Raekwon Says He Would’ve Taken A ‘Goodfellas’ Approach To Directing ‘American Saga’

Raekwon also shared that his mom is a fan of Shameik Moore’s portrayal of him in Wu-Tang: An American Saga series.

If Raekwon were directing Wu-Tang: An American Saga there would be one film in particular he’d reference for inspiration.

During a recent appearance on Talib Kweli’s “People’s Party With Talib Kweli,” Rae shared what he would do differently if he was directing An American Saga.

“Now, how I would’ve did it in another way, I probably would’ve did it in a Goodfellas way, coming from Rae’s version,” the rapper said, referring to Martin Scorsese’s brilliant crime film starring Robert De Niro, Ray Liotta, and Joe Pesci. Now, what exactly Rae meant by that isn’t clarified because he doesn’t speak on it further in the interview. Unlike the martial arts movies RZA references or borrows from to tell An American Saga‘s story, maybe for Rae it would’ve been told more like a gangster or mafia film, with Rae channeling his inner Henry Hill to offer voice-over narration of how the Wu came to be.

At the very least, maybe we’ll see Rae get the opportunity to do this with an episode from the series. But even though he’s not directing, he does like what RZA has done with the show, and both him and his mom approve of Shameik Moore’s portrayal of him.

“There was a time I was watching it with my mom. I was like, ‘Ma, you think that’s me right there? She’s like, ‘Son, he’s doing good,'” Rae said, adding elsewhere in the conversation that Moore “captures the essence” of the rapper.

Recently, RZA revealed the second season of An American Saga is retuning this fall.