Paulina Lule talks about her new show Emperor of the Ocean Parkher upcoming socially critical zombie project and the importance of nature conservation.
Photo: Dana Patrick
S) Nice to meet you. First, I’d like to know a little more about you. You are an actor and filmmaker. When did you first discover this passion for creating characters, films and stories?
I think that’s always been a part of me. My favorite thing to watch as a kid was movies – all kinds of movies. I’ve – most of the movies I’ve seen, I probably shouldn’t have seen, but I was a latchkey kid and I spent a lot of time alone after school. But I’ve seen horror movies, Disney movies, science fiction movies, I’ve seen everything.
I have always loved movies and when I was really little I was the annoying kid who could recite the movies with them and when I was alone it was fine but when I was with the family they couldn’t stand it. There are several movies that I could probably play you here from start to finish, including humming the soundtrack. That would be Pee-Wee’s Big Adventure, Red Sonja, The Lion King, The Matrix And speed. So it was always there.
I live in the Midwest, so there is no access to Hollywood and the career opportunities in Hollywood here, at least not when I was growing up in the ’90s. We didn’t have social media where you had to know someone or know someone who knew someone who could point you in the right direction. I didn’t realize I could pursue that until much later when I had an application to USC (University of Southern California) under my bed. I only knew that because I saw the TV show Dawson’s CreekI was obsessed and Dawson was always saying, “I have to go to USC!” and I was also thinking, “I have to go to USC because that’s where you learn how to make films!”
But I ended up not going to USC, I studied computer engineering and Japanese, and after I graduated from college I went to Tokyo and then Hawaii. And then I realized: Wait a minute, I have my future in my hands. So I applied to film school, learned directing and screenwriting, and then I took an acting class, and here we are.
S) You have appeared in many successful television shows such as The good place, Marvel’s Agents of SHIELD, ABC General Hospitalin the movie Honey Boyall these incredible projects and now you are the leading actress in Emperor of the Ocean Park which will air on July 14 on MGM+th. Who is your character and how does he fit into the story?
So there’s the judge, played by Forest Whitaker, and – he dies. The story takes place in multiple timelines, so we’ll see Forest a lot in the series. His children, played by Tiffany Mack, Grantham Coleman and Henry Simmons, are left with varying degrees of grief because of their different relationships with their father. Mariah and Talcott (Mack and Coleman) begin to believe that his death may have been from more than natural causes.
I play Talcott’s wife and I’m a high-powered attorney who’s up for nomination to a federal judgeship by the President of the United States. So my character, Kimmer, is at a high point in her personal and professional life. Her dream is to be a Supreme Court justice and make a difference in her country from within. That’s her ultimate goal and this is the first big step in achieving that goal. That’s great news and she has to balance that with the fact that her husband’s father just died and she has to support him while she pursues this great opportunity. And anyone who’s been in a relationship and gone through that, “Everything is really great for me, but it really sucks for my partner,” finding that balance is difficult and dramatic enough, but when you add in a conspiracy that could mess up this really great thing, that’s when you create drama.
S) Since you are both a filmmaker and an actor, when working with a director, do you sometimes find yourself putting your filmmaker brain aside or do you take advice or inspiration?
I think there are benefits to having a filmmaker’s brain because I understand why certain things are happening on set. Like why we’re putting the camera here, what we’re trying to capture in terms of the story. But a lot of that isn’t helpful to the actor. The actor can’t be lost in thought, they have to be fully present and in the moment. So in that respect, I have to turn the filmmaker’s brain off. I think in preparing the role, before I’m on set, when I’m preparing scenes, the filmmaker’s brain can be helpful because I’m scouring the text for contextual clues and as a filmmaker I’ll apply a visual language to that.
As far as working with other directors, I think as a filmmaker it’s like a cheat code for film school. That’s why so many actors become great directors, just by being there. I’ve watched all of that and I ask questions like, “Why are we filming it this way?”
S) Speaking of filmmaking, you have made several short films, some of which have won awards. And you have an upcoming project that you wrote and are directing. It’s in the zombie/horror genre, but it’s also a story that’s very close to your heart. What else can you tell us about it?
It’s a story about Miles, who gets released from prison after about six years and comes home to a neighborhood called Sherman Park, which is here in Milwaukee, and he tries to start his life over. But the city around him has “turned” against him (to put it in zombie parlance).
I wrote it as an allegory for recidivism. You know, when people come home from prison, there are a lot of obstacles if they want to start their lives over, especially here in the United States. I don’t think our justice system or our prison system is a rehabilitation system at all.
I’m a genre filmmaker at heart, I’ve written and directed dramas, but I love genre films. So I wanted to write a story on that subject that was a genre film. And so I just thought about how hostile society as a whole is to people re-entering society and that’s how the zombie concept came up. I wrote it because my own brother, who’s now deceased, was released from prison at a time when this country was at the height of a lot of racial unrest. It was in 2016, we all know what election that was. It was a couple of weeks after there had been some incidents in Charlottesville where someone had been hit by a car and there were tiki torches and all kinds of stuff. And then also locally in Milwaukee there had been some unrest in the Sherman Park neighborhood after a young man named Sylville Smith had been killed by a police officer. So all of those feelings and fears and everything that was happening during that time fed me this script idea.
S) In addition to your career as an actor and filmmaker, you are also involved in environmental activism, especially in your community in Milwaukee. What does that mean and why is it so important to you?
Conservation is important to me because I’m a nature person. I love hiking, I’m going hiking with my partner in Yellowstone National Park this summer, I go horseback riding. I – I care about nature, and I care about animals, I care about the wildlife that’s here. I’ve chosen a lifestyle that supports conservation. I’m not perfect, nobody is, and in the society we live in, it’s hard to live a completely carbon neutral lifestyle.
But I firmly believe that we are all environmentalists. If we do something to protect the environment, even in the smallest way, whether it’s using reusable shopping bags, donating to a good cause, or cleaning up the beaches, then all of those things are environmental actions.
What I did locally was work with the Zoological Society of Milwaukee as part of their arts education program. They work with the Milwaukee County Zoo to promote conservation and to bring empathy to the citizens of Milwaukee and beyond for wildlife. I worked in the Kohl’s Wild Theater program, a children’s theater where we put on musicals to teach children about conservation. We performed these plays in the summer and toured as a traveling theater during the school year, performing them in schools and community centers.
S) Thank you so much, that was so inspiring and it was really nice talking to you.
If anyone wants to stay updated on me, the show or my work, we will be launching a crowdfunding campaign for our proof of concept soon and you can follow me on Instagram or Threads: @paulinnium.
Emperor of the Ocean Park will be available to stream from July 14thth on MGM+.
