Will Packer, Producer of Beyonce's Obsessed Movie, Talks to Pop on the Pop!

Obsessed producer Will Packer is a man who gets what he wants. He wanted to produce a film with Beyonce, Ali Larter and Idris Elba, he got that. He wanted to be a successful producer, The Daily Variety has named him one of their "10 Producers to Watch," and he's quickly gone from being the guy that "couldn't get a call back" to the one that calls all the shots.

The magna cum laude Florida A&M University alum, with a Science degree in Electrical Engineering, has blazed his own path. Ditching engineering for the bigger picture, Will Packer co-founded Rainforest Films, a production company that pulls in top talent for mainstream flicks.

Packer took time out of his busy schedule to talk Beyonce, Sasha Fierce, Obsessed, making it in Hollywood, and what he's doing with Chris Brown, T.I., Paul Walker and Matt Dillon.

Obsessed opens today in theaters everywhere.

POTP: How would you describe Obsessed if you were to give it a personal synopsis.

WP: Obsessed is a really cool thriller. It follows this couple whose got this idyllic life. All is well in their world until the femme fatale shows up and wants everything that they have and will not stop until she gets it.

Are you ever able to get the cast members that you seek?

Oh ya! Ali, Beyonce and Idris were all our first choices for those roles, and we got all three. That doesn’t happen a lot, but when it does, you know that the film will be close to the vision that you have for it.

So, I have to ask some Beyonce questions. Did Sasha Fierce ever show up on the set?

The thing about this role was that there was a lot of physicality involved in it. There’s the cat fight to end all cat fights in this film! And Beyonce, because she is such a physical presence on stage, at her concerts, in her music videos, she brings that. That was no problem for her with the physicality of this role; she was ready for that and she brought it!

You don’t wanna get between Sasha Fierce and her man because when it came time for Beyonce to really come and bring that element out, it was really easy and comfortable for her because that’s just something she’s used to doing.

The physical aspect, the stunts, a lot of that stuff she did it on her own, she demanded to do it on her own. On take like 10 or 11, when everyone was tired and done for the day and all the actors, stunt doubles, even the crew, Beyonce was the one saying “No, no one more time! I can do it again. I can do it better. One more time!” She was hardcore like that.

Who was in Beyonce’s entourage?

It was her, the stylist and her mom. Every now and then Kelly Rowland would show up or Michelle Williams would show up. For the most part, it was [Beyonce] in her element and I think that’s how she likes it.

How were you able to raise the money for your first project?

It is called beggin, borrowin’ and stealin’. [My business partner and I] literally went out and got money from, like, 50 different sources. I’m only talking about raising like $20,000. There were some people who were like, ‘Here’s a check for $500, good luck.’ Then we’d have people that would let us borrow equipment. We didn’t even have the credit cards that we could max out at that time.

Did Beyonce express her excitement about taking on the challenging role of Sharon?

No question. Very early on when we were having conversations about this role, it was clear that she was gravitating to it for the same reason that why we were gravitating to her. This would be something that would be a total departure from what she’s done before, very different from her Austin Powers Foxy Cleopatra, campy role. It was very different from her Motown singer in Dreamgirls.

This was a housewife, a very relatable character to a lot of women. And as an actress that has this huge global persona that I know she wants to shed when it comes time for her to be taken seriously as an actress, it was important for her to take a role that was totally outside of her comfort zone.

How did you train to become who you are today?

In the fire, on the job, that’s how! I said ‘I think I got a knack for this’ even though Hollywood keeps telling you, ‘NO you can’t!’ that drove me even more. I produced my first four films totally independent, outside of Hollywood, on my own.

Why do you feel that Hollywood was telling you no? Do producers typically have a lot of money, or was that a race issue? Why exactly did you feel that way?

You got a lot of people trying to get in, so Hollywood tells a lot of people no. It's tough to get any movie made, I don’t care what you look like, even if you’ve got money.

On the other side, as an African American producer, there’s not a lot of 'em. I didn’t have a lot of people who looked like me on the other side of the table saying ‘Yeah, I’ll give you a shot.’ But, either way, I didn’t accept any of that as an excuse not to be successful.

At the end of the day, Hollywood is a reactionary industry. It’s driven by economics. If you get that and if you can figure out how to bring a project that’s going to make money, or even better yet, like I did, you can make money outside of Hollywood on your own, that’s the fastest way to get attention in this town.

What film genres would you like to work on in the future and why?

I haven’t done a horror film. I just got a chance to do my first action film [The Takers], and that’s gonna rock. It’s Paul Walker and Matt Dillon and Chris Brown and T.I. and Hayden Christiansen and that’s gonna be really cool. Because my personal tastes really run the gamut, I wanna be a producer who’s able to do everything across the board.

So you’ve worked on The Takers, what was that project like?

The Takers comes out in January 2010 and it was awesome! Everybody wanted to dress better and be cooler and have the cooler ride than the other guys. That kind of competitive spirit came across on film and it helped to fuel the characters of who these guys were. It turned out really cool. I think audiences are gonna really respond to it.

Obsessed opens today in theaters nationwide!