The second season of BMF has been in high demand ever since the first wrapped. Following the titular Black Mafia Family, the Starz original will finally make its return on January 6. GameRevolution spoke to stars Da’Vinchi and La La Anthony, who play Terry “Southwest T” Flenory, and Markaisha Taylor respectively, all about Season 2, the relationship their characters will build, the pressures of building a role based on reality, and more.
Exclusive: Da’Vinchi and La La Anthony discuss BMF Season 2
Is there an added pressure to get things right with BMF, because the show is based on and inspired by real events?
Da’Vinchi: Yeah for sure, there definitely is. When you’re playing characters who are still relatively young, alive, and vibrant, you deal with like, “how are they gonna like how I’m portraying them?” but after the success of Season 1 and talking to Terry Flenory about my delivery with the character, and seeing how excited he was for it, he was just happy about it, he loved how I did it, I was like, “man this is just great, now I’m able to take this and go even further with it.”
La La: For me, it is added pressure, because you wanna do it justice. I always think about if somebody was playing me, I wanna be like, “okay yeah I would do that, I would act like that,” you don’t wanna watch somebody playing yourself and be like, “they’re so far off the mark, they don’t get it.” I don’t think it will ever be perfect, but you want it to be as close to what they were really feeling or what was really going on as possible.
La La, we did only get fleeting glimpses of you in Season 1, but we do get to see a lot more of you as Markaisha this season, so what should audiences expect from you this time round?
La La: A very complicated love story. She’s coming from an abusive marriage, and then she meets Terry and at first, he’s just flirting, she’s not paying him any mind, and then it becomes more. He has all his baggage and mess with him, so it’s just two broken people dealing with a lot of mess trying to come together, and it just creates a lot of problems, but also in the middle of it all is still a beautiful love story.
Da’Vinchi, Terry comes in hot with that flirting, he shoots his shot pretty much straight away, so where is his mind at in those moments?
Da’Vinchi: I think in the beginning he’s just having a good time, he’s like “man this older woman who’s beautiful,” it’s a fun thing to do, but when he starts seeing her mindset, it makes him start falling in love. He thinks, “with this I can develop into a man and become this king I always pictured in my mind.”
Reflective of that La La, I’d say Markaisha is a bit of a mentor with Terry, would that be fair to say?
La La: Definitely. I think that she sees potential and passion, and she wants to bring that out of him, and I think that should be a characteristic of any woman who’s with a partner or even a friend. You want to see the best out of the people that you care about, so I think she’s intrigued and attracted to his passion and his confidence, and she’s like, “I want to help him be the best he can be.”
The scenes you two share can be emotional, romantic, and intimate, so I imagine there has to be a lot of trust between the two of you?
La La: Yeah, that’s for a fact. You definitely have to have that and I’m so grateful that Da’Vinchi and I do have that, because it makes our jobs a lot easier and it makes it easier to trust and let go, and just let the moments play out. You don’t have to be concerned because you do know each other.
Da’Vinchi, BMF Season 2 seems to be about expansion, but Terry and Meech seem to be at each other’s throats perhaps more than ever before. Is that a running theme throughout this season?
Da’Vinchi: Yeah, they’re definitely gonna be at each other’s throats but I don’t think it’s gonna be as much as last season. Maybe I’m just so used to it now so I don’t even realize, but I do know Meech starts to gain a real level of respect for Terry later on in the season, because he’s seeing him transform and go into manhood, so it’s a little different from the beginning bickering that they each had.
I think part of what makes this show so special is the cinematography, the music, the costuming, it really transports the viewer back to the late 1980s in this season. Did you feel that on set?
La La: Definitely, I think as soon as you put on the clothes, makeup, hair, and then you’re on the set, you just feel like you’re right back in that timeframe. It puts you deeper into the moment and the characters. It’s interesting what hair, makeup, clothes, and a setting can do for a person, it definitely helps and just sets the tone. Also, it gives viewers an added bonus, you get to see this amazing story but then it’s like, “I love her glasses, her hair,” it just gives the viewers more things to love.
Da’Vinchi: I feel like the clothes, the wardrobe, does that for me. It helps transform me into that character. You’re playing that Jack Sparrow type thing where boom, you just transform, you go into this world of the 80s and 90s, and you just have a good time with it.
The show is funny and light at times, but a lot of it is quite heavy. Do you ever find it hard to switch off at the end of the day when you go back home?
Da’Vinchi: That’s an interesting question. Sometimes, but the craziest thing I found doing a lot of different projects, is that life starts to imitate the art. Some weird shit would happen in real life that was going along with what happened in the script. I don’t know why that always happens to me. It makes it hard for you to forget that character until the project is done. Sometimes, the days are so long on set, you end up playing that character longer than you play yourself. You kind of lose yourself in it for the duration for that project, especially when you’re the lead on it. It’s weird and plays with your reality a little bit.
La La: I definitely agree, and it’s good to find things to take you out of it, especially if you’re having one of those intense, emotional days on set. You don’t wanna always take that home with you so it’s good to watch a funny movie after, or do something that takes you out of it, because when you’re as passionate and dedicated as we are, you can carry that stuff with you into your life and not know how to switch it off.
Filming wrapped for BMF Season 2 in July 2022, so what’s that wait like between wrapping filming and the premiere?
La La: It seems like it’s so long, and then when it gets here it seems like it was so fast, it’s the most interesting thing. When it comes, it feels like we were just on set a couple of days ago. Time is just a weird dynamic.
Da’Vinchi: It feels long, but then when it comes it feels like we just got off set, but then your whole year just blew past. It’s really weird, you do these projects and there’s a big chunk of time before it comes out.
It feels like TV is more important than ever right now as a form of escapism, so what do you both hope viewers take away from BMF Season 2 over everything else?
La La: I think that I want viewers to understand that this was real life, and there’s so much love, heart, and loyalty at the center of this story. It’s not just another drug show, another violent show, at the center of this is a real family dealing with real family issues, and there’s so much love between the families, the friends, the crews, and I hope that really resonates and shines through with the audience.
Da’Vinchi: I hope people just watch it and are really entertained by the true story and how these unfortunate circumstances these two brothers are in, how they manage to climb out of it with the decisions that they made being faced with this reality. It’s super entertaining because a lot of us will never be faced with these exact circumstances.
BMF Season 2 starts Friday January 6 on Starz in the U.S. and on LIONSGATE+ in the U.K.
