RZA’s One Spoon of Chocolate is now in U.S. movie theaters, starring Shameik Moore as Unique, a newly released prisoner and military veteran trying to rebuild his life in Ohio.
After collaborating with Shameik on Cut Throat City and Wu-Tang: An American Saga, RZA explains why he tapped him for the movie.
“I’m really a fan of him as an artist. I really think he has something special,” he tells ABC Audio. “Every time we work together, I see him sponge up the material, and I see him just lose his self and become the energy that I need. And he does it in a very unique way. I won’t describe his process, but I’m a fan his work.”
RZA even compared their working relationship to other notable director-actor duos.
“It seems like my energy through him as a director to an actor, I don’t know, we might have a Denzel [Washington]/Spike Lee thing going on … or Ryan Coogler/Michael B. [Jordan]. I don’t know, but I love working with him,” he says.
The film also reunites RZA with Quentin Tarantino, with whom he worked on The Man with the Iron Fists and Django Unchained. “We’re family. … We’re brothers,” RZA says.
One Spoon of Chocolate follows Unique as he relocates to Ohio after prison, hoping for a fresh start. Instead, he becomes the target of a racist sheriff and team tied to missing Black men in the town. He prepares for vengeance by reading a survivalist handbook, inspired by a book RZA received 15 years ago.
“I actually own land in Ohio,” RZA says, “and so one of my friends had gave me a book on … how to start a fire, how to get a fish … how they do all these things, and so I took that idea.”
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