Reuters
[ Source: Reuters ]
Clarksdale didn’t just provide history and blues for director and writer Ryan Coogler’s hit movie about art, Jim Crow and vampires. One of the Mississippi Delta town’s musicians contributed to the “Sinners” script.
After a special screening in the town, which has no cinema, Coogler told the audience gathered in a community hall about the first time he described the movie’s plot to a group of Clarksdale blues musicians he had asked to contribute to the score.
He said he hesitated when he got to the part about the vampires. He went ahead. Then, Grammy winner Bobby Rush filled the silence.
“I had a girl once that was a vampire,” the musician joked.
The line was given to Delta Slim, played by Delroy Lindo, a piano-playing character who brings both comic relief and depth to the movie.
Thursday’s screening and discussion came after Tyler Yarbrough, a community organizer and movie buff in Clarksdale, wrote an open letter asking Coogler and Warner Brothers to bring the movie to a town where people drive 80 miles (130 km) to Memphis, Tennessee to get to a cinema.
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