Earlier in the year, SkyWire’s Daniel Andrade had an interesting talk
with Kealoha Nakamura, who played
Davi in Season 3 of Fox, on a deeper
level that ventured furthered into the actor’s thinking and methods. His
conversation became our gain, however, and now you can get that inside look
within the artist and what’s next for our first ‘Man of the Year’.
Daniel Andrade: Key, thank you so much for joining me here.
Kealoha Nakamura: Thanks for having me Daniel,
I'm really excited to be here.
Let’s go ahead and get
started. When we first meet Davi, at least from what we can see, it seems like
he's getting picked on by his fellow Hacradians but by the end of the season,
we see Davi as a great warrior who is very strong-willed, for better and for
worse. Tell us a little bit about Davi's journey in season three and how he got
from that point to his end point.
Well when he was being picked on by his fellow
soldiers in his unit you can see that he's wearing the same mask that his unit
leader is wearing, and that just kind of gives you an insight the Davi is
actually being trained to be a new unit leader even though he’s so young. They
see potential in him as a thinker and as a fighter. So I think that his unit is
very jealous of him and he’s definitely a very by-the-book kind of guy, where
there’s a definitive right and a definitive wrong, and that never really makes
you a lot of friends. So it’s very common that he gets picked on by other
people. What else was there?
So by the end of the
season we see Davi as this strong, powerful warrior, and very strong-willed, so
how did he get from that point to the endpoint?
I don't even think that there was too much of a
character arch for Davi as in becoming a stronger warrior, I think it's more
just learning more about him. It's almost revealing what was already there. if
there is a character arc, it’s probably in the opposite direction, where he’s
learning to let people in. He’s learning to get along with people that are not
like him. He’s figuring out that the world is bigger than Hacradia.
That's true. I like
that, it’s more like unpeeling those layers. He’s like an onion right, as Shrek
would say? (laughs) So, speaking of that warrior spirit, I personally
really enjoyed your fight scenes. Every time I see them I always really just
enjoy watching them, and they were especially pretty unique since you were
fighting with your with your tonfas, or as I like to call them tonkas (laughs),
a weapon that relies more on brute strength than more of like a sharp point. So
tell us about what you did to prepare for those fight scenes and about your
background and fight choreography.
Yeah, I appreciate that, thanks man! So I don't
have too much experience in martial arts. I grew up playing sports my entire
life, but I love to just like run and jump off of things and climb trees when I
was a kid and I guess that never really went away. It was just all playing and
watching like Jackie Chan growing up. That was huge for me, just to watch
action and fighting. My brother and I would always play fight each other. And
then as far as the tonfa go, I’m a really big fan of Japanese anime and manga.
And every manga tries to stand out differently by giving a new weapon that's
not very common or everyday, like a sword or a staff or something like that,
those are kind of common weapons. Uncommon weapons I've seen are like fishing
poles, umbrellas, like these weird things that you’d never think of, like
yo-yo’s in one of them!
Wow!
Yeah, and I just thought what's something that's
still like a classic weapon, but isn't seen all the time? So I asked Hunter
when I first met him if he had access to tonfa. From then I was just obsessed
with figuring out different ways to spin them, different ways to use them. And
he would send me videos, I would send him videos, and we’d just nerd out on all
this fighting and stuff that we could do. And I just would be in my room, I'd
have tonfa’s in each hand, and I would just look in the mirror and spin and
spin them.
Just over and over!
Yeah, I would just get comfortable with the
weight and the speed at which I could do it and I just wanted to make it look
as smooth as possible. I mean you have to think about it from the character's
perspective, he's probably been training with them... he said he's been
training since he could walk, so they probably gave him weapons as soon as he
could hold them, really.
Yeah that’s pretty
exciting, that’s pretty cool! So, you know, one of the things about the
character of Davi is that he doesn't really emote too much; oftentimes he’s a
very serious, straight-faced person. But we do have those moments where we do
see some of those emotions come out. So how are you able to portray these
little emotional bursts while staying true to the overall character of Davi?
You know, it's funny, with acting, when you want
to portray those things, you want to be very subtle with these emotions. Like,
you don't have to pop your eyes to show that you're surprised, just like a
little flinch shows that you weren't expecting something coming up. I think
that's the same thing with Davi, and I don't know, maybe it made it easier
having a character like Davi where if something were to surprise him, he has to
maintain this stone-faced illusion that he was expecting it or he was prepared for
it. And then internally just thinking about everything that is going on, trying
to process it as Davi, my body responded naturally to what I was thinking. So I
wasn't thinking about “I should play this moment like this, I should play this
moment like that,” I just thought if “this is happening to Davi.” It's not a
hypothetical, this situation is happening to Davi, and with that I immediately
just kind of felt it. So it wasn’t a conscious decision, it was just reacting.
So you were just in the
moment there?
Yeah I was very locked in.
Kind of along those
lines, one of the things about Davi is he has that ability of those animalistic
tendencies. As you know, every character that has this ability, it’s kind of
portrayed or characterize through various different animals, so for Davi it’s
characterized by a gorilla. So how do you think that particular animal connects
with the character of Davi?
I think it’s pretty much everything. When I was
talking to Monroe about creating this character, she told me that I had
animalistic tendencies... Well, Davi had animalistic tendencies, I didn't have
it (laughs). I was just kind of thinking “what kind of person is Davi”? He’s
someone that’s very tight-knit in a group, so it has to be an animal that lives
in a pack or herd or something like that. And then Davi’s fierce, he's a
fighter. He's very strong-willed, and if he saw one of his own doing something
wrong, he’d be willing to jump up and fight for what he believes is right. And
that's a tough thing for a society that's so patriotic for their own country;
what animals are willing to fight each other? So that was that. And then I
thought about his weapons also; a lot of the weight lies in his fist.
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Yeah, oh ok!
Yeah, so then you go and think about what other
animals fight with their fists, aside from like kangaroos and stuff?
Ha, like a boxing
kangaroo!
Yeah, so in the end it really just came down to
looking at all these different personality traits and thinking about how his
ability shapes his personality. It actually kind of came down to thinking about
the color scheme too of his clothes.
Oh ok!
Yeah, he wears gray and black, and then I
thought what other animals are gray and black, fight with their fists, live
with family, all this stuff? It kind of pointed me in the direction of the
gorilla.
Oh wow, ok! That’s
pretty cool, I didn’t realize that deep extent of that connection. I like how
you said about the whole working in a team, like a congregation of apes, and
how that kind of matches with the gorilla. You know, speaking of that, I kind
of asked Monroe a similar sort of question here, do you think Davi's
animalistic tendencies have helped him more or burdened him more, or kind of a
little bit of both?
Hmm.. You know, that's something that I think
I'm going to reveal a little bit more of in season 4. You don’t even see Davi’s
animalistic tendencies until the very end, when he’s like screaming it, these
noises that are coming in and starting to scare him and back him into a corner.
And you know, there's a lot of tension and there's a lot of fear that's going
to be coming up in season four, just by the way we ended season three. With
that stuff I think we're going to see Davi letting loose a little bit more because
he's not so in control. And in that sense, I think you're going to see more of
a burden.
Exactly. He could be destructive with it. And
you’ve already seen that without his ability, he's a fierce warrior, so with
his ability, what is there that can happen?
Whoo… Well we’ll just
have to wait and see huh? Haha! Alright, again kind of along similar lines of
what I asked Monroe, is that one of the cool things about this season that most
people tend to kind of connect with is this introduction of the Brotherhood,
and these characters that are working together toward a common goal here, even
if they have different intentions for why they’re helping. So how would you
characterize Davi's relationship with Fox, first of all, and then afterwards,
what is his relationship like with the rest of the Brotherhood?
So with Fox, he's kind of looking for a glimpse
of hope. I don't know if you've watched The Last Airbender…
Of course, it’s one of
my favorites!
So Prince Zuko, he looks at Ang as his chance
for redemption, and that's kind of how Davi looks at Fox. He respects her, and
he knows the myth surrounding who she is, so he's aware of the role that she
plays. He has trouble getting along with everyone, but he knows that if he
wants to go back home, this is the way to do it. So he probably sees them more
as an opportunity, more than a family, for the first part anyways. As for
Orasmin, they're about as opposite as you can be.
Hard as Orasmin tries.
[laughs]
Yeah, exactly. Orasmin is very warm and
friendly, and he wants to be very including of everybody, to the point where he
would like to sugarcoat things or beat around the bush. But Davi is very
straight-to-the-point, very blunt and can be very harsh with a lot of his
words. Orasmin cares about everyone else's feelings, while Davi absolutely does
not. Davis gone through very formal training, where Orasmin has been
underground training one-on-one with an expert, so even that bit of it, I Davi
respects Orasmin’s fighting ability, even though Orasmin actually knocked Davi
out.
Haha, yeah!
Oron is just kind of there to Davi. He's just
kind of like another piece that Davi can use in the future. He wouldn't
necessarily say he likes Oron, but he's tolerable, more tolerable than
everybody else. They definitely butt heads, you’ve seen they almost got into a
fight at the end. They're different, but they respect one another. I think if
Davi got along best with anyone, it’d either be Oron or Deja. That brings me up
to Deja. Davi’s animalistic tendencies know when there is danger in when
there's not, and with Deja, he senses that and he senses the fighting ability
of Deja, the potential. He knows this would be a tough fight if they were to
get into it. He knows how deadly she is. So with that I think he actually gets
along with her the best because for one, they were both caught at the same
time, they’re both not originally a part of this group.
That’s true…
So he feels that both being from separate
nations, and not even really being a part of this journey about restoring
everything, he gets along with her the best. As for Daisy... she’s part of the
Brotherhood now right?
Yeah, by the end of the
season she is.
Yeah, she’s like the most worthless thing on the
planet to him. Because
Davi judges everything based on survival skills right? Daisy has shown that the
best she can do is fire a bow and arrow. She needs a lot of help, and she asks
Fox to teach her to not be that. But all Davi sees is just like a weak little
puppy and not so much in the cute sense. It's almost like “if I leave you alone
you're probably going to die.”
More like the helpless
sense.
Yeah… So that’s how he relates to everybody.
Kind of along those same
lines, I'm glad you brought that up, because this last question here that I had
for you was one of the most striking conversations that Davi had with the
Brotherhood, and even at the live premiere you could hear the audience reacting
to it, was when he talks about how the love between Daisy and Fox is wrong.
Davi sees things as very, like, “it’s for survival” and all of that sort of
stuff. By the end of season three, having seen everything that they’ve gone
through together and the love that they share and that they truly have for each
other, do you think Davi still holds to that belief, or do you think he’s maybe
starting to come around?
I think he still holds on to it because he wants
to hold on to every bit of Hacradia that he has left. But I do see him coming
around and starting to accept it. I don’t think he sees it as “it’s ok for
everybody,” but in this specific situation with Fox and Daisy, maybe just this
relationship is ok.
Maybe, just maybe,
right? Alright so I have a few little quick hypotheticals for you, putting Davi
in these interesting situations. So the first one that I’ve been kind of
thinking about it was what do you think Davi would have done if he never met
Fox and the Brotherhood? Do you think he would’ve remained in Hacradia or
eventually maybe wandered off on his own anyway?
Well, he would’ve remained with his people, just
because he’s so gung-ho about being a savior to his people. But he would’ve
definitely done it differently. If he had the opportunity to keep growing with
his unit leader, who knows how strong he could’ve been with all that formal
training and support from his homeland. And I think eventually he would have,
whether he was prepared or not, he would have wanted to take on Rath himself.
Oh wow! So you think he
would’ve eventually found his way to Rath just because of all that anger he
has?
Yeah.
Alright, well I wanted
to leave some time here to devote to this big announcement that we have for
you. So if you want to go ahead, I won’t steal that thunder from you, then I
definitely have a few questions about that, but if you want to tell our readers
here, we have a little scoop, a little exclusive here! So what do you want to
tell them about your next big project?
So I’ve had the opportunity to talk with Monroe
about the future of SkySoft, and 365 was a very beautifully done
project, and I thought “I want to do the next one.” So originally, it just
started with me talking to Hunter about Joshua Garreth, and I think I want to
be Joshua Garreth for the next one. But then, the more we talked about it, we
just kept taking it a step farther, and it ended up with me saying “OK, I want to
write Season Two of 365.” So that’s
in the works right now!
Wow, that’s pretty wild!
Yeah, it’s going to be a fun journey. It’s
already proven to be really stressful as it is! So I got the green light from
Monroe and it’ll be in the works for 2019.
Nice! So if you don’t
mind then, kind of along those lines, I have a few little questions about tha
whole process of it, because it’s definitely something that’s very interesting
to me. So my first question is, because a lot of people don’t know about this
part of the process, but what was it like to pitch this next season? You know
this whole show was initially created by Monroe, it still uses her characters.
I know personally, when I first heard you guys talking about it, I was a little
worried that it might almost seem like you were trying to take this from her.
Obviously that’s not what you wanted to do, but I’m sure that was maybe a
thought in the back of your head as you were pitching this. So what was it like
to pitch it? How were you feeling throughout this whole pitching process?
Oh God, it was frightening! It was really
difficult to pitch this idea to carry on 365.
I definitely want Monroe to be a huge part of it because it is her project, it
is her production company, it’s everything! This is her life! I need to make
sure that I do it right, so I’ve asked her to play a large role in producing
it, directing it, and filming it even. The other side of it, though, is I had a
lot of confidence pitching myself out there, because I believe that I do have
good ideas and that there is a lot to build off of Season One, that there is a
lot to keep it similar, but not the same, you know? So I wouldn’t be taking it
from her, I’d be helping grow it really, that’s the goal.
With her blessing.
Yeah exactly, with her blessing. The way that
you kind of separate the idea of taking it from her versus helping it grow is
you just have to check your intentions. So the more I thought about it, the
more I thought, “There’s a lot that needs to be told here, there’s a lot that
needs to be done.” You know, they talk about Joshua Garreth the entire season,
about how they hate him so much. So I thought, “Man, why do they hate him so
much?” That would be such an interesting story to dive into the kind of rivalry
that is there between the new school and the old school. During the pitch
meeting, we talked about that a lot, and there is a lot of work that needs to
be done. So I’m definitely going to be looking to her for a lot of the help.
So how is your take on 365
going to add to the universe that’s already been created for these characters
that we’ve come to know?
Well, I think that 365 did such a good job at humanizing these celebrities and showing
us how they go through these struggles and have these trials and tribulations
that a lot of us have, maybe on a much grander scale because they are
superstars, you know? My idea for Season Two is going to be showing that kind
of personal relationship that Joshua has with everyone, really. I think that
there’s going to be a lot of moments where he questions himself, he questions
if what he’s doing is right, and that’s a question that I ask myself almost every
day- especially with acting and writing. So a little bit of insight about me is;
I thought about going to physical therapy school. I thought about going to
graduate programs. I actually got accepted to San Jose State’s Masters in
Athletic Training Program, but I turned it down. There are all these things. I
even had an interview for this physiotherapy school out in Australia, and I
ended up not confirming because I told myself at the last second, “This is not
actually what I want.” So you’re going to see a lot of those moments where
Joshua is like, “I want it so bad” and “What is my real passion?” So that’s
going to be a large role in it. And you’re going to get to meet his family too,
which I think everybody needs to see, because it’s so important to remember
that everybody is somebody’s little boy or everyone is someone’s little girl,
or what have you. They have these relationships. In other people’s eyes, these
people that you can hate and you just despise and don’t like, they have a whole
other side of them where people do like the-, people love them! They’re their
son, or their father, or uncle or aunt or whatever. So I think when you see
people in that light, it’s a lot harder to dislike them.
So then it’s pretty much
adding to this universe by kind of expanding on this theme of humanizing people
that we don’t usually get to see that side of.
Yeah, people that seem like they’re out of
reach.
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365 ©SkySoft Entertainment
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So, have you ever
directed or written before for TV?
You know, I’ve dabbled in the writing process.
It’s nothing big. I’ve written this script for this short little sketch that I
wanted to do with my acting class, but I realized that getting everybody
together on the same project- or getting everyone’s availability for the same
day, is impossible! With
this one, I’m trying to keep all that in mind, where this is going to be my
first project that I write and it’s going to be an experience. It’s going to be
my pioneering journey!
And you know, kind of
speaking along those lines, and you kind of touched on it a little bit, but
what is it about 365 that made it
want to be the show that you want to make your writing debut on?
Well, I love The
Office and I love Parks and Rec,
and 365 is kind of like a window of
opportunity to where I could kind of see its similarities between those shows.
It’s a mockumentary- it’s something where you can see into the lives of these
everyday people. And ever since I started acting, I was like, “Oh I would love
to be like a pop star or something,” some kind of public figure in music or
something. And I saw this as an opportunity and I saw this show as something
that was loved by a lot of people.
So I think we’ve already
kind of touch on this a little bit, but if you want to expand a little bit
more, just to give you an opportunity to do so, what makes your take on the
story, at least on this next upcoming season, what makes it special and makes it
stand out from everything that we’ve seen so far from 365, from this first season?
What makes it stand out? I think the thing
that’s going to make it stand out is the story itself. It’s going to be the
other side of the coin. Gwendolyn Fay is aging, she’s losing her throne to this
next up-and-coming star but what she doesn’t realize is that she’s created such
a legacy, such a mountain to overcome, that Joshua almost feels discouraged
every time he thinks about Gwendolyn Fay. He sees what he was to do in order to
be the greatest musician of all time.
Of all time, wow! But I
mean if you’re going to dethrone Gwendolyn Fay, you kind of have to be the best
of all time!
Oh gosh yeah! Gwendolyn Fay is Josh’s Mt.
Everest.
So, you had kind of
mentioned it earlier, but 365 is an anthology series in which each season takes
place within the same year. So why did you decide to keep your story about the
music industry, as opposed to something completely different within the same
year?
Well one is I just saw an opportunity to play
Joshua Garreth. Remember, when I was thinking of pitching it, I just wanted to
pitch myself as Josh, I was fine with whoever was going to write it. But then
the more I thought about this character, the more I thought, “Man there’s this
whole entire life that needs to be covered.” I thought it was pretty funny how
everybody hated him. But you need to remember he has his own side of the story.
Alright, one final
question here. At least for me, I’m sure for you as well, but one of the cool
features of season one of 365 was
that Monroe actually sang all of these Gwendolyn Fay songs; that is her voice
that you’re hearing. So I guess it kind of leads to the question: will you be
singing some original songs for this upcoming season?
We’ll find out!
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Written by Daniel Andrade
Photographed by Monroe Hayden
You can watch Kealoha play Davi on Season 3 of Fox returning from the SkySoft Vault on
November 19, 2018, listen to an exclusive podcast interview on SkyWire's Beyond the Page with Daniel Andrade on November 18th.
Fox: Season IV premieres August 26, 2019
365: Joshua Garreth premieres November 2019
365: Joshua Garreth premieres November 2019
You can follow Kealoha on Instagram @kingaloha and
on Twitter @kinggalohaa
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