UNBeknownst podcast episode #6
Cayman Grant (BBA’01) graduated from UNB Saint John with a BBA in 2001, and has since become an Emmy award-winning writer and director making films and TV that have been screened in over 100 film festivals worldwide. Prior to moving to Los Angeles to pursue her career as a writer and director, the Canadian born, she worked in politics, the music industry and then helped build three successful start-up medical companies. Since then, she has written and directed several projects with one of them earning her an Emmy® for her film, Playing for The Mob, as a part of ESPN’s highly acclaimed 30 for 30 Series. Her film, The Boy, was a finalist in the prestigious NBC Universal Short Cuts Film Festival earning her the Oxygen Best Female Director Award chosen and presented by Academy® Award Winner, Geena Davis. She's also directed for the hit network ABC show, The Good Doctor.
As the host of the acclaimed podcast White Speak that seeks to help the non-Black community understand what's really going on with the #BlackLivesMatter movement, Cayman inspires anti-racism by answering the burning questions about why it's happening.
Cayman talks with UNBeknownst podcast host Emily Barner (BBA’96) about storytelling in Hollywood, understanding people, and why failing is important for success.
Listen to the episode
Highlights from the episode
Emily: How do you translate stories about people into screenwriting?
Cayman: It’s a matter of understanding. Even in business writing, you're telling a story: who are you speaking to? What do you want them to do? And in a story, it's an emotional journey that you're taking them on, but you're deliberate. Similarly, it's about understanding the human psyche, the emotional journey of story. There's the beginning, middle and end stuff, and you can go outside of those things, but you better stay on point. It takes 10,000 hours, if Malcolm Gladwell is correct, for you to become good at something. So when you get that, when you put that time in, you can translate that into anything. Storytelling is a skill and it can be taught. I feel is my special skill is understanding people and having empathy toward them, and asking the questions of why they do what they do. Because people will always fascinate you. But you know selling a product, selling a story, it's all the same, it's just a different vertical. Also, all of us who do it professionally still think we're frauds. The stories that I write and direct – most of them are true life stories. A lot of them are crime, everything from mob to serial killers to cult-like stories. Most of what everybody thinks they know about high profile stories...there are always humans behind it. I have a responsibility as a storyteller to tell people’s stories well. You do your best.
Emily: Do you ever feel like pinching yourself that you’re succeeding in this industry and receiving an award from the likes of Geena Davis?
Cayman: I feel blessed for being able to do what I do every day. I'm grateful that I got to pursue my dream. But the thing that gives me the most special feeling of accomplishment is that I get to know these real-life people and their stories, the ones that I always knew about historically, and now I get to really know them. That's what's special about what I do: the human side.
Emily: You have the podcast called White Speak, which helps the non-Black community understand what's really going on with the Black Lives Matter movement. Can you tell us a bit more about this and why you created this podcast?
Cayman: I have biracial children – I'm married to a black man from West Philly. When I came to the states the first time, I remember seeing Confederate flags everywhere and thinking that everybody liked the Dukes of Hazard. I didn't realize that the United States had such race issues. And over the years, you come to discover that it's built this way. It's not that the system's broken. It was built to be this way, and it was built that we don't see the issues that exist systemically, and that has to do with it being a young country. You know, when we were born, when the Constitution was born here, it didn't include women and Black people. They never intended us to have rights. And so one of the issues in this country is that in order to change anything, you have to change the Constitution. To change the Constitution you have to have a ratification of a tremendous amount of people. It's a different kind of democracy than what we're used to in Canada. So I've always known about what is happening behind the scenes, but when George Floyd happened, that was the trigger because I was spending four hours a day on the phone trying to talk white people off the ledge and making them understand what's really happening. I decided to parlay that into the podcast so that I could save some time. I could have people on the show that could explain elements that people don't understand. We discuss the complicated problems that exist, talk about why people shouldn't do certain things and why they should do others, and why things are the way they are. There’s a disconnect between what black people see and how they can explain it to White people, and I can sort of look at it like I'm a translator. So that's what the podcast is set to do. And I don't know everything, trust me. I'm learning every day and when I have people on I'm learning something every time. So I'm just trying to offer some level of understanding because it's taken me years to get to that.
Emily: Yeah, it's just even being able to start these conversations because they're sensitive conversations. I think what you're doing really helps bridge that gap.
Cayman: Knowledge is power. And understanding is power. So you can have the knowledge, but you have to genuinely work to understand.
Emily: I love your fire, your drive. Do you have any advice to give young UNB students or alumni?
Cayman: If you want to do something, do it. But don't forget you have to do the work. It takes a long time to be good at something, it takes a lot to master something, but everything is achievable. There's bad luck – I've had bad luck myself. You have to get up and do it again. I would say to folks that you always just need to be open and try to discover yourself. Learn from other people's mistakes, because life’s too short to make them all yourself, but you want to also be your own person and so be comfortable with who you are and embrace the things that you're good at and work on the things you're not. And don't be too judgmental because everybody has a story and you might have just hit them on a bad day.
Emily: Have you made mistakes and had failures?
Cayman: Of course. Those mistakes are important because...do you think they discovered penicillin on the first try? Thousands of tries? No. Failure is part of it. And I think that when you quietly fail, you just continue to expect to do your best, and it's the mindset that you can keep trying and accomplish great things.
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