Hey guys, welcome to another episode of Eating While Broke.
I'm your host Coley Wick, and today.
We have very special guest author, filmmaker, musician Nick Brooks in the building.
How are you doing.
I'm doing well. Thanks for having me excited to make some roto.
I felt like a radio host.
If you don't know Nick Brooks, he has this is a novel called Promised Boys. And then you have Up and Smoke that's coming out in May. You have an album that's dropping accompanying the book in May. And then I did read somewhere and you could dispel the rumor or not, but I did read that this was also picked up by Promised Boys, was picked up by Netflix.
It was Obama's and produced.
That's what I wanted to highlight, and produced by the OBA. So this is a really big deal. I want to cover all that. I want to cover all those moments. But before we get into a Nick, you gotta tell me what you're gonna be cooking me for breakfast today.
Man, you got a great breakfast coming up. This is hotel, something I was introduced to in college. It's essentially just ground meat, turkey, beef, whatever, melted cheese, and tomatoes.
Awesome, very simple, very easy. I love me a broke dish because the broker, the story broker, the dish, the real of the story, the better the story. That's what I've learned on this shed. Anytime I get a dish that has a million ingredients, you already know the story ain't gonna be.
So go ahead, start whipping me up my breakfast.
Okay, okay.
And while you're.
Whipping up this breakfast, you can't go ahead and take me back to what was going on during.
The roteal days. Wait, yeah, you already went through the grees.
Go ahead, yeah, the hotel days. I'll take you back. Like I said, I was introduce to Rotel in college and I'm from DC. Initially went to school in Oklahoma, Norman, Oklahoma, so it was a huge culture shock. The way I got there is because, like you mentioned, I'm a musician and I was rapping. I was in a group and then we were trying to figure out what we were gonna do, and was trying to get out of the city, trying to get out of DC. And I got into
the school did I get into? I got in North Carolina and t and I wanted to go to Hampton, didn't get into Hamptons and my man who was rapping with he got into He got into Hampton, but not North Carolina, and so it was like, okay, that's not gonna work. And then suddenly we got a.
Visit Fumus because wanted to stay together.
Because we was rapping, and we was like, okay, it's one of those things. Like my mom, she was a nurse, she was real practical. Same thing with his family. He's like, oh, you got to go to college. So he was like, okay, we'll go to college, but once we get there, we're
gonna still make this rap thing work. And a recruiter came to our school talking about the school Oklahoma University, which I had never heard of, and I think probably at that point I don't even know if I had been on a plane, and they took us out there to visit the school. It was an amazing experience. It was great, and turns out we both got in and we was like, we're gonna go to Oklahoma, and so anyway, that's how because people always ask me, like, Oklahoma's random
from DC, but that's how we got in. That was the school we got into, and we wanted to go. We wanted to make music.
And were childhood friends.
Childhood friends. Yeah, it's my god brother.
So I'm sure your parents were very at ease knowing that they sent the set.
For sure, for sure, for sure, for sure they were. And I've always been a very independent Like I was super independent. My mom remarried at like when I was like nine, and she had three daughters, so like she had a lot going on. So I was always independent. Yeah yeah, yeah, with her, with my stuff. If I was just doing my own thing. I started working at
thirteen type shit. I was always on my own. So it's funny because my little sisters, they all went to school right My mom didn't want them to go nowhere. They all right around DC. But for me, she would like, wherever you're gonna go, you know what I mean, which was fine. I ended up it turned out okay. But so yeah, we ended up in Oklahoma and I met and I started to meet different people. That's a good
thing about college. I do think some of it is a little bit of a sham, but you meet people from all over the place, you know what I'm saying. I got to meet people from the South, I got meet a lot of people from Texas primarily, And so I'm in school and Rotel. Of course, you in college. Nobody has money in college from when I ended up having to train for the Howard which I'll get to,
and those kids had a little bit of money. But we're in college and trying to figure out, just trying to figure it out, and we get introduced to this this It was two dishes that people made a lot. It was in Rotel. That's where it started. And now you know what, I actually know what the first time I had it. The first time I had I was at a kickback and it was out. I tried it. It was amazing, and it's like, yo, what is this?
I just never had it? And it was like, it's called rotel, And so they told us it's just cheese, meat, tomatoes, and boom.
You get and then the crazy on the tomatoes. It's called rotel.
It really but I didn't notice that.
Today.
I had never I never realized.
That maybe that's why they called it.
Of course, of course I never realized that it's got to be right. It's too much of a coincidence. Yeah, But of course, like you said, how you just realized that today. It took me a while to realize that too. But yeah, so it's like, okay, cool with it. That's essentially where it started. It's like I was at a kickback in college in Oklahoma, Norman, Oklahoma, of all places, and it's the first time I had this dish and
it was amazing, and I made it. We probably made it once a week and it would last us the whole week. You know what I'm saying. Make it will make it every probably every Monday, last us the whole week through the weekend any parties. It's also a great drunk food, you know what I'm saying, because it's the meat, it's the chips. You could do it for snack, do it for dinner. It's good when you're drinking. Like, it's just versatile. It's cheap, that's the main thing. It's cheap.
So it's just a versatile meal, easy to pack up, easy to take, easy to store, you know what I'm saying. So that's where rotel started.
Okay, so you're in college, you're with your wrap mats.
Yes, what are you going to school for?
So at the time, I was going to school for nursing. Again, if you remember, my mom was in there. She was the most scesful person I knew, you know what I'm saying. She my dad worked on the railroad, and then my grandfather Will I spend a lot of time with if he was a pastor. So these was really as far as adults like these, my mom was the most selfriend cool. Maybe I'd be a nurse, which I would have made a terrible nurse because I don't like people all that much,
you know what I'm saying. But I ended up going into so yeah, I was doing nursing.
And your mom was probably happy to hear that too.
Again, security and she's practical. She And here's the other thing, it's all my mom knew for real, like she because that's just happened to be what she went to school for. I don't even think she really had too much of a concept of all the possible possibilities, you know what I'm saying. That's something that again, when you like from the city like DC, is like you're not always thinking
about the possibilities. You're thinking about what's easy, was practical, and that's what she was on, and that's that's what she wanted me to be on, you know what I mean. But I was creative, you know what I'm saying. So I just did nursing because again that's just what I knew was and so that's what I That's what I initially was majoring in.
Okay, so you're where did the ships come in? You realize in the middle of class that you didn't like your classmates.
You said you were no.
So what happened was, so I was doing like I said, I was doing nursing, but we still was trying to rap. And so what we were doing was we were rapping. We were doing a lot of college shows. We both players. Was in fraternities, so we're doing step shows, We're doing college shows, were on the radio all the time, doing features with people in the city, like making music videos.
We was buzzing in this region. And so what happened was I got a call one day from actually another nursing students funny enough, and she was like, yo, like I got something to tell you. Don't tell nobody. I saw your video and I want you to know that Kanye West is my cousin. So of course I'm like, okay, you know what I'm saying. Like at that time, cap wasn't a word.
But it's Okay, cap, right, but tell me more if I would even thought cap because why she didn't want to tell you. Okay, so go ahead, but I'm interested. I want to hear this phone call.
Yeah, that's the first thought I had was like bullshit. And it's one of those things when you're a artist and you're trying to be an audist, you know what I'm saying that or people always giving false promises, you know how it is. Anyway, I'm like cat, but tell me more. So, Kanye's my cousin his family. He's actually from Oklahoma, his family from Oklahoma, and we're all still pretty much here and he's working on a new album. And I sent your video your latest real It was
a song called Robot that was doing pretty well. It was on the radio, dollar we made a video to it. She said, I sent you a video Robot to one of our other cousins, this guy named Tony Williams. Now, I don't know if you're familiar with Tony Williams, but world famous Tony Williams is like somebody who still works with Kaye's to this day. Is Kanye's cousin. He sings on if you listen to college drop out. All the vocals are tony or let registration. All the vocals are tony.
This is it was a pretty big deal at this time. So I'm like again, all right, now it's starting to make sense. Right, so I'm like, okay, put us in touch. Then you know what I'm saying.
So she said, she said it. He liked it.
She said he liked it. She said he liked it. They're working on a new album. They're working on his first album, Good music Play is also working on an album which I later learned what I'll tell you what album I later learned it was. So I sent it to him or I was like, yo, connect this and we'll see what happens. Because again I'm not just happens. You run into people who make these promises and you get disappointed. And again, mind you, at this time, I'm
skipping a few things. But I was accepted to you on the academic probation, meaning like I had to maintain a certain GPA. Right, I've already played semester players. I got a point to GPS, so I had to exactly. So I had to go to to pay some bills, so I had to go to summer school and all types of I'm just laying some foundations so you just understand. And we're also doing all this music. I'm not really focused on nursing for real. I'm only doing nursing because
I'm just have to be in college. I get a call a number I don't recognize. Hello, Yo, it's Tony right. So Tony Williams caused me, and I'm like, oh shit, all right.
So it's becoming less cat.
It is becoming a budget less cats. I'm like, oh, what's up? What's up? You saw your video, heard a few of y'all records, heard y'all been doing your thing. I want to take you to our studio in Oklahoma City. It's called Diamond Studio. So boom and now so now out. We're hitting the home and he's heard some bruhs. Bro, we need to ride to Oklahoma City. So we go to Oklahoma City meet Tony and it's incredible. So he's
giving us the rundown. It really is him. He got on his the Jesus the Good Music chain, he got on the Jesus piece and everything, and we are huge eyes because we were like, what the fuck is going on? This is because just when we just came from DC to fucking Oklahoma thinking like and hear and that were bumping into good music. That's crazy, right, it just feels so kiss me. So we're there. We So what ends up happening is we end up working with Tony on
a bunch of songs for his first album. We write two songs for him for his and this is a project's coming out on Good Music, and he ends up doing a song for us for one of our like a mixtape we were doing at the time, Average Joe's, and so as we building, he starts to say, Okay, you know what, I never forget this. It was one session that we went to Nate was in the booth, I think, and Tony took off his chain. It was a song that Tony was fucking. He was like, oh,
this is hard. He took off his chain, the good Music chain, and you put it on me. He was like, yo, y'all better get just get ready, now, just get you this, get used to wearing this. I'm like, bro, this is crazy, and he's yo. We're in Hawaii right now recording the album My Beautiful Dog Twist the Fantasy.
So I'm like, favorite record.
But so at the time of course, I'm like, I don't know what that is, but yes, get us to Hawaii's all want to take you to Hawaii, introduce you, like I think this is I think this is a match. And then around this time, Big Sean has just signed. Right, he has been signed for a little bit. Sean was probably there like my key artist at the time. Right, he don't want to get y'all on the song with Sean, Big Sean all of this right, So again we're like,
oh my god, this is crazy. So this is all happening, and I'm getting I'm slipping further and further in my schoolwork because again I'm thinking, it don't matter anyway. I'm about to get signed. I'm about to leave like this don't even you know what I'm saying. I don't even need to be here.
I made it.
And so it's time to put out Tony's project. Like he's getting this project the joint that we wrote wrote them records for. I'm time to put it out or getting ready to put it out, and he's hitting me and he's yo, he needed something like the vocals were off for. Basically, he needed the engineer to send him something. Right,
I'm in I'm trying to focus. I'm on academic probation, and so he keeps calling me, and I step out of class and I a little bit, snap a little bit, and I'm clas d d D D dah, And I never forget the worst he said to me. We had a long conversation, but the worst he said to me, he was like because basically, I was like, Yo, that's your engineer, Like you hit me, Like, just hit your engineer.
And he was like, Yo, in life, if you're going to do something, you gotta be all in one and then two if you want to If you're trying to do something, you need to make sure that you don't want doing it. Like you can't rely on somebody else to do something for you, you know what I mean, when it's an opportunity. That's called when you get an opportunity. Basically, don't rely on somebody else to follow through an opportunity for it. You need to be there to follow through
on yourself. And he hung up and he never spoke again. He never stopped answering our calls, stopped answering our emails. I was hitting up the engineer Chris Cutter at the Diamond studios, couldn't get in touch with nobody. And I always learned a few things from that, Like one it was like one I had, it was ego, right is to be honest, I felt like in that conversation when he had first hit me, he was like screaming on me a little bit, you know what I'm saying. So
I it was ego. It was all ego. And it was also those lessons that Tony said, you gotta if you want something done, you gotta make sure you there to do it by yourself or do it for yourself. And if you're gonna be in something, you gotta be ten toes in. And my boy is so crazy because my boy Nate, he was confused. He's like, Yo, why this nigga not hitting us back. I just told Nate that story maybe six months ago.
Oh my gosh, you was playing like.
You didn't well up, but you didn't. To be honest, it all clicked and I was like, I don't think at the time, I was ready to say, damn, just from that one conversation, he's just gonna stop sucking with us, you know what I'm saying. I don't. I don't know if that was like the thought. So I don't think. I definitely wasn't trying to lie in and be like oh shit. But but when it all did click in and I really okay, I took accountability for maybe the way I responded in that moment. I was like, okay,
it makes sense. I was just I got I'm just to him. I'm probably just a young nigger. He just be like, who you talking to? Like that? So anyway, but I just told that story then Nate six months ago, and he was like, damn, bro, you should have just because here's the other lesson I learned. You should have just asked for help. Because I was in the group.
I was like taking on the leadership role, right, so I'm like, I'm getting all the stuff printed, I'm the one going to the rate like it's a lot on me. So it's probably also just stress. And everybody responds to stressed differently, especially at certain phases in their life, certain phases of their career. And I think the way I responded, I was probably stressed. Whatever. But another lesson I learned, and even this is just Nate telling me this role.
You should have just asked me for help. You should have just told me yo, Tony need this. I can't get to it right now. Can you just handle it? And he was like, I would have just handled it, you know what I'm saying. So anyway, yeah, yeah.
Did you end up finishing school?
Okay, So all of that happened, all that sacrifice, and then at the end of the semester, I get a letter from you saying I can no longer say I have to go. And so again, this is my this is everything, this is our whole. Basically, this is the moment where it's funny because this is where their meals started.
But this is like when my rap career back, the first phase of it ended because I got a letter saying you because of your grades or whatever, like you can no longer continue unless you change a major start all over, you know what I'm saying, which at that point I was there for three years. So what you're telling me, I gotta literally And are.
You telling your mom all this news? You're keeping it all yeah, like come on, let's have common sense.
Come yeah, yeah, I'm keeping it up. But again, and this is why I was just trying to lay the felt I was real. I'm always been independent. It's not like my mom. I was paying my tuition or nothing like I had. I worked two jobs, you know what I'm saying while I was in school. On top of doing the music and making money doing music, I was working, which is another reason probably why my grades wasn't.
You're juggling a lot, make it man.
So I'm still Jamaica. I work hell of jobs now but all day, you know what I'm saying. But so anyway, they got that letter, told my boy I gotta go, and that was that, you know what I'm saying that that that was the end, the beginning and end. We had really tried to pursue RAP for all of those three years, and yeah, it went up in the ball of flames, as they say, Hold I turned this one down, this one, Yeah, there we go. So yeah, after all of that, but here's the thing. So that happened, and
again how things just work out. My mom happened to be a nurse at Howard's Student Health Center. So I did tell her. Of course, I'm like, yo, I don't think I'm gonna stay here.
I was.
I don't think. I was like yo, I don't think this is what I was. I don't think I'm gonna stay here because the tuition's going up and I don't know if I can cover it. And so she was like, look, I work here at Howard. I've been here for two years now. If an employee works at Howard for two years, the children can go to Howard for free. So she was like, if you want, you can come finish here. And so what I did was I told her. I was like, I don't know if I get in. You
know what I'm saying. Can you help me? And so she talked to the She was like, I know the people in the nursing department. So I had to transfer to Howard under as a nursing student. The dean of nursing saw my transcripts was like, Crystal, I'll accept him in. But when he come in, he got to change his major. So I got into Howard, got to go to for free, and was able to change my major and just do another two years psychology psychology.
So I ended up graduating, getting closer to the novel land.
Yeah, I'm sorry if minueis tell.
Me you no, it's good. I'm trying to.
So I got the musician. I feel like the promise Boys is coming soon, right.
It's just around the corner because I can skip over a lot here. So when I get to Howard, basically the music's done. I'm focusing now on what I'm gonna do for my career.
And your boys stayed back and he.
Stayed in Oklahoma. Yeah he's still out there. He's in Dallas, Texas now. But so now I'm at Howard and now it's time to focus and really lock in. Fuck, So what I'm gonna do. So what I ended up getting into with education, I did a program at the college called Teach for America, started teaching in DC, and I got put in. I got placed in the kindergarten classroom. While I was at Howard, I was teaching the middle of high school boys, which is a lot of what
Promised Boys like. A lot of what I pulled from that experience is in Promise boys. But after school, I started teaching, and I was teaching kindergarten at first, and I quickly realized, again me being Jamaican, as you call it, I didn't say and that you said it. But again I'm hustling, right, I'm like, Okay, I'm teaching. I'm reading these kids these books that are very easy to write. The dog jumps, the dog runs.
That's how I feel. What I read to my daughter right now, who wrote this.
It's like I could write this though, I could write this book. And so that's what I started doing. I started writing children's books, and I started finding pictures online and match the words that I was writing. And my kids, my students, was taking to the books so much that in the principal so she's like, yo, like we should
pitch this to the whole child network. And so I pitched a children's book series to the Titter Network and before I know what, they gave me a check to put my books in all of their schools across the country. My children's books. Yeah, so that was the That was like the first entry into and so get me being a hustle, I'm like, oh shit, that was Yeah.
You can never as an entrepreneur tastes one drip of blood. Yeah, you know what I'm saying, like, Oh, that's possibility.
Exactly, there's something over here.
So I'm getting excited, you know what I'm saying.
So that's what I So that happened and I'm like, oh, yeah, let's run this up. And so I started writing children's book and while I was in Tea for America. They also had me get a master's in curriculum and instruction. So I doubled down and write a curriculum manual to go along with the books, and I started consulting. I started selling the books in the curriculum to schools all across the country. Texas, Alabama, California. It's going crazy.
You you the gangs, the kindergarten teachers.
I was.
She was like, I'm not just taking this teacher.
Salary's they gotta pay teachers more. That's really what it is. They gotta pay teachers more. That's a whole other conversation. But so I'm doing that. I'm doing that. I'm doing that.
It's really brilliant.
Actually, if you think about to put it together, a curriculum with the.
Kids with a little black girl on the front. You know what I'm saying, year is this?
This is before COVID.
Oh for sure, this is twenty I was doing this like twenty fifteen.
And the only reason why I want to highlight that is because during COVID there was this big spike in supporting black businesses. Oh what you were able to accomplish at the timing that you were able to accomplish, I would say would be considered a really big fea for sure.
No, I appreciate that now. It was definitely ahead of his time, ahead of his time. For short.
Shout outs to you for thinking outside the box and even taking the initiative to write the books for the kids. It showed that you really cared about the kids, for sure, because even I'm not gonna lie, I've been low key writing some kids books because some of the kid's books sucks so bad. Yeah, I'm like, can we at least have an underlying message and story? I want to hear
the hero's journey but with the three letter words. But yeah, I agree because I used to think Doctor Zeus was great, and then I got kids and a daughter, and I said, oh.
I was wondering eating this.
Sense, you know, And.
And I don't even want to take us off track too much, but Baby Shark happens to be one of those songs where it's like the deer ran away with the lion or whatever. You're like, why what, what sense does this lie even make? One day she's gonna grow up and go The dere and the lion are not friends. The needs there like you know what I'm saying, See these things and you're like, why even make up this lie?
It doesn't make sense? And that's what I'm.
Glad you saw it and you solved the problem and you got your hands thirty.
I was just about to say something because I go around to like colleges and and stuff all the time. It's something I always say, is it's the four p's. It's passion, it's purpose, it's prosperity, and then it's proficiency, which is what are you good at? What are you talent to that? What are you passionate about me? I'm passionate about writing, I'm passionate about storytelling. Purpose, These kids
need books with characters that look like them. Prosperity again, I'm thinking, like, okay, all of these is one hundred books in this class, it's five classrooms in the school. If I'm writing, you know what I'm saying, booming, that's money there. And then proficiency. I'm good at writing because I spent all of my formative years writing lyrics. So I put so that's when I approach it is I'm putting these four piece together. Like wherever those intersect, I
think is where you're gonna find your niche. So anyway, so I did all of that. But now even though I'm writing the Chordan's book, because once I wrote books in the curriculum, it's kind now I'm just selling right now my salesman. And I'm also very much in education, which is still not necessarily my bag. I want to be an artist. I want to so anyway, So that's how I got into books. That's the taket stuff. It's going to come back. Then I saw a movie. I saw a movie called Foodville Station.
I remember in that movie, and I'll tell you why I remember. Yeah, you already know what I'm about to say.
Tell me m b Oh, my goodness, you don't know.
Yeah, that has been my crush forever since that movie. No, I've like Michael B.
Jordan shout outs to the true ones that really had a crush on him since he was on I think it was All My Children or one of those soap opera shows from the Wired days.
I knew he was also in this movie called Chronicle. Some people know that movie Chronicle.
I don't know all his movies, yeah, because I like him more for his looks than But alright, let's stay.
On top of and so I guess it's like maybe twenty sixteen or so. So anyway, it hit me so hard. It's about Oscar Grant and around this time is when a lot of the you Got Trade my Mad Mike shit was just happening. It's still happening right all the time, man, and so it really hit me. But this movie particularly hit me. And it's like, yo, who made this? And so I went to look up the filmmaking. Of course I come across this guy, Ryan Cooger, cool and the
way he spoke. I was watching his interviews and everything, and it's like something about him like I connected to and just knowing his background, how he was like, yo, I didn't come from making films. I came I was an athlete, college athlete. Again, it just connected with me, I was. It made me feel like, it made me basically made me feel like, oh shit, like it's possible, like I could become a filmmaker. Like I've always been a huge movie buff. So I was like, Okay, maybe
that's a thing. Maybe I could be a filmmaker, right, maybe I could write stories. And so anyway I heard he went to the school USC which is supposed to be the best film school in the world. So I'm like, all right, Bell, I just go to USC too.
Then was cracking up these degrees.
Boy bruh, I got Yeah, I went from a point to nine to hold in. Yeah, I'm about to go. I'm gonna go back and get I'm gonna get my doctorate soon. But yeah, so I make my first you gotta make a movie to get an se. I made my first movie. It did surprisingly well. It was featured in place in four thirty Under thirty all of this stuff. Not only did I end up getting in the sc but I got a full ride from George Lucas.
But you had to do the film before you even get in.
Yes, you got to make a five minute film before you even get in.
Jesus.
Yeah. But it again, like you said earlier, when things when you know when something's going well, you lean in. So when I got in and got the scholarship and everything, and read my letter from George Lucas and all of this, I'm like, oh, Okay, there's something here, and so I go to SC. I make a bunch of more movies, write a bunch of scripts. I actually real quick before because this is about to take us into to present day. But while I was at SC, I got to work
for Lebron James. So I worked over at spring Hill when I was there, while we were making Space Jam, which of course one of the producers on Space Jam is Ryan Coogler.
Okay, and so get real close to Ryan.
So this is the thing, is like, now I'm looking at the signs too. You know what I'm saying. Now I'm driving him around on the w B lot. This the same guy that I saw his interview You know what I'm saying four years ago that made me even want to become a filmmaker. Now I'm driving him around on the w B lot. You know what I'm saying, Like it's it's crazy. So anyway, so I did that while I was at SC, write scripts, made some movies, all did pretty well, and then I graduated from SC
in twenty twenty. Of course, twenty twenty Boom, Pandemic hits, Everything go crazy right KOs madness said, la man, it is what the fuck is going on? And that happens. And again in retrospect, particularly when you like talk through these type of things, you had these little realizations. But like for me, my whole thing was like all right, I gotta write, like I just want to write now. I know there was like probably just anxieties, yo, I gotta just you know what I'm saying, just my brain
trying to do something. But I started writing every single day pretty much all day, all day. So twenty twenty, I'm doing that.
How are you supporting yourself through the pandemic?
Shit? The government?
Oh you're doing the unemployment checks like the highest paid unemployment. Yeah yeah, I didn't unemployment.
Man, you should have? Should you should? I tell everybody they get a chance to eat off the government, do it because they gonna get off you.
Back, and we're gonna make that a little clip, you know.
What I'm saying. So yeah, So I'm writing every day and twenty twenty one comes around. I ended up getting a gig working on Mandalorian, which is again because my stage name is ben Kenobe, so it's which I pulled from Star Wars. So all of this is George Lucas Kalla ship and working on Mandalorians all just cool shit. While I'm working on Mandalorian, a lot of that writing idea started to pay off. I sold my first book series. The first one was Ethan Fairmont. It was a middle
grade series. The second one was Promise Boys. Right now. Promise Boys was really unique because Promise Boys was the biggest publishing deal for young adult debut author ever. It was like a huge publishing deal. And the way I got into that was basically, I was writing a bunch of scripts a.
Huge publishing deal for Breakthrough but not and I like to ask this, not with the category black at.
It, no, no, but young adult though young.
Adult no that, but that makes a difference another incredible feed. Yes, So that's bigger than just micro.
Targ for sure, especially coming from like self publishing, my own you know what I'm saying, my own Chorgre's books all fucking Vista print or whatever I with Lulu or something I was using. But yeah, so the book goes crazy, like really crazy. I never forget. It was interesting because when the announcement was made about the book on set on Mandalorian, I was an assistant to one of the EPs, one of the showrunners, and so when you're in the
you have a certain kind of role. But when the news came and about the deal and the size of the deal, it was just interesting how I never forget just how I felt like dynamic started to change about how people were looking at me on set. It was just interesting. But that's Hollywood, and so that happens. And then, of course, because of the size of the deal, it goes on to be sold as a TV show.
I told myself I wasn't gonna whole bad questions, but go ahead, go ahead.
How much?
What was the size of the deal? Can you wreak it down?
Please? It was a seven figured deal. There's a seven figured deal, and I think, man, I'll leave it that. It was a little over m yeah, in a quarter or something like that.
Okay, And you got the call to get this deal. Okay, set, yep, we're gonna rewind. So you get the deal. How exactly did you end up coming pitching and getting into this position?
Okay? So while all of that writing I was doing, I wrote a script. Me and my co writer. We wrote a script. And my core writer is also a novelist, and so I think this is probably done by the way. I think I can probably mix this. Yeah, go ahead then, and he's a novelist, and so we wrote the script. This is not gonna taste good. I can tell.
You, you know what, your story is really good?
So it's okay, I'm just going to eat there you.
Go, please do. I don't want to make you sick. So he's a novelist. So we're writing scripts, and I came across this property, this IP, and Hollywood loves IP, and I get it in some cases some type of cases, I don't. But I came across this property, this old comic, it's the first black comic book ever happens to be in public domain. And so we wrote a script based on that, and we sent it to his agent to figure out. Before we knew it was in public domain, it was just trying to get some clarity.
What does that mean? Public domain?
It basically means anybody can use it for free. You know, typically you got a license or you gotta pay somebody.
How does it end up in public domain?
It's typically if basically time period if it comes out before I forget the exact year, but it's a certain time period if it comes out, if it came out at a certain point, anything that comes out a lot of people don't know. A lot of Disney shit is public domain. Little Mermaid is actually public domain. Like me and you can write a Little Mermaid, but the freak out. I'm not kidding. We can't use like some of the
same elements that Disney had put into their stuff. But the concept of Little Mermaid or I think also Jungle Book, a lot of it is public domains. So anyway, public domain means you can use it for free. Essentially, that's the short, shortes short.
But you can't use the characters. Stop visiting with your mic.
Oh my fault. I even realized that was the mic my fault.
What is this thing?
Yeah? No, you can use as long as it's not a character invented by Disney, right, or a character invented by whatever.
So you can use like the synopsis of the book.
Or exactly the basic premise, the basic premise you can use. Yeah, so we can. Yeah, we could go write the Laddin. We can write in a Latin book if we wanted to.
Okay, so you so you see this black comic.
Which is great because then yeah, so I see this black comic is in a public man like huh. I got an idea, And again I love mysteries and it's about a detective. I love that type of ship. The first book I really read that got me in the reading was a guy named Walter Mosley, who did Devil in the Blue Dress. But anyway, so we did that, we send it to this agent to see to inquire about the rights before we learned it was in public domain, and she was so interested in the voice of the script.
And so she asked her client who I was working with, who did you write this with? Because it's a black character. My co writer is white, and she I think she understood.
Like your writer a guy or girl?
Yeah, yeah, so yo, who did you write this with? And so he told her about me, and she is a more established book agent. So that's how the whole thing came about. It's like she had me meet with another one of her clients and we talked about some ideas and they pitched me a couple of ideas and asked me and see, this is why I gave that all of that context, because they were already trying to
crack a mystery set in all boys school. So when I tell you I worked with all boys, it was like when they heard my story and they heard that I love, They're like, oh shit, you are the guy for me. So anyways, that's how writing the book came about. And then from there it was pretty traditional. I wrote the book, did a treatment, and then they just took it out. They took it out to town and people just went crazy over it was a bit and wool.
So that's how it all came about. And look at me, I watched it.
Definitely looks like it's going to be a dishmade by man.
It is that. But so that's how that happened.
Right, Should he pour some water in it or something?
I feel like you should add Is that what it's supposed.
To look like?
No, not really.
I think if you add water or something to it.
Okay, maybe I had a little bit of water. Shut So we just saying thank you, thank you. Someone looks stupid.
You can never look so just you talking it makes it impossible stupid.
Yeah, so that's the deal right again. Because of the size of the deal, it goes on to be sold Netflix, Obama, all of the cool headline stuff, and it sounds really cool. Only that, so I think we ended up wrapping up the deal in the end of twenty twenty two. Twenty twenty three comes and we are stating up the room to write the show. But now Hollywood goes on strike.
Oh my god, that's right.
Oh my god, you know what I'm saying. So I'm thinking I'm about to get my big I'm about to write my first show. I was about to go crazy boom right or straight and so at this time. So now I'm like, all right, So now TV stopped. And by the way, in this amount of time, we also sold another TV show, a separate one that I could go on all these different tangents. But we sold another TV show to c W. But again that one's just stopped too, put halt to everything.
And again me and the show was picked up was just stuck. And that's a risky thing because I've heard stories getting picked up and then something like this happens and then it just goes done. I know this because Nick Cannon told us he bought a house and ended up basically broke again off of a deal that got picked dropped.
Yep, that's what happens, right, And this is what and this is what we're worried about at the time. And so that's happening. Our shows are done. I'm like, okay, fuck, what's going on with Hollywood? Is it going to be TV? Is it gonna be movies? So I started writing my next again. I start writing my next book, which is up Big Smoke. So this is twenty twenty three.
I start righting, So Promise Boys is out, probably the book is out.
Yeah, it come out TV.
The TV on the Promised Boys is on hold.
It's on hold.
Okay, now you're like on to the next on them up in Smoke and Smoke.
Okay, Before we get to Up and Smoke, can we talk about the Obama's getting involved with the Obama production company get involved. We cannot skip over that.
That's huge. Yeah, So take me back to what was going on during that time.
So this is around again. This is like towards the end of twenty twenty two. Much like the book, the bidding war going on. You meeting with all these different publishers, similarly the show all these different publish or all these different production companies production pods.
And are you getting in front of them because of the booking agent.
I'm getting in front of them because really because of the size of the book deal everybody. So it was a big article, right, So of course again it's that's the Hollywood things. Like it was hot in this one moment and so we shout.
Us to all the publishers out there that make sure that you.
Know what I'm saying. Shout out to Mai my publishers over at McMillan and Morgan. And then so at that time, yeah, they it was a big article about the size of the you. And so because of that, all of the production companies are like, yo, who is this? How do we And then of course the article is like emerging filmmaker, big deals. So now they're like, oh, not just an author, filmmaker, oh usc oh George Lucas koala, Oh you know what I'm saying, A bff, you know what I'm saying. All
of these things start to just line up. So all of these publishers or all of these production companies excuse me, are wanting to meet. And so of course we met with some I'm trying to I'm also in this, in this fame, trying to think like what I can't say, what I can't say, But there were there were some people that I was hoping, there were some other a lot of people that we met with, and there was
probably two people at the top on my list. It was I think I can say this, It was the Obamas, and then it was Jay Z And so these are the two. So I'm meeting with all these productions and I'm like, yo, all right, this is an Obama whole, Obama whole. Like these are like our dads, you know what I'm saying, these are both our dads.
Oh my goodness of all things, I did not expect you to say, oh, Pama or jay Z. I promise you I would have been doing that same dance and I would have been saying.
Yeah, no, it was something I would have because they're both first families. Ear to ear, Yeah, yeah.
The heights of happiness. I don't know how you even keep your feet on the ground because you try not to get your hopes up to it.
All right, Yeah, they both first fans you got hold of and B and then you got pro for Yeah. I'm just like these are too. These are just iconic blackness. And so anyway, so it's like long story short, Higher Ground and also just coming to call Temple Hill, which has a lot of adaptation, particularly hya they coming out on top.
And yeah, and they came out on top. Because I have to know what was the deal breaker.
There was a few different things. One at the time, Higher Ground had a deal with Netflix, so it's like cool, like this is really cool, I think. Also, again I'm just trying to choose my words the right way. I think it's like just thinking about who do because then you got to consider who do you feel like move the needle at a particular place more more? You know what I'm saying, You think like.
A pure businessman.
Yeah, you're like, which has the most leverage in the game exactly if you move the names aside, which resume clears out exactly?
And I can imagine, to.
Be quite transparent, there was a lot of other players in this. It's not this is just Nick Brooks's thing, right, there's a lot of the players. Is the the agency, Like, there's people who put this whole package together, a lot of other players, some of which like got nicer watches than me, you know what I'm saying. So it's like there's a lot of it's a lot of it's a lot of cooks.
I'm going to use that, you know.
So it's not just because I might have said hole to be honest, but it's a lot. It's a lot going on. So yeah, so that happens. But then again we get to so yeah, so new're high ground, Timple Hill, We're at Netflix, that's what they're I want to say, overall, I think they had overall there at that time, and yeah, boom, that was that. So I'm like, cool, I'm about to be I'm about to have a TV show. Shit, I might direct the pilot, like I'm going crazy in my head.
But then twenty twenty three rolls around and it's like the industry shuts down again.
Yeah I remember that.
You know what I'm saying, And it's like now everybody's out, people again, losing jobs, executives getting cut left and right, and now we're like, yeah, so now what is it? You know what I'm saying, which again is why Okay, I go back into my just like how because one thing I skipped over is when twenty twenty happened, I didn't only start writing books again. I started making music again, you know what I'm saying, And so that was helping me.
I had got a few salt like I did music for I had a song on like a Clone tip ro big Netflix movie shout out to Joel, and I was putting out EPs and so I was doing little things. But then the TV stuff started to take off on like boom, But then Pandemic or then the strike everything clops again. So now I'm back and let me go right again, make music again, you know what I mean. So it's just like you know what I'm saying, jump rope. So before you.
Get into music, let's sit down. Come sit with me. Do you want to serve us up?
Yeah?
I guess I played us up. We're gonna eat your your rotale. Yeah, cheers.
Oh it ain't too bad. Real, What did you think? You know what?
I thought it was gonna be salty because you were going in on that. He was going in on that. Lorries, I said, boy, at the heavens, please, but no, it's great. Oh you were killed us. You ain't gonna take just one bite.
It's actually.
Like that. It's pretty good.
That's a pretty good.
I know this is a crunchy meal guys for all your listeners, but it's good.
S r M whatever, right R.
I saw this girl on the one of those channels and she was slurping, and I was like, looked at her views and I said, damn, I could totally be a slurper.
Yeah, I could totally.
You can make money off anything now.
And I was watching her eating and the only thing against me the most on those videos is like where they buy their.
Food.
Okay, I'm like, where did you find this gigantic crab? Like what story is selling these?
But take me back to you being and you're getting back into music.
Yeah, like I said, Yeah, when twenty happened, I didn't just start writing every day. I started making music again just again or release as an artist, as a musician, just this is what I love to do, not thinking anything of it. And then I'll put out.
My first project and this is solo homie from.
Solo, So this is my first Yeah, this is now just been Kenobi solo artists and yeah, I would to be honest, I was just doing it for fun. It's really nothing to report other than because and this is why I just like doing stuff like and people again people, when people ask me about my story and my journey, I always mentioned, like one, just doing just put yourself out there, but also just being flexible like and a lot of these points when there was an obstacle or
a barrier, it's just about how you pivot. That's what I call it. The pivot. What's your pivot? The art of the pivot, what's your pivot? Yeah, So when that happened. I just I was making music. But because I was making this is what I was gonna say. Because I was making music, I caught the attention of a director who I actually had met at spring Hill when who was writing on Space Down. His name is Joelle Taylor. Just a brilliant guy. He's also the director of They
Clone Tyrone. But he heard my music just because we had tapped in when I was working from when I was working at spring Hill. He was like, Yo, you're actually really dope. Like I want you to work on the soundtrack for They Clone Tyrone. So now all of a sudden, oh the soundtrack.
Yeah, a really big check.
So you know, I got invited to the writers camp to work on the soundtrack. I did about and again this is one of those moments where you think, oh shit, Like by this time, I'm jaded, so I don't nothing excite me, to be honest, nothing excites me.
Really, you know what I'm saying in a different way.
Oh no, just like as far as like thinking oh this is my big break, you know what I mean? That is just not your numb now yeah it doesn't. It's just it's like whatever.
But at this point, all your endeavors are leading to a life that is more stable or do you feel like it's still rocky in your finances.
It's definitely stable, it's just not what I envision or what I want. You know what I'm saying. I have a really big dream both, so it's certainly stable, but it's just yeah, it's just I'm not where I want to be.
Now you're doing the music for the soundtrack, are you starting to work up on.
Up and smoke?
At this time? I'm focusing on the music, thinking that's gonna pop. And of course, all the songs I worked on at the writers camp, none of them got picked for the soundtrack. Yes, exactly, see, and that's what I'm saying.
It's like that, you know, that's where God, you're jaded at that point, you.
Know what I'm saying, because it imagine I was like, oh my god, I'm about to But here's the cool thing, because again, because of my relationship with Joelle, he actually hit me and was like, Yo, do you have anything from your own catalog that we can use? And so again this is why it's so important to just do stuff, because had I not just started making music, I would have my answer would have been no, I just would
have been shut out of luck. But because I had been making music, I seen him a few tracks on my own and one actually got selected. So I ended up did having a song in the movie. So again it's just how you move. But anyway, so now I'm doing that, right. This is all leading us back up to twenty twenty three write a Strike. So now, because the TV show's not going and we had, like I said, we had two shows that I thought I was going to be consuming my time. Because that all stopped, I'm
now writing Up in Smoke. So twenty twenty three, I start writing Up in Smoke. I did the first fifteen pages, then the first thirty pages, then the first fifty pages. I was like, yoah, fuck with this, and I sent it off to my editor at McMillan, who edited Promise Boys, and he was like, Yo, this is really great. We want it. And so then I had another publishing deal, right, So I sold Up in Smoke in twenty twenty three to McMillan.
Wow, yeah, and that's your second book to that's.
My second young adult novel. It'll be my fifth novel. Wow yeah, it'll be my fifth novel.
Under them no fifth in general exactly.
Okay, yeah, but yes, my second one with them with McMillan, Wow, yeah, I smoke and so this is all twenty twenty three. I'm like, okay, boom up in smoke. That's gonna be my next one. But I'm also again, because I'm not doing the shows, the TV shows, I'm like going back to the music, and so I'm making music, and it dawned on me it'd be a really cool idea. Another thing I do is like multiple POV. So Promise Boys is three boys, he's three protagonists. Is that what means points of view.
Points of view POV? Yeah, three different points.
Of view, three different like I don't ever seen like vantage point or what's some other ones. It's a ton of them that like rotate these or what's the one I think fiction.
I don't know if this is a good example of POV, but where the five boys the way they wrote that script where the five boys, we're in the park, Yes, when they see us, when they see yeah, yeah, I thought that that was really a great one.
It's really cool that you pulled that out because when they see us was actually somewhat of a count for Promise Boys. Particularly the TV show. So yeah, yeah, you're totally right. Yeah, when they see us.
So that's a good example of POV.
That's a good example of of multiple POV.
So you try to write with three po and minimum of three just.
Multiple just in general. It's not it's no number, no minimum, just it's just particularly for mystery. It helps hide secrets and clues like for mysteries and makes it more compelling. You take a movie like knoves Out, We're the classic is clue. You have all of these different people with all their own povs. They all see things differently, they all have secrets, they all are hiding things from each other. That just helps create like a compelling space for mystery.
So that's why it's cool to do it, and particularly in pros and novel form. So Promised Boys is three POV's Up and Smoke is two Cooper and Monique. But I thought it'd be really cool to include a third POV in the form of a rap album and have the rap album have clues to the murder in the book.
Okay, oh, so that's so Up in Smoke and your album go together.
It's a package deal.
It's a package deal.
And so when you purchase Up and Smoke, does the book come with a downloadable.
Not necessarily, but we are doing We're doing certain things. So for example, we're doing a pre order campaign right now. If you pre order Up and Smoke now, you will get a free you'll get a track, you'll get unreleased tracked from the album.
Okay, you know, and then that will point to a clue in the book exactly.
I like it.
Yeah.
I was out somewhere in Texas and I saw a bunch of people following each other with their phones out and I saw I was like, he must be chasing up Pokemon. So I feel like when they read Up and Smoke, it's like a similar engagement where if they listen to it they can.
Figure it all out, stuff out. That's pretty amazing. Yeah, I think, very hard to do.
It's a lot of writing. It's fourteen tracks on the album, so hell a lot of writing. And it's just a cool idea. And like my whole thing Promised Boys are similar. Is like I want to pull in what the industry will call like reluctant readers or edit reluctant readers, kids who just don't typically pick up a book. And I get Again, I get asked a lot like what makes like why don't kids read it? Or are there books
for all kids? Of course they're all like the only reason why a kid is not reading book is because they haven't found the right book. And so I like to write books. You know what I'm saying. Yeah, I like to write books that feature again that I'm from DC. I grew up in DC, and so I write books that I know kids who growing up in DC would respond to. I'm putting things in the book that either I've experienced, our friends have experienced, or kids that I've
taught have experience. I used to coach Little League football, Like I know these kids. I know these young men. So I'm trying to write books for them for real, and it is working. I have gotten calls from grown men who have been like bro, like my fifteen year old son is reading because of you. Thank you. You know what I'm saying. So I say that to say, it's like for me, putting the album with the book is another way of like, how do I engage? How do I engage? How do I make this interactive? How
do I open up? How do I connect both dots? How do I connect people? To my music. How do I connect people to my books? On both fans?
And that's what I was about to say next. I'm a huge jay Z fan. Yes, gigantic, gigantic. There's a painting of jay Z in.
Yes about that when I was like twenty four and had a shift here.
But I brought up jay Z because if you were to say, if you're out there listening and you want to say, Okay, I'm not necessarily ready to read up and smoke, but you buy the album, then after listening to the album you made, you're gonna want want to read the book. And I only reference that to Jay because a lot of times if you even get a micro nugget of what was going on and he was writing record, you're like, oh my god, that's what I
was having in There is some parallel. So I like that you did try the music route, because, especially in the black and brown market, we definitely find I think find our relatability more in music than yes books for whatever reason. But yeah, I like that they could either pick the music, yeah, or the book.
And you tell me the reason.
The reason is because in music and when you say black and brown and you know it's also from particularly particular neighborhoods, often lower social economic status neighborhoods. The music calls to exactly our day to day life, what'll be going through. It's familiar, and I think sometimes with books, people are not empowered to write those same things. I think it's I'll give you an example for me, something I hear from my purpose I didn't necessarily hear from
my publisher. But sometimes what they imply is that that black boys don't read, and the reason is because we're not writing books like Promise Boys, or we're not writing books like Up and Smoke. It's like a chicken in the egg. The reason people aren't writing those books is because publishers are not publishing them. You know what I means, Like, the reason the kids are not reading again goes back because they don't have the books that are familiar to them.
So when you say it's like, for whatever reason, we relate more to the music, because well, people are making familiar music. People are not necessarily writing familiar books for all types of people. You know what I'm saying from all these places that we come from, and hopefully that's what I'm trying to do with Promise Boys, Up and smoke and all the things that I do.
Yeah, I think you do a really great job of also letting your light shine and allowing others to do the same.
I think what can be said.
To a company what you just said is like seeing a young black author have a huge writing deal, someone that also started in music, something that they can look at and say, oh, I can do it. I had an interview previously where the guy said he wanted to be a kindergarten teacher because he only had one black male kindergarten teacher in the school. So he was just
like that one guy had such a huge impact. So it is a chicken in the egg situation that a lot of opportunities weren't given to us for such a long time. And the fact that you can go on camera and someone, whether it's one person or two people or five million people, hear this interview and say, wait a minute, I can be like him, or like how Ryan Coogler had inspired you. Wait a minute, that one interview at the right time.
So kudos to you.
All the young kids who like kids who rap you can write books and you just don't know they can do it.
Yeah, a lot of people don't even think I had enough.
I love the idea of having authors because it switches up. Originally, when we were going to do the interview, I was like, I'm going to stay away from the music because it's to me, has become like the standard stereotype. But to say a best selling author who has had so many pivots and relatability, it's a beautiful story, and I see why the book and the music are tied together in your mission. But I really appreciate what you've done here,
and your cooking is not too bad. I was only choosing not to eat at all, guys, because I didn't want to chew in the ears. But look at to that camera and tell everybody where they could keep up with everything.
Nick Brooks, Ye, yeah, you can find me at my website just benickbooks dot com, t G and I see kb r o ks dot com. Find your Instagram Official Nickbrooks, TikTok Official Nick Brooks. You could google Nick Brooks.
Yeah, it's very he's very Google Google.
You can google Nick Brooks.
And then up in smoke drops.
Yeah.
May six, So you guys, by the by the time this interview drops, the books, we'll try to make sure it releases around the same week.
There we go.
That'll be the goal we shoot for me. There we go, so we can help push the promotion.
Let's do it.
But yeah, guys, and then also right now out on shelves is promised.
Boys. I am not a huge fiction reader, but I will be reading this book.
Guys, there we go, so it looks let me know what you think. Yes, and I'm into thrillers, so I know I'm gonna do this book even though it ends in murder.
And you can pre order Up and Smoke Lamb. So if you go to the website.
And you can order the music first. If you don't order the buck getro vice versa. Remember that, guys. All right, thanks for tuning in. Peace out, y'all. Peace for more eating while broke from iHeartRadio and The Black Effect, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.