Entertainment, TV, Television - Navy Times

Singer finds new sense of respect with series

Plenty of pop singers have successfully made the leap to television and film, but Jill Scott, star of the new HBO series “The No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency,” isn’t just another case of a celebrity franchise expanding into new territory.

First and always a poet and spoken-word artist, she started her acting career back in 2000, the same year she released her neo-soul debut, “Who Is Jill Scott? Words and Sounds Vol. 1.”

“I auditioned for an apprenticeship at a theater in Philadelphia,” she says. “I worked building sets, learning how to work the sound and helping to build a new theater. I mopped floors and cleaned toilets and broke down drywall in the basement, and I got free acting classes.”

Scott’s big-screen credits include Tyler Perry’s “Why Did I Get Married?” and the independent film “Houndog,” playing the R&B singer Big Mama Thornton. In her latest project, she plays Precious Ramotswe, the plucky plus-size detective from the popular mystery series by British author Alexander McCall Smith.

The two-hour pilot airing March 29 was filmed on location in Botswana and directed by Anthony Minghella, an Oscar winner for “The English Patient.” Minghella died last year of complications from cancer surgery.

Meanwhile, Scott, 37, is getting ready for yet another career to add to her resume: She is engaged to drummer Lil’ John Roberts and the couple expects their first child next month.

Question: “Who is ... ” has been the big question in your artistic career. So who is Precious Ramotswe?

Answer: Precious Ramotswe is a detective and a young woman who was raised by her father. She has a keen sense of what justice is, and it’s bigger than the black and white of books that say what the laws are. She is a generous person who believes in justice at all cost. She is a woman who has lost a child and left a husband, and she is a revolutionary, because she is doing something that is completely out of the box in a country like Botswana.

Q: How did this role come to you?

A: Long before my agent brought it to me, I saw “The Talented Mr. Ripley,” and I thought, “Oh my God, who directed this? This is the most amazing acting and cinematography I’ve seen.” I fell for this guy, this Anthony Minghella cat. Years later, my agent calls and tells me there’s an audition with Anthony Minghella. So that was enough for me. I wanted to be near this guy. I wanted to work with him.

Q: How did you prepare to play an African woman?

A: I have a dialect coach that I worked with for two months, every day for an hour. And I read the book, that was important. But I wasn’t really prepared until I got to Africa. Everybody has ideas of what Africa is like, but when I got to Botswana, my eyes, my ears, my nose, every sense opened up. I had a dialect coach in Botswana who had me unlearn everything I had learned over the past two months. But it was just being in the country, watching people, going to someone’s house and having dinner.

Q: You had never visited Africa before filming the pilot. What was your first impression?

A: What struck me was that I didn’t have this overwhelming sense of home. As an African-American, people always told me that when you get to Africa, there’s this vibration that you feel and you know that you’re home. And I was hoping for that. I got off the plane and I took my shoes off — but it was freezing. Everyone says Africa is so hot, but it was cold, I needed a coat. It’s cold, I’ve taken off my shoes because I’m expecting this vibration that I don’t feel. Everything people told me was incorrect.

Africa is not aggressive, it is not rude. It doesn’t jump on you and make you feel a certain way. It seeps into your soul gradually, peacefully.

Q: What else surprised you?

A: So many things are different, like how long it takes to get a meal. It’s typically an hour because someone is actually cooking food. It’s a completely different mentality about work. The malls close at 2 o’clock on Saturday and Sunday, because who should work on the weekends? That’s not fair. The work ethic is not the most important thing. It’s life, it’s family, it’s meals together. It’s respect. Respect is very important, even the children are respected. I’m used to New York, Philadelphia, Los Angeles, where things are fast and people are fast and you have to earn respect. In Botswana, it is a given. You are born, therefore you are worthy of respect.

Q: You got into acting the old-fashioned way, in the theater. What did you learn during your apprenticeship?

A: Number 1, I learned that theater is definitely hard work, because you have to maintain this character eight shows a week. You have to focus, because you are under the same lights wearing the same clothes saying the same things — it’s a challenge and really fulfilling as well. That apprenticeship gave me so much. I learned that every single party needs to be respected, because you can’t do it without the costumer, and you can’t do it without lighting and sound. It takes a village to make a play, and it takes a village to make a film.