Tyrese Gibson paused when asked how he got the lead role in “1992”; the film is a heist movie set on the first day of the Los Angeles riots that followed the acquittals of LAPD officers in the beating of motorist Rodney King.
“That’s a loaded question,” says Gibson, who grew up in the Watts neighborhood of South Los Angeles. “When I was 14, April 29, 1992, I was in the streets of Watts, South Central L.A., looting and rioting and protesting.
“And so the sense of humor that God has is like, ‘Oh, you’re going to really do it before you do it,’” he says of living through the reality of that day before reliving it in a feature film.
“I had no idea that I’d be a singer or actor, none of the above, let alone I’d be doing a film and be starring in a film that’s something that I’ve seen, heard, felt and experienced in real life.”
Director Ariel Vromen says it was the authenticity Gibson possessed as an Angeleno that made him the right choice to play Mercer, a former gang member working to rebuild his life and his relationship with his son after serving time in a California prison.
In “1992,” which opens Friday, Aug. 30, Gibson, who portrays the protective father of Antoine (Christopher Ammanuel), seeks to escape the violence of the riot by taking his teenage boy to the catalytic convertor factory where he works as a janitor.
They arrive as a gang of thieves led by Lowell (the late Ray Liotta) and his two adult sons (Scott Eastwood and Dylan Arnold) are breaking into a safe containing millions in platinum used in the anti-pollution devices. A deadly cat-and-mouse game follows as Gibson captures Eastwood while Liotta holds onto Ammauel.
“Tyrese, for me, was an interesting choice,” says Vromen, an Israeli who moved to Los Angeles in 1999 to pursue a filmmaking career. “A few names were circulating for the role, and funny enough, I think there were, like, four finalists, and three out of the four did not carry an American citizenship.
“I’m not going to mention names or where the actors were from, but definitely not from L.A.,” he says. “So when I met with Tyrese, when I spoke to him for the first time, and I realized that he is from Watts, South Central, that he grew up in those streets.
“I felt that, you know, John Singleton did ‘Four Brothers’ and “Baby Boy” (with Gibson). And then Tyrese moved into ‘The Fast and the Furious’ and the ‘Transformers’ and a lot of movies – some of them, you know, with a huge audience following.
“But I felt like he’s almost like a Lamborghini left behind in the garage,” Vromen says. “And knowing that he actually is from L.A., there’s no more authenticism. I’ve seen in him potential.”
Vromen says the screenplay by Sascha Penn had floated around Hollywood for a decade before it crossed his desk in 2020. At one point, Ice Cube and his real-life son O’Shea Jackson Jr. were attached to play Mercer and Antoine.
“I sat down and read that script,” he says. “That was just after the George Floyd riots in Minnesota, and L.A. was still in a mess. But after reading a script, I took the car and went scouting the locations, even before I committed to do the movie. And you can still see the shattered windows and the cardboard, you know, all over the place and a lot of burned buildings.
“It was almost surreal that I’d just read a script that had a concept and had a really, really interesting idea of combining those two worlds together,” Vromen says.
The hybrid nature of “1992,” which fused the social justice implications of the King verdict and riots to a heist story and a pair of father-son narratives, was important to both Vromen and Gibson.
“When you approach any storytelling, if there is a certain message you want to convey; it’s very difficult because you cannot teach or preach,” Vromen says, who says a story must engage the audience. “They’re going to be entertained, and at the same time, they’re going to get an emotional experience.
“In ‘1992’ we had to bring that extra element,” he says. “Eventually, it resonates between the two families, between the two colors, between the two societies that clash.”
“We wanted to tell a story of a person on a day, of a person that already experienced that harsh reality in the past,” Vromen says. “Because the character of Mercer was rioting the Watts riot in back in 1965 and then now coming out of jail trying to have a correction to a relationship with his son, he’s sucked into a giant trauma.”
The dual father-son stories were particularly important to Gibson, he says, adding textures and emotions that elevated the movie in meaningful ways.
“To be honest with you, being that I was born and raised literally in Watts, at Martin Luther King Hospital, I wouldn’t have been stupid enough to enough to make a mockery of my own city by doing something corny and unrealistic and unbelievable,” Gibson says.
“I wouldn’t have done a heist movie, and I wouldn’t have done a 1992 riot and looting movie,” he says. “So if those elements were not holding hands with this story of the father, as well as Ray Liotta being the father to Scott, then they would have probably had to cast somebody else.
“I was looking to make a specific statement at this point in my life, in my career,” Gibson says. “I wanted to do something uncomfortable. And you know you can go Michael Bay and be blowing up and shooting up and have drones with fancy cameras and bumblebees. I’ve played these games and I’ve had those elements, and it’s been incredible.
“But I was like, you know, It’s time to do something to pull at the heartstrings. I was just really praying for a role where people care again, like care about the outcome of what might happen here.”
In addition to actors such as Gibson and Liotta, the credits for “1992” include another well-known name: Snoop Dogg is executive producer.
“Snoop Dogg told me he was out there looting and rioting and protesting as well from Long Beach,” says Gibson, whose new David Foster-produced album “Beautiful Pain” arrives on Aug. 30, the same day the movie opens. “Ariel Vromen was kind of doing his thing and just trying to feel out who has the grit, the authenticity and the sensitivities of the place.”
Vromen said Gibson’s take was exactly right.
“So Snoop and Death Row Pictures (which Snoop Dogg owns), you need the organic authority stamp,” Vromen says of the partnership.
“We needed that kind of a presentation, like, you know, that one of the original OGs, he’s supporting the story in the film,” he says. “And the second part is the soundtrack. We needed really good guidance of somebody that contribute.
“I did promise him on the next movie he’s going to have a role,” Vromen says. “Here, it just felt that he’s too iconic. It would be almost gimmicky. So he was kind enough to understand that.
“He’s an excellent producer,” Vromen says. “The audience needs to know that there’s another person that’s thinking of them.”
