*Chiwetel Ejiofor is opening up about starring in the “Rob Peace” biopic based on “The Short and Tragic Life of Rob Peace.”
Ejiofor wrote and directed the film based on the New York Times bestseller by Jeff Hobbs. “Rob Peace” is based on the true story of a brilliant young man (Jay Will) torn between his father’s shadowed past and his own promising future. Raised by his devoted mother (Mary J. Blige), Rob risks everything he has worked for to free his imprisoned father (Ejiofor).
Blige serves as an executive producer on the project along with Jamin O’Brien, Morgan Earnest, Luke Rodgers, Jeff Skoll, Robert Kessel, Bruce Evans, Faye Stapleton, Ali Jazayeri, and David Gendron. The producing team includes Antoine Fuqua, Rebecca Hobbs, Jeffrey Soros, Simon Horsman, Andrea Calderwood, Kat Samick, Alex Kurtzman and Jenny Lumet.
Speaking to Screen Rant, Ejiofor explained what inspired you to take on Rob’s journey and tell this story.
“I read the book not long after it came out, this is the book by Jeff Hobbs, Rob’s roommate at Yale, and I was just really struck by the fact that, I guess I had been thinking in a slightly sort of not constructed way about some of these issues. About some of these things, about some of the kind of systemic challenges that can center on individuals,” Ejiofor said.
“And then reading the book and understanding Rob’s journey it highlighted and just shed this incredible light on all of these systemic intersections,” he continued. “Rob is existing as a brilliant young man full of all of this potential, I mean extraordinary, limitless potential really, and this brilliant mind. He’s existing in these intersections of race, of housing, of education, of the criminal justice system. These intersections, for all of his capacity to rise above or engage the world, has this effect on him.”
The actor added, “And almost by definition it’s almost in a way, designed to have that effect. So I was so struck by trying to bear witness to this. The stories that came out around Rob after all these events took place were I think in the sort of media world and the media landscape were incredibly judgmental of Rob and were judgmental of his choices in a way that missed, to my thinking, the real point of what was going on. That Rob was challenged ultimately by systems. I really wanted to talk about that on film,” Ejiofor said.
“Rob Peace” opened in theaters August. 16.
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