This film features Xosha Roquemore (PRECIOUS, USA -TV's Southland). Her brother Rokki Roquemore plays the character of ARCHIE and she did the role as a favor to him and the director who had coincidently seen her in a play after she had graduated NYU School of the Arts.
Darryl McCane was in the same graduate class at Columbia University with Academy Award nominated writer/directors Lisa Cholodenko and Kimberly Pierce.
Darryl won the Hartley DuPont Award for Outstanding Excellence upon graduating with Honors from Columbia University's Graduate School of the Arts in 1994 along with his Mentor/Thesis Professor and friend Ralph Rosenblum, who edited The Pawnbroker of which CLAY is 'styled' and the Academy Award winning Annie Hall. McCane read Ralph's book, "When the Shooting Stops before he ever considered going to Columbia. It was after reading that book, Columbia University became his MFA destination.
Darryl shot a part of this film at his childhood elementary school and church, St. Louis Bertrand in East Oakland. The home of the very first Black Panther Free Breakfast program. Darryl lived on 97th and E. 14th (now International blvd.) and the Black Panther Offices which were shot up by the FBI was on 96th and E. 14th, and SLB is on 100th and E. 14th. St. Louis Bertrand Parish has been serving the Elmhurst and East Oakland Catholic community for more than 100 years. Mrs. Ludovina Peralta Ivey donated the land where the church and school now stand.
In the script, the former Raider running back, Terry Robiskie's name is used for a character. Darryl's Mom sold homes to many of the 1970s World Champion Oakland Raiders (not Mr. Robiskie) but his name was unusual for a Black man and that was a memory Mr. McCane included in the script. Mr. McCane teaches and Coaches at Washington Prep High school in South Los Angeles where Raider great Clarence Davis attended before USC. Darryl's Mom sold Clarence his first home in the Oakland Hills, a half mile from where he was raised.