Despite being one of the most prolific artists of our time, one who juggles a career as a Grammy-winning music producer and artist with prestigious fashion jobs like Men’s creative director for Louis Vuitton, Pharrell Williams does not sell himself at the sort of Type A character that has everything planned out 10 steps ahead.
With a project like “Piece by Piece,” which chronicles his personal and professional life up to this point, featuring interviews with Jay-Z, Kendrick Lamar, and Gwen Stefani, it was more like the musical phenom was completely resistant to the idea of even agreeing to make a documentary about himself. “My agent was just being so persistent and I’m like, ‘Bro, you gotta stop asking me. I don’t want to do it,’” said Williams to IndieWire over breakfast at a hotel in Los Angeles. “Once he said, ‘You could do it any way you want,’ that just made me think about it differently. And once I thought about it differently, then it was like, ‘Oh, maybe this could be fun.’”
First came the idea to recruit Oscar-winning documentarian Morgan Neville, then came a quirkier request. “My primary concern was just more like, ‘How do I express this piece in a universal way?’ And I think LEGO as a world and a platform just felt very welcoming, it felt very generational,” he said, reflecting on the decision to have the film be animated via LEGO.
What resulted is a portrait of someone who has used their immense creativity to make it out of the mud and onto movie screens. Though, again, Williams was just intrigued by the unique way he could tell his story, rather than how his journey could inspire audiences. “All the other symptoms and side effects are awesome. They’re just extra cherries on top, but I can’t be disingenuous and sit here and tell you that I had thought about every positive implication,” he said.
Below, the documentary subject discusses how the film, and its five original songs, came together “Piece by Piece.”
The following interview has been edited and condensed for length and clarity.
IndieWire: With “Piece by Piece,” what came first: the song title or the film title?
Pharrell Williams: Song title, interestingly enough. We were going to call it “Outside the Box,” but then, after the song, this popped up the way that it did. It was like, “Oh, maybe that needs to be the name of the film.”
How early did it come about? I imagine having to then animate a musical sequence to it takes a lot of time.
Probably halfway through the project. Project was five and a half years in the making.
And so was there a script or outline that said “Insert new song here,” or did you know from day one that you were writing a big musical end number?
Yeah, I knew I wanted a big number. I always described a big Bollywood number in concept, but not in sound or in style or genre. But everything led to a big number.
And you knew from the beginning that you’d want a marching band on the track as well? Having a band at the end is not only a reference to your start in music, but they also come together piece-by-piece.
Yeah, literally. Literally, that’s the point.
And you knew, “Let’s end on that,” versus just thinking of music that could fit into the film at any scene?
Yeah, that was totally intentional. Because I wanted people to hear something that felt fierce and stealth, but at the same time bright on the choruses. And then for it to just get as big as possible. What’s the biggest way we could do that? It’s to put a marching band in there. And why not put my own, one that I grew up in as a kid?
To that end, you’ve mentioned a lot of the ideas around having the film be animated via LEGO. But I’m wondering if that is closer to something that’s more like feeding your inner child, or was it more along the lines of, “Oh, this would be really engaging for my children to watch one day”?
It was exactly all those things. It was exactly that. Both. Inner child first and then the other stuff just started to reveal itself, to make sense. “Oh, OK, maybe if I do this, it has all these other benefits.” It’s holistic.
Had you watched any LEGO films with your family before this process?
Yeah, I loved the LEGO films, but I wasn’t really interested in doing a documentary on myself. When you ever hear your voice on voicemail, it’s annoying. Part of the reason is because you hear how your voice sounds outside of your body. But when you’re listening, as you’re talking now, you hear yourself within the cavity of your skull. So you’re used to that voice, but then when you hear it outside of you, you don’t like it and you wouldn’t like an hour of it either. You would not like that.
It’s like imagine it over a Walmart loudspeaker … torture. And then also too, you’ve seen yourself a million ways. You know yourself. You know you did two minutes ago, two seconds ago, two minutes ago, two hours ago, two days ago, two weeks ago, two months ago, two years ago — for me, over two decades ago. You ain’t interested in it. You’re not curious. You already know.
It’s like thumbing through a little animation book. If you’re on the most previous page, you don’t need to thumb it. You know exactly how you got there. That’s not interesting to you. But then when my agent says, “You can do it whatever way you want,” I’m like, “OK, well let’s use the best storyteller, Morgan Neville, the best documentarian I think, and let’s do it in LEGO.” And he thought I was crazy, but he said, “OK, I’ll ask.” We asked Morgan, he said, “Yes.” We asked LEGO. They said, “Yes.” We asked Focus. They said, “Yes.” We asked Donna Langley and Universal, and she said, “Yes.” The movie is a sum of a lot of yeses, and when you add them all up, that’s what impossible looks like.
Speaking to the support you yourself has gotten as a creative dealing with executives, saying that even a job like Men’s creative director at Louis Vuitton feels pretty hands-off in terms of feedback, how has your relationship to the people that oversee your creative work maybe influenced the way in which you were overseeing Morgan direct this film? Were you side-by-side with him every step, or was it more that you trusted him to go off and do his thing?
No, he went off and did his thing. He went off and did all the interviews and then everything else. But I walked him through what it is that I wanted when I first pitched it to him. I was like, “I want you to shoot it the way you would because I think that you’re a master storyteller.” I was like, “And once you shoot it, then I want you to get rid of all of the visuals. Just keep the audio and let’s do the visuals in LEGO.” That was my blueprint for it.
It was one initial conversation that was like, “This is what I’m thinking,” and then letting him cook?
And he really got it.
Were you ever big on chronicling or archiving your life in any way?
I didn’t want to for all the reasons that I laid out. In order to chronicle, you have to look backwards. I’m not good at that. I always look forward. Even if I don’t see where I’m going for myself, I see where other people are going, and that’s enough for me and how I can be helpful.
Interesting, because you do hear a lot of music producers and fashion designers think about holding onto old beats, or being inspired by the label’s archive, when generating new work.
It’s not that I don’t need to, it’s just I’m just not interested. I’m so much better when I am curious, interested, and enthusiastic about something. When I’m not, it’s torture and it’s work. And looking back is torture for me.
Have you watched the film then?
Yeah. But not a lot of times though. I don’t like looking back. I’m cool with it. I love what I’ve done, but I feel like the time that I’m spending looking back, I’ve just blown some time that could have gone to looking forward.
So with a song like “Piece by Piece” wrapping up of the film, it’s still rooted in forward-thinking rather than nostalgia?
Because it was animated and it was in LEGO, I could see it and be inspired.
Not as painful a process?
100 percent.
Another thing that struck me about the film and the soundtrack is that rapper Tyler, the Creator does not appear as himself in the film, but still appears on “Virginia Boy (Remix)” on the soundtrack. Did it at all feel important to involve him in this project? The film doesn’t get into it, but he’s representative of the generation of artists you’ve inspired, that you now get to work with. Or was it simply just, “We’re friends”?
Yeah, just, “We’re friends.” Yeah.
But I think there’s a thought about legacy there.
No. I don’t read into things quite like you see it. Which is interesting to me because when you say these things, I’m like, “Oh, interesting.” Well, you see it very differently than I do. For me it’s just what feels right. Sometimes there is some engineering and architecture that goes into it, but it was just important to me because, I guess, while you’re saying legacy, it made the most sense to have him, but it was more like he also just felt right for it too.
That’s valid. Of course, I’m being like, “Hey, did you make all these super conscious decisions?” But I understand that sometimes creativity is more going with the flow or an instinct.
Most of the time for me it is.
There are five original songs on the “Piece by Piece” soundtrack. Is there another song you really like besides the title track?
I really appreciate “L’EGO Odyssey.” That one is strong to me.
Did you come in with a lot of opinions as well about, “This is what I think music written for film should be”? You’ve had great success doing that for “Despicable Me,” but I wonder if there’s a general idea of “This is how music can really contribute to a film.”
I never thought about that either. It was just, I like it and I had such a ball doing it. That was enough for me. I don’t know if I stood back and was like, “This is what it’s supposed to feel like.” I just don’t think about things like that. I’m more just in the moment and very appreciative that I get to do what I get to do. And that’s probably more in line of what I was thinking outside of loving the experience. It’s like, “Oh, man, I love that I get to do this. This is such a blessing.”
Because “L’EGO Odyssey” is very cinematic. Hearing that, it does stand out as like, “Oh, of course this is scoring a big scene,” because it adds to the emotions that one may feel watching the film.
Yes, sir.
Which isn’t always the case with every song.
And that one I set out to flex my muscles.
Speaking of showing them what you got, you’ve talked about this trend of people all getting their own music documentary, but something a lot of people don’t get is a musical film inspired by them. Was “Golden” a more forward-thinking opportunity, in that it didn’t feel so near what other people were doing?
We’re still cooking. Get ready.
It will be fascinating to see that in conversation with this film.
Oh, man, get ready. It’s going to be special.
“Piece by Piece,” a Focus Features release, is now in theaters and available to rent on demand.
