucci's going to dress us and I went yeah I said no and he went what are you fucking nuts you get to keep the suit

phone it back phone her back I mean Now streaming on Paramount Plus, it's the epic return of Mayor of Kingstown. Warden? You know who I am. Starring Academy Award nominee Jeremy Renner. I swear in these walls. Emmy Award winner Eidie Falco.

You're an ex-con who ran this place for years. And now, now you can't do that. And BAFTA award winner Lenny James. You're about to have a plague of outsiders descend on your town. Let me tell you this. It's got to be consequences. Mayor of Kingstown, new season now streaming on Paramount Plus. You know what's better than the one big thing?

Two big things. Exactly. The new iPhone 17 Pro on TELUS's five-year rate plan price lock. Yep, it's the most powerful iPhone ever, plus more peace of mind with your bill over five years. This is big. Get the new iPhone 17 Pro at tellus.com slash iPhone 17 Pro on select plans. Conditions and exclusions apply. This next photo, this is your wedding day, but it's not a traditional.

wedding photograph. No, it's more. We got married after 23 years together. Oh wow, really? Yes, together. And we got married at the Los Angeles County Court. Right. Which is very close to the airport in Los Angeles.

And you have to go through, because it is a working court. You have to, and again, coming back to guns and stuff, you have to go through metal detectors to go up to the eighth floor where there are hatches, matches and dispatches. So it's birth, marriages and deaths all on the same floor. And you don't want to get into the wrong line. And it was one of those moments where basically I came over on a, what most people do is like an 01 visa, which is a, I'm. otherwise known as the Rolling Stones visa because it was created in 1971 up until 1971 up until this visa how you got a visa was there was a lottery and a number right and you put your name into it and if your number came

up you got you got a visa and that's how you applied for it and there was a certain number and then it cut off in 1971 America reached its quota but they forgot that the Rolling Stones were coming on tour and so that So they had to create this new category, which was called Alien of Extraordinary Ability. And it was created, it was created for, that's how I think of the Rolling Stones. That's exactly how I think of them. And they were the first aliens of extraordinary ability. And that became the benchmark, therefore, the way, the way of you.

Why has no one ever taken that as an album name or a band name or, I mean. I think somebody probably has. That's a great band name. do. Yeah. So my kids, because they're all under 21, they all got green cards if I got a green card, but my missus didn't get a green card because we weren't married. And so we all of a sudden had to get married. And I had always been very resistant to the whole notion of it for very childish reasons. Just because... Ball and chain. Like that sort of... It wasn't so much ball and chain. It was when I was, this is the story I choose to tell.

It was basically that I was just immature. But it was, the story, I had two mates when I was growing up, very, very, very close mates who I was growing up. And they're both families that after I'd lost my mum, both of them had looked into fostering me. Right. There were other friends of the family who had looked into fostering us both and other ones who, my brother's friends who had looked into fostering him. but both of these families had looked into fostering me after I lost my mum and one of the families, let's call them, the Smiths

and really loved up, you'd walk around the corner and they'd still be kissing each other, they're always holding hands, they were beautiful, and then I had another friend, really close friend, we'll call them the Joneses, and the Joneses were, they Mr and Mrs Jones

never spoke to each other I never saw them ever speak to each other and they lived in the same house I was around there I was around there quite a lot and she you know she would have his food ready

for when he came home from work but they never engaged they never spoke he would say all right boys as he kind of came in but you know they never really spoke to it it was a deeply unhappy marriage and it was like one of those subjects

with your mate that you just never talk about. Right. And then I remember later finding out through my, you know, through my Smith mate, I remember having a conversation with him talking about how loved up his mum and dad were. Yeah. And I remember him saying to me, they're not married. They were never married.

Right. And it was coincidence. As coincidence would have it, they both happened to have the same last name. Oh, right. they just carried on so for then on in your head the longevity of a happy relationship was not to get married

a happy relationship was the Smiths not the Joneses bloody hell that's just two couples yeah and it just stuck in my well in two couples is your world when you're a kid do you know yeah yeah that was like well that's it

if I'm having that conversation I don't want to be the Joneses I do want to be the Smith I do want to be the Smith I aspire to be the Smith and that was my kind of thing and my missus will respond like you. She'd kind of go, what?

That's just ridiculous. But I would stick to it adamantly because it was, you know, I decided that was me. Right. That's what defines me. And in a really weird, like in a way, there is a romance to it. Like, I can see your missus thinking, well, he is inadvertently saying he wants longevity with me

because he wants to be like the Smiths who never got married. So there's a sort of compliment in there. But if I... You have to dig for it. But if you're waiting for a proposal, it's really disappointing. You'll be like, oh, those bloody smiths. Yeah. So our proposal was my missus going, we need to do this.

Yeah, it's purely legal. We're doing it on Saturday. So we did. It was just us. It was us and our three girls. And then we went to our favorite restaurant. And that photograph is us walking out of the... It's a call picture.

Taken by one of my... Taking out of a photograph by one of the... my other kids who's um is us getting out of the car heading into our favorite restaurant and it's all gone well you haven't turned into the joneses have you we haven't not yet i mean there are times when it feels like oh right we're just not talking to each other particularly particularly now in isolation it's like we're the joneses shit let's not be the joneses shit we've got to we've got to sort this out you look really happy to be sitting next to a really alarming zombie it's it's It's, he's a, um, uh, your favorite zombie, it says.

That was when, that was when I, it was my first episode when I got back on the show once they'd asked me to be, to come back permanently. Right. Because, um, the first five years of the show, I just did three episodes. I did the first ever episode. I did one episode in episode three. And then I, I, I did one, one part of an episode in, uh, in episode in season five. and but that was the beginning of season six and you know and he is um Col Coleman is a stunt you know because you need because of the prosthetics right you your stunt coordinators need to be because they're zombies and old zombies and you know they're not eating much so they have to become slightly skinny so actually he's somebody that I've

killed, struck, stabbed in the head, shot in the head, cut in half. He's in a bad way. Yeah, it's about 15 times. But I never see him until that point. Until he's fully kind of, he's fully made up. So the reason why I'm cracking up in that one is because we've got a pause in filming. And he's come and sat down next to me and he's full kind of makeup. And he's gone, he's lent over and he's gone, all right, Len, it's really good to see.

to you again. And I was like, and I've gone, who's that? And he went, it's Coleman. Like, I'm, like, it's my point. He's gone, it's Coleman. And I've gone, close to know it's you. And that, and we just, we just cracked up. Yeah, that's great.

And it was just, you know, it was a, it was a moment that I loved where I was just like, This is Hollywood. This is my Hollywood. This is Hollywood. And, um, you, I never would have thought. And at that point I'd been in America for two and a half, three years, something like that. And, you know, and they searched high and low and saw loads of people for those particular roles. And it ended up completely separate to each other, ended up being me and Andy.

And I remember a couple of times that we were just in the middle of scenes or having done something. we just look at each other and go, this is ridiculous. How is this happening? This is ridiculous. Normally we end the show with a photograph. I know it's really difficult because you're not at home and get your hands up, but we always end with another picture. So I'm going to nominate another picture for our chat to end on,

which is I love, I tell you, I love that picture of all of us lot on Save Me, because it looks like a real photo. It looks like a real bunch of people down the pub. It doesn't look like actors posing. And I remember Nick took it with his camera, didn't he? It looked like it wasn't done by professional photographer. Well, Nick is a professional director, but he did snap it on a camera to capture a sense of just a bunch of regulars down the boozer.

And I loved that shot. I love that. I love that photograph. And I nearly put it in. But then I thought, is that like self-promoting? What is that about? Well, I'm in it. So I'd have been well chuffed.

I'd have been like, yes. Yeah. I love that photograph. and I love it because I think it really embodies, and no one's going to know because they're not there. Yeah. But I think it really embodies who that group of people are. Yeah.

It was like for me anyways, it was like we struck gold. Yeah. Because, I mean, I'll take all of us as actors and the job we did hands down. But who we are as people and the fact that we got on and we liked each other and people liked coming to work and people enjoyed hanging out. I think I'm almost more proud of being a part of creating that

than I am actually creating the show. Well, it's a delight to be a part of it. I'm glad you were fucking fantastic. I see it's all been gearing towards me getting a compliment, then that's what I've been after. It only took like an hour and 33 minutes. Listen, thank you so much. Oh, yes. We'll call it a day. Thank you.

Thank you so much for chatting to me and sharing your photos. Thank you very much. That's it for this week. The rest of Series 1 is available with all the photos on our Instagram page. And Jen and I will be doing new episodes every week. Thanks for listening. Bye. I'm Max Rushton. I'm David O'Dardy.

And we'd like to invite you to listen to our new podcast. What Did You Do Yesterday? It's a show that asks guests the big question, quite literally, what did you do yesterday? That's it. That is it. Max, I'm still not sure. Where do we put the stress? Is it what did you do yesterday?

What did you do yesterday? You know what I mean? What did you do yesterday? I'm really down playing it. Like, what did you do yesterday? Like, I'm just a guy just asking a question. But do you think I should go bigger? What did you do yesterday?

single word this time I'm going to try and make it like it is the killer word. What did you do yesterday? I think that's too much, isn't it? That is, that's over the top. What did you do yesterday? Available wherever you get your podcasts every Sunday.