How Anderson .Paak Became a Filmmaker

What this episode is about

Anderson .Paak discusses his journey into filmmaking, sparked by his son's interest in YouTube, which led him to revisit his passion for video editing and storytelling. He shares how his experiences with music videos and inspiration from filmmakers like Ice Cube and Spike Lee motivated him to write a script and gain practical experience on set to develop his directorial abilities.

Key takeaways

• From YouTube skits to directing: Who knew parenting could morph into a Hollywood career?
• K-pop meets hip-hop: A cultural clash that’s ripe for comedy and heartfelt discovery.
• Turning life experiences into film: When your son becomes both your muse and your co-star.
• Directing feels like jumping into the deep end—without a life vest—or script.
• A Hollywood dream: Is leveraging family for inspiration genius or just family drama waiting to unfold?

Who speaks in this episode?

• Dax Shepard (Host) · 4 min speaking
• Anderson .Paak (Guest) · 9 min speaking

What is discussed, and when

1. 0:00 – 3:00: K-pops, Stampede, Kayla Amazon, Ice Cube
2. 9:00 – 12:00: Hard Rock Cafe
3. 12:00 – 12:58: K-pops, February 25th

Notable quotes from "How Anderson .Paak Became a Filmmaker"

• Like are nine times out of 10 it's like they wrote it themselves and they just did it themselves. I grew up on watching like Ice Cube Friday and like Spike Lee, all these stuff. So these they kind of just took it in their own hands and they.

  about Ice Cube · at 1:14

• I met her through the [clears throat] production team, Stampede, who gave me the initial funding for this idea I had called K-pops, where I'm a washed up musician that finds out his son could be the next K-pop star. Oh, fun.

  about K-pops · at 2:47

• And I'm watching your movie and I'm This is Anderson Pack.

  about Anderson .Paak · at 7:04

• It was so nerve-wracking for me because that was a big scene and we're like in the we did it in the Hard Rock Cafe in Hollywood Boulevard and we're we're renting it out for a certain time and I got extras and I got them and they're.

  about Hard Rock Cafe · at 11:45

• Yeah. February 27th it comes out AMC theaters.

  about February 25th · at 12:51

Who and what is mentioned in this episode?

People

• Anderson .Paak — Person · Main guest (implied) / subject of praise · 1 mention
  The conversation centers on the guest’s first film and directing journey; the host explicitly frames the movie as an expression of “Anderson .Paak’s soul,” strongly implying the guest is Anderson .Paak.
• Kayla Amazon — Person · Referenced collaborator (co-writer) · 1 mention · first at 2:44
  Named as the co-writer of the guest’s script/film project, indicating a key creative partnership behind the movie discussed.
  I wrote I co-wrote it with another talented writer, Kayla Amazon.
• Ice Cube — Person · Referenced inspiration (filmmaker/artist example) · 1 mention · first at 1:18
  Cited as an example of artists who took filmmaking into their own hands (specifically via 'Friday'), shaping the guest’s directing ambitions.
• Spike Lee — Person · Referenced inspiration (director example) · 1 mention · first at 1:22
  Mentioned alongside Ice Cube as a model for auteur-style creation—writing and making work independently—reinforcing the guest’s approach to directing.
  Just did it themselves. I grew up on watching like Ice Cube Friday and like Spike Lee, all these stuff. So these they kind of just took it in their own hands and they again…

Books & papers

• K-pops — Book · Primary recommendation · 2 mentions · first at 2:42
  The main topic of discussion, a script co-written by the speaker and Kayla Amazon, about a washed-up musician discovering his son could be the next K-pop star.

Companies & orgs

• Stampede — Company · Business focus · 1 mention · first at 2:48
  The production team that provided initial funding for the 'K-pops' project.
  I met her through the [clears throat] production team, Stampede, who gave me the initial funding for this idea I had called K-pops, where I'm a washed up musician that finds out his.

Places & events

• February 25th — Event · Release date · 1 mention · first at 12:51
  The release date of the movie 'K-pops' in AMC theaters.
• Hard Rock Cafe — Place · Setting · 1 mention · first at 11:49
  A location where a significant scene from the movie 'K-pops' was filmed.

Full transcript with timestamps

0:00 You directed motorbike, right? Was that the first thing you directed? How did we get into directing? [snorts]

0:06 Uh my son in in co uh you want to be YouTuber and I was like stuck in the house. I'm like okay let's see. He had no subscribers. So I was like let's let's juice it. Like come on. Let's figure out utilize your dad. You know what I'm saying? Like

0:19 let's do some skits, you know? So I start doing skits and I get more into it than he is. I'm like oh my god this is this is great. I I when I was younger I used to do home videos all the time. my sister and like I was in high school I was into video editing. I went to like a technology school, magnet school. So, one of the electives was was video editing and I got I was like it was a whole world that I was obsessed with and I used to love like editing and making my own videos and doing all that stuff. So when I got with my son and co it brought all that back and I was like got my laptop out and I was like dude let's do some funny skits and I would be up all night to post and so he inspired me to write uh a script and uh I wanted to do a movie and I knew that I needed some experience. I needed some time on set working and learning the language and or to even get a real so that people would

1:10 fund it. I was watching all this stuff and I was like, "Okay, the movies that I like are nine times out of 10 it's like they wrote wrote it themselves and they just did it themselves." You know, I grew up on watching like Ice Cube Friday and like um you know, Spike Lee, all these stuff. So these these they kind of just took it in their own hands and they again they worked with the people next to them and so I was like cool I'm going to just do that but I need some experience. So I was like I'm going to do a bunch of music videos. I want to get like 10 15 music videos. I told my team, I was like, "Anybody who's down to let me direct, I'll send treatments and let them know I'm serious and I don't care." And and and Leon was one of the first people. And I was uh working with a really talented DP who showed me a lot, showed me the ropes, uh Tequila, and [snorts] we put together a treatment where, you know, we wanted to do film

1:56 and I was like, I want to do narratives um music videos because I wanted eventually I want to do a movie. So, stories. This is all to you know, help me get experience with that. And um Leon was down and Leon was great. He like he just was like I was I had this whole narrative of like at the end you're going to get shot in the gut, you know, like you know he was just down. He was such a sweet guy and I was like we're going to make you like sex symbol and I want you to like be with the girl and like making out and all this stuff. And he was like so shy and I had to like switch some stuff up and

2:30 he's very shy. Shy. Yeah. Yeah. That's a song. Yeah. So, yeah, he was great. But, um, yeah, that was uh that's how I got into directing.

2:39 Okay. And now you've written this script. I wrote I co-wrote it with another talented uh writer, Kayla Amazon.

2:46 Okay. How did you meet her? I met her through the [clears throat] production team, Stampede, who gave me the initial funding for this idea I had called K-pops, where I'm like, um, a washed up musician that finds out his son could be the next K-pop star. Oh, fun.

2:59 It was It was totally inspired by my son and and in in the house, you know, my ex-wife now is they were obsessed with K-pop and everyone was going crazy. So, I was like kind of the outside guy looking in hip-hop like, "Well, you need to know about Tupac as well."

3:15 You know, like they were just like, "Screw you." You know, like we're Korean. And so, I was like, "Oh, this could be funny." you know, like

3:22 very, you know, the disgruntled salty musician that like begrudgingly has to go into this K-pop world, but ends up finding out he has a son.

3:30 He takes a job as a drummer on this competition show in Korea. And when he gets there,

3:35 Yeah. he kind of meets this little kid who's your real son. Yeah. Which is incredible.

3:41 He's He's dangerous. Yes. He's dangerous. He's He's 2.0. He's killing it. He's bilingual, everything. He's killing it. Oh,

3:49 I took it to them and they were like, "We love it." And they were like, "We'll give you the money for it." And I was like, "Wait, you serious?" And

3:54 now I had to I was like thrown into this and um it was the toughest thing I ever did.

3:59 Uh how about leading up to day one of production where you're I almost I almost didn't do it. I tried to like kind of weasel out of it. I'm in over my head. I'm a sham.

4:09 I'm going to get exploded. I charmed my way into this situation. Exactly. And now we're [ __ ] cuz I don't have the goods.

4:15 Chickens have come to roost. Yeah. I owe a lot of people, you know. So, it's like and I got my family involved now and all of a sudden, everyone's looking at me and I This is the crazy part. It was like the strikes were happening. So, I kind of had a I kind of could have, you know, I was about to like use that. I'm like, you know, strikes like

4:34 Yeah. Again, you start building the [ __ ] story and it's sounding better and better. This is logical. I want to do it.

4:41 I don't want to be a prick. Yeah. Like, come on. I'm on a picket line. I can't do it. Can I do it?

4:47 I'd love to. I'd love to. I'd kill to but it's moral morally, you know. God. So, yeah. And then and I remember talking to my son. I'm like, "Do you even want to do it?" Because the other thing hoping maybe he can pull the for you.

5:01 YOU TELL ME YOU DON'T WANT TO DO IT. YOU AIN'T GOT TO DO THIS. MY SON'S MY NUMBER ONE PRIORITY. HE GOES, "I'M MY MOM, BRO.

5:09 My son want to do this." We're all so full of [ __ ] Yeah, dude. I was going to pull that one.

5:14 HE'S A CHILD. HE WANTS TO BE A KID. LET HIM be a kid. He looked at me. He's like, "I better [ __ ] do this. You had to be in acting classes for a year straight." I'm like, "Shit."

5:26 The the leap is just like, "Just start the thing." And there's really no space for the fear.

5:33 Yeah. Soon as I got on set, I was like, "This is the greatest." Oh, good. I was waking up every morning like like you got to be there the first one on set and the last one off, you know? like

5:44 I got to learn so much and my team was like the best. I had the best team. My DP was like a like old school dude that comes from TV. So, everyone was like this was their he had been wanting to do something with like music and this was like his first real film that he got to do. And

6:00 I mean he's he did like this was like on the set of like you know these like not MASH but like those kind of shows you like.

6:08 So everyone was like rooting for me. He's 106. He's 106. So we didn't have to Exactly.

6:15 We had to take nap break. He did die. He did die in the middle. Uh yeah, but camera knew camera knew the vision. A camera stepped up.

6:28 You're my wanted this way. You were in the cam yesterday. You're the DP today. Look who's got promotion.

6:35 Where did you shoot? You were in I shot everywhere. I shot in Rafford. I shot in, you know, Ktown. I shot in Korea.

6:43 Is the record shop in the alley here or there? It's there. It's there. Yeah. That felt real. I'm like, "Yeah, if this is a film, I watched it last night."

6:52 Oh my god. What do [clears throat] you think? I loved it. You know why I loved it? If you can go, oh Lord, I I I got the thing in my head out onto the screen in the exact way I wanted to. That's the victory of a lifetime.

7:03 Yeah. And I'm watching your movie and I'm like, "This is Anderson Pack." Yeah. This is Anderson Pack's soul.

7:10 Very least. wall to-wall music. It's dancing. It's so fun. There's so much love for your kid in it. Everything that is you is on the screen. And I was like, what an accomplishment for him for his first thing

7:25 to have gotten his soul out in such a palpable and tangible way. So, it's a huge victory.

7:30 Thanks, man. Yeah. I It made me so happy the exact same way your music makes me and and watching you play drums makes me. It's like it's another little domain that you executed who you are,

7:43 which is hard to do. Very hard. And I hope you feel that when you watch it, like, oh, I did I did the thing. My my spirit is there.

7:50 That's awesome. Yeah. The music was that part easier for you or also very challenging.

7:55 It was tough. I mean, doing like needle drops. Yeah. I was having a ball. Sure. Yeah. That's the fun part.

8:01 Until they told me how much it cost and I was like, let's just use my stuff. Yeah. Yeah,

8:06 but you got some favors. I think I was listening to the needle drops and I was like, that's an expensive song. That's I don't know what version you saw. But yeah, up until recently, I had to [ __ ] update and it's like, oh my god. But yeah, some of them it's like some of them are cooked in there. We can't, you know,

8:22 but it was like, oh man, [ __ ] cost. And but that's the thing you learn every time. If it's like important for you for these if you want needle drops or whatever, it's like you have that has to be a very important thing for the budget. Like now I know now, you know, going in Yeah. And you can get married and it can be the scene.

8:38 A lot of the scenes like I'm thinking about the music first. I'm thinking of make I'm making the scene based off like the song that I know I want to use, stuff like that.

8:46 I'm very much making movies like how I would make an album, you know. So, um yeah, that was that's one big one thing I learned. And um yeah, but the scoring is a whole different thing. And the first I got to score, she's like a prodigy. She was like 12 and like

9:01 um one one of Soul Rasheed's friends. Yeah. Who's that little kid? Who's your girlfriend?

9:09 I'm pretty sure she can do it. She had a violin. Tell her bring that. She's like a, you know, virtuoso and

9:16 I don't know how to speak the language. I'm like, can you just make it happier or darker here or make it blue? I don't [ __ ] know. And these scenes are the score of make or break a scene. And

9:24 that's everything, you know? Especially for like the more like emotional points. I don't want it to be cheesy. And it's like,

9:30 yeah. You're walking, you're dancing this [ __ ] line. Yeah. where it's like, I need the emotion, but I don't want to be caught

9:36 Yeah. manipulating. Exactly. I don't want to tell them how to feel and all this stuff. But then also, it's like,

9:42 you know, we're not making these [ __ ] deep ethereal things either. It's like I'm making, you know, I want a feel-good warm family movie, you know, at the day like when my mom and like my sisters are watching it like, you know, and I love those kind of like Sundance Deep, you know, Oscar things, but I'm always the odd man out like wanting to watch that kind of [ __ ] And then my sisters are like, "What the [ __ ] is this?" You know,

10:07 like, "Can we watch Zootopia?" Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. Like, put on Tyler Perry, bro, or something, you know? And I'm like,

10:13 Yeah. So, it's just walking that fine line. The thing it reminded me of the most of is um

10:18 Pitch Perfect. Weird. Oh, I love Pitch Perfect. I don't know why that just kept coming up. Just that that that like because everyone in the cast is young and they're hungry and they're cute and just the learning to dance and learning to sing that street and stuff like that. Yeah.

10:36 Do you feel an extra I assume you feel an extra pressure with the music because you're like people are also going to be looking extra hard at the music because it's me. Like that's annoying, too.

10:45 Yeah. Yeah. My DP was like, "They're going to be on your ass about directing and then and and acting. You're not going to get any, you know, no one's going to cut you any slack. The most you could do is just make it you and just

10:58 do it." And I that's why I'm really happy that I was a part of the writing. Yes.

11:02 And honestly, it wasn't a stretch to play the character. I'm playing pretty much myself, but like a wash up version, which is really fun. I love like self-deprecating [ __ ]

11:08 I was like, "Oh my god, he's so [ __ ] natural." And then your son is so goddamn natural. That's who I was like riding the coattail of. I was That was the whole point. I was like, "Son, you're you got this. Let me ride your wave."

11:19 Uh, are you going to make more movies? I would love to. Yeah. If I ever get to work in this town again,

11:23 I will continue to make some more movies. You got Earthwind and Fire in it. Earthwind and Fire.

11:28 How'd you get that, dude? Big favors. I owe a lot of people. A lot of a lot of promises have been made.

11:35 Was it fun to play with them? It was so much fun. And I got to do a little improv with them. And they were so cool. And they were like, you know, they just like they love the story. They were like, "Cool, we'll do it." And um it was so nerve-wracking for me because that was a big scene and we're like in the um we did it in the uh Hard Rock Cafe

11:53 in Hollywood Boulevard and we're we're renting it out for a certain time and I got extras and I got them and they're like one of my biggest idols and I'm just like I got cameras and I got to do this. It's okay if we do another take here and this and that and I got my son and

12:08 it was like one of the last shots too. So, I was just like, "Woo!" It was a lot going on. I chained smoke my brains out uh that whole process. But yeah, they were great and they were really cool and I got to do funny improv with them and

12:19 that's so fun. It was a huge huge thing. My thing I do when I'm directing is and I had an assistant say to me, "I'm a little worried about your Starbucks order."

12:29 Cuz I would get a venty drip and then um three dopios to start the day. Double shot of espresso. That was like the morning coffee order for me. You would go, I don't know if this

12:47 straight up, man. Um, the movie's great. People should see it. K-pops. Yeah. February 27th it comes out AMC theaters.

Questions about this episode

Who speaks in "How Anderson .Paak Became a Filmmaker"?

Dax Shepard (Host), Anderson .Paak (Guest).

What is "How Anderson .Paak Became a Filmmaker" about?

Anderson .Paak discusses his journey into filmmaking, sparked by his son's interest in YouTube, which led him to revisit his passion for video editing and storytelling. He shares how his experiences with music videos and inspiration from filmmakers like Ice Cube and Spike Lee motivated him to write a script and gain practical experience on set to develop his directorial abilities.

What is mentioned in this Armchair Expert with Dax Shepard episode?

8 people, works and ideas are mentioned, including K-pops, Anderson .Paak, Stampede, February 25th, Kayla Amazon, Hard Rock Cafe. Each one on this page links to its own page with every episode that mentions it.

How long is "How Anderson .Paak Became a Filmmaker"?

The episode runs 13 min; the transcript is about 2,989 words in 71 timestamped sections.

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