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How do you find inspiration? Say you\u2019re doing your holiday shopping<\/a> and you\u2019re struggling to find the perfect gift for that difficult person on your list \u2014 parent, partner, paramour. How do you let your mind drift to a place where the clouds part and you achieve a sort of awakening?<\/p>\n To be honest, I don\u2019t always get there. But caffeine is usually a good place to start<\/a>. <\/p>\n I\u2019m Glenn Whipp, columnist for the Los Angeles Times and host of The Envelope newsletter, back in your inbox for the next few months as we sail through the atmospheric river<\/a> of awards season. Climb aboard.<\/p>\n (Bexx Francois \/ For The Times)<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/figure><\/div>\n You might remember how much I love \u201cSinners,\u201d Ryan Coogler\u2019s audacious, genre-defying blockbuster that explores the intrinsic power of American blues music<\/a> and Black life in the Jim Crow South within the context of a vampire horror movie. <\/p>\n So I was thrilled to talk with Coogler and his longtime department heads \u2014 a movie family that includes Oscar winners who have been with him since his 2013 debut, \u201cFruitvale Station\u201d \u2014 for The Envelope\u2019s first cover story of the season<\/a>. There were a dozen different ways I could have gone with the piece, but our conversations kept coming back to the scene in the juke joint when young Sammie (Miles Caton) conjures spirits from the past and future onto the dance floor. <\/p>\n How did Coogler summon this scene? It goes back to that question I asked at the outset: How do you find inspiration? <\/p>\n For Coogler, \u201cSinners\u201d began on Nov. 17, 2021, a date fixed in his mind because it was the day one of his favorite rappers, Young Dolph<\/a>, was murdered. Coogler was devastated. And his mind drifted back to Nipsey Hussle<\/a>, the L.A. rapper gunned down outside his South L.A. clothing store in 2019. Coogler was living in Los Angeles at the time, trying to get a \u201cSpace Jam\u201d sequel off the ground. <\/p>\n \u201cI felt like I had my heart ripped out, bro,\u201d Coogler told me. \u201cI have two younger brothers I\u2019m really close with, and I remember reading an article in the L.A. Times about his older brother recounting what happened<\/a>. It just broke me. And then I get the news that Dolph\u2019s been killed in his hometown, and I just remember feeling, \u2018I\u2019m done with rap, man.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n Later, Coogler spoke with his friend, \u201cBlack Panther\u201d producer Nate Moore, lamenting that rappers who talk about their lives, beating the odds and escaping hardship, sometimes end up succumbing to the thing they thought they left behind. Moore isn\u2019t a rap guy, but told Coogler that his favorite music, grunge, was just like that \u2014 in this case, artists addressing their struggles with depression and addiction and then, on occasion, overdosing or taking their own lives. <\/p>\n Toward the end of that day, Coogler was driving back from the set of \u201cBlack Panther: Wakanda Forever.\u201d Passing through Byron, Ga., the Oakland native looked out his window and saw, for the first time in his life, a cotton field. During our interview, Coogler pulls out his phone and finds a video his sister-in-law shot of him taking it all in and picking a sprig of cotton. Coogler kept it, eventually putting it on his work desk at home. <\/p>\n \u201cThat was a part of finding \u2018Sinners,\u2019\u201d Coogler says. \u201cThe other thing that happened was I started listening to grunge music, taking a break from rap. And as soon as I put the music on, I was like, \u2018Yo, this feels like my uncle\u2019s. It led me right back to his record collection.\u201d<\/p>\n That uncle, James Edmonson, loved the blues. Coogler\u2019s cousin, Edmonson\u2019s youngest daughter, told the filmmaker about a Bill Withers\u2019 song, \u201cI Can\u2019t Write Left-Handed,\u201d<\/a> written from the perspective of a Vietnam veteran. Coogler listened to it, and it reminded him of \u201cRooster,\u201d<\/a> the Alice in Chains song written by guitarist Jerry Cantrell for his father, who served in Vietnam.<\/p>\n \u201cSo I\u2019m playing these two songs one after another, and I\u2019m like, \u2018These genres that you wouldn\u2019t find next to each other at a Tower Records back in the day, they\u2019re so close,\u2019\u201d Coogler says. \u201cAnd studying the history of it, it\u2019s people playing it different, but it\u2019s the same idea.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cAnd that\u2019s when I realized I had to make \u2018Sinners.\u2019\u201d <\/p>\n Coogler scrolls through his phone and shows a picture of the cotton sprig on his desk<\/a>. He dedicated \u201cSinners\u201d to his uncle, who died about a decade before it arrived in theaters. <\/p>\n \u201cSo many cosmic moments came together for this movie,\u201d Coogler says. \u201cI was always like, \u2018All right. I just gotta make sure I don\u2019t f\u2014 it up.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\nCover story: The best six minutes in movies this year<\/h2>\n