Ever since Prince passed away on April 21st, an incredible outpouring of tributes have come out from all those associated with the Purple One. Whether it was musicians, who have performed covers of Prince’s music across an incredible bounty of genres, friends, filmmakers and more, anyone who knew or was inspired by Prince has openly showed their love.
Among those many famed friends was the master director Spike Lee, who worked with Prince to score music for his films in the past. Lee has led his own tributes to Prince in recent memory, which was the main topic of conversation between the director and Okayplayer. Of course, the possibility of a Prince documentary or biopic was discussed in the interview. Lee said that Prince’s legacy was beyond two hours, and that “it would have to be like a 10-part series.”
You can read Spike Lee’s full comments below.
Oh, people ask me that left and right. You know, but here’s the thing. I’m going to I’m not gonna reach out to the family right now. It’s way too soon. Everybody and their mother is calling the estate to talk to Prince’s sister and siblings about stuff. You know, trying to make deals and whatnot. I can wait, but I would love to do it. And I think that with him, it would have to be like a 10-part series. You just can’t do that…legacy in two hours. You can’t do it. It would be injustice. It would have to be like a 10-part series.
He also said that the series would have to be as a documentary and not a biopic movie. “I think a studio would make a film a narrative of Prince, which is not what I would like to do. To me, if I was going to try to justice to his life…for me it has to be a documentary, not as a narrative. You couldn’t make Prince’s life into a movie.” And also, as Spike Lee aptly points out, “I can’t do a movie on a Prince. Who’s gonna play Michael, who’s gonna play Prince?”
No one’s going to play Prince.
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