Now Playing loading...

Omari Hardwick discusses his Real to Reel relationship and supporting black creatives

by

Courtesy of Poetics

Omari Hardwick is making sure to pay it forward. For a third year in a row, the actor-writer-poet is returning as a spokesperson for Real to Reel, a national short film competition and screening tour that helps open doors for the next wave of black creatives.

Hardwick tells ABC Radio that he personally feels connected to the initiative.

“Once I start a task, it’s just important. It’s never money, when you do this kind of work,” Hardwick says. “It’s always the money when it’s about business. But this is business at large.”

He continues, “The greater voice in the greater conversation from an actor, from an artist, from a poet, from a musician is that of expounding upon those stories that I have to tell. So these kids tell my story.”

The Power star says he’s also happy to be a mentor to this year’s winner. Rashad Frett, and other up-and-coming creatives and filmmakers because they represent him, and his narrative.

“They tell it from a perspective of a face that looks like mine, from a voice that sounds like mine,” Hardwick says. “Not the same gender as me in terms of black female storytellers, but we all are of the same culture and the same source. So, for me that’s why I can’t really leave them. They’re there for me so I got to be there for them.”

Copyright © 2019, ABC Radio. All rights reserved.


Comments are closed.