DEREK LUKE JOURNEYS INTO SOUTH AFRICA

(VIDEO) Derek Luke spent time in South Africa to portray the real apartheid prisoner, Patrick Chamusso in Catch A Fire.

Derek Luke stars as Patrick Chamusso in Catch A Fire, the true story of a South African’s journey to freedom from apartheid during the country’s turbulence in the 1980s. When Derek first met Patrick he asked him two questions, ‘do you know Beyonce?’ and why aren’t you Denzel Washington? That sent the New Jersey born actor on a challenge to learn everything about Patrick’s country and how he lived.

During that research Derek actually lied down in Nelson Mandela’s cell, a feeling he said felt very eerie to him.

“I called the theme of my research was the journey of the man. I went everywhere that Patrick went. I did dialogue coaching. I had to drop twenty pounds of muscle, weight. I’d interview with people that mirror Patrick’s life. I went to the oil refinery where he worked in Secunda. I visited the real man Patrick Chamusso. The last stop on my research was going to Robbin Island.”

Catch A Fire opens Friday in theaters.rn

“Being on Robben Island was very complex. It was complex because all these men were innocent men and when you visit Robben Island it’s like you can hear voices, voices of questions, voices of suicide; everything that all these men had to confront. It humbles you because you’re not just an actor portraying a man; you’re chosen to tell history.”