Spike Lee on Trump, Cannes Scandals and the Knicks’ Chances

Spike Lee got off to a strong start.

“No fuck ups today!” the director quipped, kicking off his press conference to Highest 2 Lowest, his electrifying new crime thriller that premiered out of competition at the Cannes Film Festival. The director was referencing his last time in Cannes, when he was president of the 74th Cannes jury, and accidently announced the winner of the Palme d’Or ahead of schedule at the festival’s closing ceremony.

But Cannes has welcomed him back. Highest 2 Lowest was greeted with a wildly enthusiastic response following its unveiling at the Palais on Monday night. The Cannes festival surprised Highest 2 Lowest star Denzel Washington, in town for only a few hours in between Broadway performances of Othello, presenting the two-time Oscar winner, and cinema legend, with an honorary Palme d’Or for his life’s work.

Denzel Washington stars as David King, a charismatic and powerful music mogul in the midst of a high-stakes corporate power struggle when his son is seemingly kidnapped. But the crisis takes a twist when it’s revealed the abductors have mistakenly taken another boy — Kyle, the son of David’s driver and right-hand man Paul (Jeffrey Wright) — while still demanding the original ransom. As loyalties are tested and reputations threatened, the line between personal responsibility and public perception begins to blur.

Lee was joined in the Cannes press conference by Wright and Ilfenesh Hadera, who plays King’s poised and skeptical wife Pam.

Highest 2 Lowest marks Lee’s first collaboration with one-time muse Washington since 2006’s Inside Man.

“It’s an 18-year gap and we were surprised it was like yesterday, because we didn’t lose a step,” said Lee. But he noted that this film could be their last together.

“I think this is it—five,” Lee added of his work with Washington. “He’s been talking about retirement even though he’s just done another deal. Five films together, they stand up.”

Hadera noted she’s also been a frequent Spike collaborator. “I know there’s been a lot of chat over the last year or so about [Spike Lee’s] history of collaboration with Denzel, but this is number five for us too, which is pretty incredible.”

Highest 2 Lowest is his first narrative feature set and shot in New York since Red Hook Summer (2012). A vibrant reimagining of Akira Kurosawa’s 1963 classic High and Low, Highest 2 Lowest relocates the action to contemporary NYC and recasts its tense kidnapping plot against the backdrop of the modern music industry and America’s media-saturated culture.

Wright called Lee “one of the guardians of the black lens on America, which is so critical right now.”

Wright, who is also in Wes Anderson’s Cannes competition film The Phonecian Scheme, said he shot the films back-to-back. “I’m probably the only person in the history of cinema who has worked on a Spike Lee movie and a Wes Anderson movie at the same time.”

The ensemble cast includes Aubrey Joseph as the King’s teenage son Trey, Wright’s real-life son Elijah as Kyle, A$AP Rocky in a show-stopping supporting role as a gangster and rapper Yung Felon. Isis “Ice Spice” Gaston has a supporting role, in her acting debut, and British singer Aiyana-Lee delivers one of the film’s strongest scenes, performing the movie’s powerhouse title track.

“Aiyana-Lee, no relation, I found her on Instagram,” said Lee. “One of the things that technology has done is that if you’re an artist, you don’t have to move from New York, L.A. and several people in this film. I found them on Instagram.”

THR‘s chief reviewer David Rooney gave Highest 2 Lowest a rave, calling Lee’s latest “a tense police procedural with a sharp dissection of social class structures…with wit, high style and kinetic energy to burn.”

The Apple Original Films production will be released theatrically in the U.S. by A24 on August 22.

In a wide-ranging press conference, Lee also took the opportunity to throw shade on those who dissed his masterpiece Do The Right Thing when it premiered in Cannes in 1989. Infamously, the film was passed over for the Palme d’Or, one of the festival’s legendary mistakes.

“It started in Cannes, then went to the United States, people saying: ‘Do the Right Thing would cause riots. Black people go insane’,” Lee recalled. “It was just pure, blatant racism, that Black people could not make a distinction about what’s on screen. And all those people have been proven wrong over the years. And none of them has ever said they fucked up. They never said that. That they misread it. But many years later, the film’s still with us. And they still are idiots, mamalukes!”

Both Lee and Wright touched on one of the big topics in Cannes this year, the issue of runaway production and the sharp decline in shooting days in the U.S..

“People are hurting,” said Lee, “no one’s working. There’s this guy [Donald Trump] who wants to put a tariff on every film that shoots [outside the U.S.]. I don’t know how that’s going to work. I don’t have the answer, but I love to shoot [in New York]… There’s just some things you can replicate. It’s the vibe, it’s an energy. I’m very lucky that I’ve been able to shoot films that place in New York.”

“I’ve worked in London quite a bit last year,” added Wright. “Obviously, I’d like to work in Brooklyn. It’s more convenient…But one of the challenges in America is that we have 50 states, so we have multiple tax jurisdictions. [Consolidating] the building of these tax incentives from the federal level requires federal leadership, a kind of leadership, as opposed to, gamesmanship or scoring political points.”

Lee was careful to never directly mention the current POTUS.

“My wife said, ‘Spike!’ be careful what you say!” he joked.

But Lee took every opportunity to talk basketball, giving several shout outs for his beloved New York Knicks. Asked about Knick’s upcoming Eastern Conference finals against the Indiana Pacers, he called the series in 4. “We’re going to win!”