We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Trenell Foster a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Trenell, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. Can you talk to us about how you learned to do what you do?

I learned to write stories at an early age in school and it was something I always enjoyed doing. It was my love for story writing that made me first want to try my hand at script writing and directing. Another thing that helped me was being a student of the art, not in the sense that I went to film school, but I did watch a lot of films and tv. I found myself not only watching these films but then trying to figure out how it was done. There’s no better teacher than experience, so I put a lot of time and effort into watching others that were in positions I wanted to be in but I also found really good mentors in the industry.

I’m not really sure what could’ve made the process faster, going to film school can take up to four years. I do believe your work speaks for itself and the right fanbase will gravitate to it. Some of the most essential skills I’ve learned is how to work with different personalities, Learning to take critiques, adjusting to changing situations and knowing your audience. The biggest obstacles that stood in my way of learning more would really be myself and time management. You need to have a good balance to be able to keep your family life and creative energy flowing.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

My name is Trenell Foster and I originally started out as a recording artist under the name Jamez Flamez. Over time I transitioned from music into internet radio and tv with a show called New City Radio, which then developed into my desire to get into script writing and directing. I decided to start my own production company Black Monolith Films and we would primarily create films and web series. Our first pilot project was called Day Walkers which is currently on Amazon Prime Video and is set to become a series. The next project we created was a fan film called Static Discharged based on the Milestone Comics character Static Shock. We are currently working with the Marvel rising Stars Project on a stop motion animation series based on the Avengers called Earth’s Mightiest Heroes which episodes 1 and 2 can be found on your YouTube channel on Infini tv on Roku. We also with permission from George Lucas and Lucasfilms have been given the chance to create our own Star Wars fan saga which we are currently in preproduction for. My company right now consists of myself as Director, writer, producer and actor, Jeremy Stokes as co-writer, Jason Polo as Director of Photography and Scott Anderson as Editor and Graphic design. The things I’m most proud of is being able to create stories and projects that the actors and fans really like. Being able to get permission from entities Lucasfilms, Stephen King, Marvel and The Wes Craven Estate to create stories based on their properties has been an awesome experience.
You can follow me at
facebook.com/TrenellFoster
facebook.com/Blackmonolithfilms
instagram.com/blackmonolithfilms
[email protected]

Is there mission driving your creative journey?

Many times people ask me what inspires me to write and create these projects. The best answer I can give is a want and desire to have stories told from an African American perspective shown more in front of and behind the camera. I want to be able to show people of color in various leading roles that Hollywood may not offer. I want to be able to give the new and upcoming actor a start in a project or fan film that they’ve always wanted to be apart of. But I’d have to say the biggest driving factor in my journey is to create a business that my children can some day take over and have the ability to work for themselves and not for someone else.

What’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative in your experience?

The most rewarding aspect of being a creative for me is seeing something that started as an idea turn into reality. Then you take that reality and expose others to it and they enjoy it as well and want to see more. There’s nothing better than seeing what you had on paper a few months ago transferred to the screen with all your ideas playing out in live action.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: blackmonolithfilms
• Facebook: blackmonolithfilms
• Youtube: blackmonolithfilms
• Other: Follow me personally at Facebook.com/TrenellFoster

Image Credits
All images and graphics captured or created by Scott Anderson