Dallas Adult Entertainment: Complex’s Uncut “Shotcallers” Q&A: Albert and Allen Hughes
Interview By Justin Monroe. Photograph by Estevan Oriol
Twin directors Albert and Allen Hughes rolled up on the movie industry in 1993 like one of the drive-bys in their classic hood gangster debut, Menace II Society, and shook the world (and anyone who didn’t duck got struck). Part of the early ’90s boom in indie filmmakers, the Hugheses managed to avoid the “hood” yoke (despite subsequent films Dead Presidents and American Pimp) by directing Johnny Depp in From Hell, the 2001 adaptation of Alan Moore’s bloody good graphic novel about Jack the Ripper. Then, as suddenly as they’d appeared, they went their separate ways and dropped off the map.
Now, the 37-year-old brothers have reunited to direct Denzel Washington in The Book of Eli, a futuristic, post-apocalyptic drama that drops in January. We got with the pair for the “Shotcallers” feature in Complex’s December/January issue, and now we’re blessing you with the extended version of the interview. Read on below to hear their insights on the collapse of society, twins, hood cinema, Alan Moore, and the truth behind the infamous “Tupac incident”…