‘People vs. O.J.’s’ Sterling K. Brown dived headlong into the glove scene: ‘I was livid’
VIDEO: Watch Sterling K. Brown, who plays Christopher Darden, talk about converging with his character in the glove scene of “The People vs. O.J. Simpson: American Crime Story.”
It’s the infamous moment that 21 years later is still generating headlines: when O.J. Simpson famously tried on a pair of bloody gloves in court at a key moment in his murder trial.
The gloves fit Simpson awkwardly, leading to the phrase made famous by attorney Johnnie Cochran: “If it doesn’t fit, you must acquit.”
For Sterling K. Brown, who starred as prosecutor Christopher Darden in the FX anthology series “The People vs. O.J. Simpson: American Crime Story,” it was a moment that incited a deep sense of anger and frustration when it came time to act out the scene as Darden.
“In the back of my mind, I’m always thinking — and you’re told as an actor — you never play the end of the scene,” Brown said when he visiting The Envelope’s video studio this week. “You always go into whatever you’re about to do thinking the best possible outcome is going to happen.”
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It was intended by prosecutors to be a power-play moment to slow down some of the momentum of Simpson’s so-called Dream Team of defense attorneys, which included Cochran, Robert Shapiro, Alan Dershowitz and his most trusted ally, Robert Kardashian.
“We need that moment,” Brown recounted as if still channeling his character. “We’re going to do this. We know that Nicole bought these gloves. We’ve got the receipts to prove it. We’ve seen pictures of O.J. wearing them … let’s put them on him. Let’s make it happen in front of America and slam dunk, drop the microphone, walk off. Right? That’s what you think is going to happen. And that’s what I was telling myself the whole time …”
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But as Cuba Gooding Jr. — playing Simpson — began fidgeting with the gloves, that’s where the actor and the character truly converged.
“I was sitting there and I was like, ‘Yo, bruh!’” Brown recalled. “I was livid. Not Chris Darden. Sterling Brown was like, ‘Bruh, put on these gloves, Jack! You know they fit!’”
To hear what it was like shooting those courtroom scenes and more, check out the full interview below.
Sterling K. Brown talks about playing Christopher Darden in “The People vs. O.J. Simpson: American Crime Story.”
Twitter: @villarrealy
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