Fleur & Manu Discuss Creating Drake’s “Energy” Music Video, Linking Up With Him & More

Fleur & Manu Discuss Creating Drake Energy Music Video & Linking Up With Him

A few days ago, Drizzy Drake released his “Energy” music video that was directed by Fleur & Manu. Since the visual dropped, Complex have caught up with the directors to ask them all about the “Energy” video, which you can read below!

Fleur & Manu chat about the concept of the video, linking up with Drake, shooting and creating the visual, putting Drizzy‘s face on Oprah and Miley Cyrus, Drake doing the Lil B cooking dance, the little boy in the video, why they chose certain celebrities to put Drizzy‘s face on such as Kanye West, Justin Bieber and Tom Cruise etc, and more!

How did you guys link up with Drake?
He called us and said he would be honored and would LOVE to work with us! I mean, it looks simple that way, but believe us, when it’s Drake on the phone, it’s pretty cool.
Who came up with the concept originally? How was it fleshed out?
He came up with the idea of having his head on VIPs, and we thought it was pretty cool, so we directly said yes. Then we would evolute to kind of weird mixes of him and the different characters, which created these Drake “creatures.”
Talk about the visual techniques you used to put Drake’s likeness on people like Rob Ford, LeBron, etc.?
We shot the scenes with sosies [look-alikes] and the same art direction, lights, costumes. Then a second time around we shot Drake’s head on a green screen, recreating exactly the same lights, camera lenses, and head movements. Then MATHEMATIC, a post production company, did an amazing and fastidious job to mix and recreate realistic faces.
Was he hesitant about any of them? The Miley and Oprah images in particular are quite bizarre.
Hahaha, you make a good point! At the end he was not sure about those two, but we really insisted on that because we thought they are the more impressive of the bunch, and finally that’s why Drake is Drake: He said yes. And there are a couple of others you’ll never see, but that’s a secret.
What went into choosing both the celebrities and the moments? Why Kanye filming the “Bound 2″ video (especially given that he appears during the “strippers in my life, but they’re virgins to me line”)? Why Tom Cruise? Bieber for Calvin Klein?
He gave us a list of artists that are famous for being publicly hated or criticized, that he would like to represent in his video, like Kanye, Bieber. Tom Cruise was our idea. Then we chose the scenes and on what part they should appear…and the “Bound 2″ line made sense to us, not to you?
Switching gears, talk about the video’s other primary setting, Drake and his boys in a classic rap video white background. Was the whole OVO squad there? Are these cutaways meant to anchor the video in reality in contrast to all the CGI/celeb fun?
We don’t like to be stuck in one style or another. The video is pretty unusual for rap, and we wanted to get a kind of tribute to classic rap videos we loved when we were kids, and make it more minimalist, classy, and realistic. Though it was a good way for us to have Drake telling you the story of those celebs/him with enemies in contrast with the true life with true friends.
Drake interpolates Lil B’s cooking dance at one point. Do you know if the Based God officially granted him permission?
Absolutely no idea about that. You’ll have to ask Lil B!
What’s the deal with the little boy?
The little boy represents Drake as a child, being surrounded by enemies since he was born. At the end, the kid that has a gun on him has a mask with Drake’s face. So maybe he is his own worst enemy.
Are there any other rappers you’d like to work with? Which artist, in your opinion, is releasing the best visuals right now?
We’d love to work with Kendrick Lamar. And Khalil Joseph’s work for Flying Lotus was amazing.