"The Blackening" Cast Says You Can't Quantify Blackness

The Blackening is finally upon us.

The film is about seven friends who go away for the weekend but find themselves trapped in a spooky cabin with a killer who has a vendetta. So, every person must test their street smarts and knowledge of horror movies against the murderer just to stay alive.

What’s so special about this horror film? All one has to do is read the name and look at the trailer to find out that the movie is Black! But with a horror film with an all-Black cast, who will die first?

The movie stars Grace Byers as Allison, Sinqua Walls as Nnamdi, Melvin Gregg as King, Antoinette Robertson as Lisa, Dewayne Perkins as Dewayne, X Mayo as Shanika and Yvonne Orji as Morgan.

The Quintessential Gentleman caught up with the cast to discuss the film and its impact on future horror films.

Perkins, who is also the co-writer of the film, said the idea was thought about in Chicago when he was making an all-Black sketch. He happened to think about having an all-Black cast in a horror movie and what would be the system in place to see who would die first. Who is the Blackest out of the group became the determining factor.

“And then once we filmed it for Comedy Central with my group 3Peat, and Tracy (Oliver) saw it, she hit me up and was like, ‘This should be a film.’ And you know, now it is. And we just really wanted to expand on that premise, in a deeper, funner, and entertaining way,” Perkins said.

The movie has many entertaining scenes, especially the scenes with Gregg who started out making funny viral skits before becoming Manboy in Snowfall.

He said that his cast had so much chemistry together that the entire movie is hilarious.

“The energy you see on camera, that’s the energy we had -- like that’s the chemistry we had. If we didn’t have it then the movie wouldn’t be what it is, so it was just like nonstop," Gregg said. "It’s so many it just became the norm,” he added.

The general perception is the movie is all about Blackness. But cast members felt that at the end of the day, one can’t quantify Black.

“What we’ve learned, is you cannot quantify Black. The notion itself is ludicrous,” Robertson said. “…I think what people are gonna take from the film is it is actually a ridiculous thing to even attempt to quantify Blackness.”

Additionally, Perkins said that those who have one perspective of the way Black folks should act and think are in for a rude awakening, which in turn, should and can lead to more roles for Black folks in horror movies and films in general.

Check out the full interview below.