Movie star Robbie Gee stars in Kyrie's "Rooftops" Video!

It's 2 o clock in the afternoon in London, I'm still jet lagged from the flight a couple days earlier. I've just woken up and our producer is yelling, "I just got Phil Hawkins and Robbie Gee!" With profanity, as I awaken from the drunken state of last night's studio session, I cry out, "Who's Robbie Gee?"

"He's an A list actor," Rudy (our producer) replied. "And actually he's more than that, he was in a UK Channel 4 TV series that ran for 9 years called Desmond's. He plays a very lovable wheeling, dealing character. And from there on, he became a very well known personality throughout the UK and went on to act in films like Underworld with Kate Beckinsale, and Pirates of the Caribbean, and my all time favorite Snatch." And then it hit me, I'd seen Snatch. He was the guy that said my favorite line. "The get away driver! What the fuck's he getting away from?!" The excitement I felt was incredible. I couldn't believe it was all happening.

The day of the shoot was crazy as music videos go. We pulled up to a driveway that led to a big industrial warehouse. As I walked through the door, suddenly it sprang to life with characters lovable and flavorful. I was greeted by Phil Hawkins our director, with his chipper and quirky personality. He showed me around the building and you could see everyone constructing our makeshift Rooftop Club complete with a 30 foot video wall screen with hundreds of faces glaring at me that Phil had gathered up before the shoot from real life submissions. There was a man hammering down the last panel of our fighters cage who also said, "Don't mind the blood." I knew this was gonna be a day to remember. 2 shot energy Todd Edwards pulled up in a black cab. He just got off the train from a late night gig in Leeds, was running on one hour of sleep and was greeted by Rudy. Todd said, "Sorry I'm late man." Rudy replied, "You do realize you're acting against Robbie Gee?" Todd then replied, "Are you shitting me? Man, I love Snatch!" Clutching his overd suitcase, he walked straight into the part with his cool, glaring eyes. This man meant business.

Just before the cameras started rolling, I noticed 2 shifty characters in the corner with an array of gizmos and equipment that would not look shy on the enterprise. These were in fact our bad guys for the day, Ramsey and Fen - UK Garage heroes spinning the wheels of steel for my very own music video, who actually turned out to be a couple of sweethearts. As the extras start pouring through the door, you could feel the music video start to come to life. I thought to myself, are these method actors or real gangsters? Mosey and Dreamweaver from Sancola Music, my friends and compadres, had written the script previously and told everyone to come dressed in hoodies. Oly Dempster, our video producer had done a fantastic job on picking our location which coincidentally was opposite the Olympic Stadium. I remember watching the closing Olympic ceremony with acts like Jessie J performing alongside David Bowie and Fat Boy Slim on TV in our New Jersey riverside studio. I thought to myself, "You're not in Kansas anymore Dorothy. No, I'm in East London, I've got a hoody on, and it's time to kick some ass!"

Phil Hawkins is a wonderful director, and very much an actor's director with a definitive focus and remarkable way of conducting everyone in an easy but extremely efficient, get the shit done quickly way. Everybody fell in love with Phil that day. Remarkable character. And an all together nice chap. There was an overall good feeling on set that day, even though we were all as they would say in the east end of London, "freezing our bollocks off."

As the day commenced, the first lines I recall were "Dark, dark, dark." Imagine me getting acting lessons from Robbie Gee! Robbie was helping me get into dark serious mode, which I really needed as Todd was making wise cracks and jokes to my left side. He's quite a jokester with a contagious smiley face. With a bit of coaching from Robbie which was the absolute highlight of the day, I was ready for "Action!" Some of the script was flavorful to say the least. One line in particular I remember while filming was when Robbie said, "Listen shorti, you might only be 5 foot tall, but you're a fucking tower inferno." It was very hard to keep my composure and not laugh. I swear if you watch the video, you can see me trying to hold back from laughing. I mean how can you not laugh at the man that did impersonations of Chris Eubank with that afro wig on Real McCoy? But what an actor he is! And when the cameras rolled, you could see why he's such a professional. I wanted to make a video that showed that there's always someone that can believe in you. Sometimes it might not be the ones that you expect or want but there's always somebody.

Walking through a crowd of people that didn't want you to be there. And to be confined within a cage represents a feeling I think we all have some time in our lives. But with a bit of encouragement, even the gloomiest of things can turn out bright. I'd like to thank everybody that appeared in the video, all the crew, and of course Phil Hawkins, Ed Moore, Dreamweaver, Mosey, Oly Dempster and Robbie Gee. I believe we truly made something special. Kyrie X

April 4, 2013 7:00pm ET by Kyrie London  

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