Long before she became famous, Emmy-winning “Bear” actor Ayo Edebiri had a brush with show business that went south in a hurry because of her cautious father. (Watch the video below.)
The “Inside Out 2” star recalled to Seth Meyers on “Late Night” Monday that Martin Scorsese’s staff asked if they could use her family’s Boston home for “The Departed” when she was around 10 years old.
Edebiri and her dad were about to leave for her piano lesson, she said. Her father, an immigrant from Nigeria, wasn’t about to give the crew the time of day when they came knocking.
The comedian hilariously captured her pop’s skepticism in dealing with what seemed to be a too-good-to-true offer: A movie by one of the world’s most famous directors would be filmed in their residence, and they would get paid for it.
Adopting her father’s voice, Edebiri recreated his reaction: “Use my house. So you can get the deed to my house. You see a working immigrant man with a house. And you want to steal the house. You want to come inside the house. Take my keys. Take the deed. And take my family. Nice try.”
The production crew insisted that wasn’t the case and tried to reassure him that they would use the house for just a few days and he would be compensated for it.
“You pay me money, so in court you can say you paid for my house,” Edebiri recalled her father saying.
The location scouts even promised him that Scorsese and Leonardo DiCaprio would arrive in 30 minutes, Edebiri said.
“Yeah, and we’ll have a Black president,” her father quipped, according to the actor.
Ultimately, the movie ended up using another house in the neighborhood.
“The Departed” won the Oscar for Best Picture, and Scorsese won Best Director.
As for Edebiri, she said she gave up piano ― but it all worked out in the end.