This year, Brooklyn-raised actor and musician Elijah Wright appeared in a multi-recurring role in season four of the hit crime drama series Godfather of Harlem. The young star entered into the acting vocation in 2010 sports romcom Just Wright, and subsequently made forays onto the stage throughout his adolescence. 

Now in college and a burgeoning R&B musician, Wright will soon appear as Kyle Christopher alongside Jeffrey Wright, Denzel Washington, and A$AP Rocky in Spike Lee’s neo-noir thriller Highest 2 Lowest, where he plays a high schooler who is mistakenly kidnapped and held for ransom. The film dives into intricacies of class and race dynamics in America, and Wright will act opposite his real-life father, playing his son in the film. Highest 2 Lowest debuted at Cannes to a nearly six-minute standing ovation, and is set to release this August on A24/AppleTV+. 

Your upcoming film, Highest 2 Lowest, is a reimagining of Akira Kurosawa’s classic crime thriller, High and Low. How did the original film influence your interpretation of the story and your approach to the character in this iteration?

Watching the film prior to shooting helped me understand the overall themes Kurosawa was trying to convey—themes that are so relevant; even now. In the original, the character I play is a younger kid, and in Spike’s version we added a bit more background to the character and aged him up a bit, which gave me a chance to add more depth to my portrayal. 

This year marked your television debut as Jerome Greene in Godfather of Harlem. How has working in television differed from your experience in film?

What I appreciate about television is the space it provides to explore a character’s journey in depth. Jerome in Godfather of Harlem tends to forge his own path and while his character is essential to the series’ resolution, he also has many directions he could potentially go beyond the main storyline. This open-endedness is something I find particularly interesting as it’s a stark contrast to playing a character in a film, where the story is more contained. 

Where do you hope to see change in the world?

I hope that we can love each other more. We’re living in strange times with such a level of fear and uncertainty. Ultimately, I hope for peace in the world, but it takes people, myself included to look at ourselves and actively take the steps to create change. We have to do so for our future generations and emphasize the importance of fighting for the rights of marginalized communities and for those who are and have been disenfranchised. Additionally, I hope to see change in a way that creates unity. We’re all so disconnected. It affects the way we watch films too. We don’t share the experience in the same way. I hope we can all learn to accept one another, and I believe we can get there one day. And I hope that my art can play a part in creating that necessary change.

Photographed by Selah Tennberg

Styled by Annie & Nora

Written by Brynn Shaffer

Grooming: Carolina Pizarro

Production Assistant: Melanie Perez