Interview: Tirf Alexius, Remoh Romeo Go Home in ‘Lakay’

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CHICAGO – In America, we all came from somewhere, and there is always that other “home.” Brothers/filmmakers Tirf Alexius and Remoh Romeo – twenty-plus years removed from their native Haiti after moving to Chicago – go back to their homeland after the 2010 earthquake, and captured that journey in the new film, “Lakay.”

“Lakay” means “home” in the Haitian language of kreyól – the film is being presented in English and kreyól – and the brothers travel to search for relatives in the aftermath of the earthquake. What they found besides that family is a sense of identity, a fuller appreciation for the country and culture they left as children. Everything they expected to explore became something else, while the devastated island country of Haiti struggled to regain a foothold after the destruction.

Tirf Alexius, Remoh Romeo
Remoh Romeo and Tirf Alexius Explore Their Haitian Childhood Home in ‘Lakay’
Photo credit: 4 Features Film Co.

Remoh Romeo is the older of the two brothers, whose father came to America in the 1970s looking for employment opportunities, and settled in the northern environs of Chicago, Illinois. The brothers had half-siblings left behind in Haiti, and it was that family they were seeking in the film. Romeo and Alexius are entrepreneurs, and found success in the music business before before expanding into acting and filmmaking, which they studied at Columbia College in Chicago. They released a feature film in 2013, “Critical Nexus,” and pride themselves on learning the film business from all angles, including marketing and distribution.

HollywoodChicago.com interviewed the filmmaking brothers, about their remarkable journey and production. We can go home again, with Tirf Alexius and Remoh Romeo, in “Lakay.”

HollywoodChicago.com: From the moment your mother told you ‘Haiti is broken’ – after the earthquake – what was the process that had you both thinking we need to go back, and we need to bring a film crew to document the journey?

Tirf Alexius: Initially, when my mother told me that, I wasn’t thinking of going back right away. We spent the days afterward assessing whether my brothers were okay, and what the next move would be. We started sending aid and supplies, in relief mode, while still working to find out if everyone was okay. It was during dinner one night around that time that my wife just looked at me and realized, ‘okay, when are you going?’ She knew that I couldn’t stand being removed from it, and needed to go down there.

Remoh Romeo: To add to that, once he had that conversation, to me it became automatic that we’d be going. I was on board. When we were planning to go, we knew we had a duty to our brothers first, but also we were filmmakers, and we wanted to shed some light on the situation. We knew we could provide some awareness to the situation that Haiti wasn’t getting. We considered it a dual purpose.

Alexius: We wanted to capture a Haiti that people weren’t seeing. There was good coverage, but I always felt that something was missing. It became the regular ‘Haiti is the poorest country in the Western hemisphere’ on repeat, and we wanted to seek the richness of the country.

HollywoodChicago.com: Let’s go back to the day you were on the plane, going back to Haiti. Can you both remember a private thought or anxiety as you were riding through the sky on your way there?

Alexius: It was a bit scary because I didn’t know what to expect. While we were doing the preparations, people were telling me not to go. But since I am Haitian, how can I not go to Haiti? It was that outside negativity that had me questioning it a bit.

Romeo: I was excited, and had nervous anticipation as to what I would remember from when I was a kid. I had no fear, it was just more about a nostalgia in wondering whether it looked the same.

HollywoodChicago.com: How much government interaction did you have in preparing the production. Were they interested in what you were doing?

Alexius: We were going there for personal reasons, so we were avoiding government interaction, so we could travel freely. We wanted to keep under the radar. But once we got there, the government was very cooperative, because we wanted just to capture our story, and subsequently their story.

Romeo: In the media, the Haitian government are always being bashed. I told Tirf I didn’t want any politics involved in this journey, it isn’t a political story anyway. It was hands off regarding that subject.

HollywoodChicago.com: Since you were both small children when you came to U.S., at what point in your development did you realize you had the Haitian narrative, or was it overshadowed through you journey as lower middle class persons of color in the U.S.?

Alexius: Basically, I didn’t realize just how Haitian I really was, until I went back to Haiti. I knew our family ate certain food and had our rituals and ways, but we worked hard also to be ‘American.’ I had to go back to find myself as a Haitian. Everything that we had been before was so Haitian, but I didn’t realize it until I went back.

Romeo: I was nine years old when we came here, and we didn’t want to be the kids in school who had an accent. We worked to lose as much as possible, and speak perfect English. We spent twenty or so years running away from being Haitian, and of course when I got older I started to appreciate who I was and where I came from – and the earthquake and our journey there put it in perspective.

Tirf Alexius, Remoh Romeo
Sweet Home Chicago in ‘Lakay’
Photo credit: 4 Features Film Co.

Alexius: The realities of growing up in Chicago meant there were many elements to overcome, and then add the other layer that we’re from the islands. We’re black and we’re Haitian. It was like a jab punch, and then an uppercut. [laughs]

HollywoodChicago.com: One of the most precise framing devices in the film was the conversation on the porch. with your friend Hugh Grady, at your family’s old multi-flat in Rogers Park Chicago – in the middle of a cold winter. What was the origin of that idea, and what freedom did it give you in post production that surprised you?

Alexius: We knew that if we were going to tell this story, that it needed a setting. Why not go back to our beginnings? And our beginning was that porch. We were also open to whatever developed while we there, and allowed ourselves to go to some of the darker places in our childhoods. We didn’t prep the scenes or talk to each other beforehand, but being on that porch and talking, we had conversations we never had as brothers, living and working together for 30 years.

Romeo: The porch was like a magical key, that opened up a box that we didn’t expect – whatever inhibitions we had felt before suddenly melted away on that porch, it just all poured out.

Alexius: While we were in post production, we just kept saying ‘this is great in itself,’ so we knew we made the right decision for including it.

HollywoodChicago.com: In the film, Tirf, you speak about being “embarrassed” about your Haitian heritage, to the point in which you were lying to people about it. At what points in your lives did you begin to gravitate back to the Haiti in you, and what was the starting point to the journey back that became ‘Lakay’?

Alexius: My wife was actually the one who would talk the most about it, regarding my name or something I would say, she’d always introduce me as Haitian. I would always cringe as a reflex, just because of my thought processes regarding being within the heritage. Finally, I asked myself why do I still feel this way? It took that type of exploration. Then I had my daughter, and she is Haitian, and I just wanted to embrace it.

Romeo: Mine is a bit different. When I found out that Wyclef Jean from the Fugees was Haitian, at that point I started embracing my identity, because at the time we were making music as well. If they were accepting, it’s okay to be Haitian.

HollywoodChicago.com: One of the great innovations in the film, which many have argued against, was to create two versions – English and kreyól. When you dream in kreyól, what do you dream about, and is the tone of those dreams different in nature?

Alexius: Memories are images, they don’t necessarily have words. More recently I have been dreaming in kreyól ‘tone,’ because we translated the film ourselves.

Romeo: We all sat down and argued about the language in that translation. It had to stay in context of the film, because of what is translated has to carry the weight and emotion of the dialogue in action on screen. It adds an epic quality to the story.

Alexius: The feedback on the translation has been tremendous, people love it. The Haitians feel the film is about them, and there is a level of detail that says we desired to be authentic as possible.

HollywoodChicago.com: What was the freakiest commonality, completely out of any context or thoughts about the journey and project, that you had with your half brothers?

Tirf Alexius, Remoh Romeo
Tirf Alexius & Remoh Romeo, October 12, 2014
Photo credit: Patrick McDonald for HollywoodChicago.com

Alexius: We laughed about it, but we all had the same demeanor, like it was completely natural. [laughs] For example, we all stood the same way. One of my brothers also looked like my Dad, who passed away quite a long time ago.

Romeo: We all just looked alike. I make a reference in the films to our foreheads, they were just all the same. You can’t deny the similarities.

HollywoodChicago.com: You spoke briefly in the film about accompanying your Father on jobs, to translate for him. I see both bravery and fear in that destiny. What is an example of the bravest things you’ve ever saw your father do, and what keeps coming back about your family’s fear of America?

Alexius: For me, when my father went to work, even though he didn’t speak the language. That was the bravest thing I witnessed. I just had to go and translate for him.

Romeo: He stepped into a ‘no man’s land’ at a much older age, he was in his fifties. It’s different then when you’re younger, and I always thought that was really brave.

HollywoodChicago.com: And the fear?

Romeo: I have to say it was economic. My Mom and Dad worked hard for what little we had, but always wanted us to respect our schooling, to get to a better place, to better what they had.

HollywoodChicago.com: Finally, when all was said and done involving the idea, filming, editing and completion of the film, at what point during the process did each of you have your most emotional moment, based on that journey that occurred, and result of it all?

Romeo: I knew in the midst of the project that we had something special, and I always envisioned how people would respond to it. When we did the private screening in Miami, the audience responded exactly how I hoped they would. For me, that was the most emotional affirmation. At the Q&A, people weren’t asking questions as much as just affirming what they had just seen. That was my proudest moment.

Alexius: When I saw the finished product, I started reflecting about my whole life, the one here and the one there. To come to a place where I could really embrace those two parts of me, and really be proud – not just of the heritage, but what we had done. To finally say, this is all good.

“Lakay” opens in select markets, including Chicago, on October 17th. See local listings for theater and show times. Written by and featuring Tirf Alexius, Remoh Romeo and Hugh Grady. Directed by Tirf Alexius. Rated “PG

HollywoodChicago.com senior staff writer Patrick McDonald

By PATRICK McDONALD
Senior Staff Writer
HollywoodChicago.com
pat@hollywoodchicago.com

© 2014 Patrick McDonald, HollywoodChicago.com

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