Clarke Peters says starring in 'Da 5 Bloods' changed his perception of the Vietnam War '180 degrees'
- Peters told Insider he was arrested in a demonstration to end the Vietnam war in 1969.
- However, he said meeting American veterans who still live in Vietnam changed his views.
- "I have much more sympathy now about what they had to go through and what war has done to them."
Clarke Peters grew up during the Vietnam War. He watched the live reporting alongside his father, a veteran of the Korean War, and was dumbfounded as to why the US was fighting there in the first place.
Peters' objections against the war even led to him being arrested while attending the massive Moratorium to End the War in Vietnam demonstration in Washington, D.C. in 1969.
Fast-forward 50 years, and Peters suddenly found himself in Vietnam for Spike Lee's "Da 5 Bloods."
"I'm in Vietnam and all these ghosts come up," Peters told Insider over a recent Zoom call, looking back on making the movie. "I'm thinking, we're Americans and we're going to Ho Chi Minh City. That was Saigon! How are these people going to treat me?"
In "Da 5 Bloods" Peters works alongside the likes of Delroy Lindo, Isiah Whitlock Jr., and Norm Lewis to play a group of Vietnam veterans who, decades after fighting in the war, return to Vietnam to retrieve the remains of their squad leader (Chadwick Boseman), find the gold they left behind, and take on the ghosts of their past.
So how did Peters, a man who most of his life was against the war, feel about playing a soldier who fought in it?
He said it completely changed his perception of the Vietnam War.
"180 degrees, it really did," Peters revealed.
The actor, who was awarded a BAFTA best supporting actor nomination for his performance as Otis, the medic of the group who reunites with his Vietnamese lover during the war and learns he has a daughter with her, said what made him think differently was his interactions before filming began with American veterans currently living in Vietnam.
"These men went back to Vietnam for whatever reason, they needed to go back there," Peters said in amazement. "I have much more sympathy now about what they had to go through and what war has done to them."
Peters admits even a few years after shooting the Netflix movie he's still processing the fact that American soldiers who fought in the war realized the only way they could find peace was to live in Vietnam, though, it doesn't mean their demons have been exorcised.
Peters recalls he and his castmates speaking to one American veteran who seemed to change right in front of their eyes when they asked him if he'd ever seen someone die during his time in the war.
"His whole energy changed," Peters said. "He was quiet. He took a long time to finally say, 'Yeah, I did.' And this brother is living in Vietnam, so I wonder what ghosts are haunting him. He seemed to be so relaxed up to that moment, but you could just feel the sadness and anger and loss welling up inside him."
Peters, who is also known for his work on "The Wire" and "His Dark Materials," said the experience of being in Vietnam before shooting began on "Da 5 Bloods" didn't alter his Otis character from how he was originally portrayed in the script. But he does feel he brought more love to a character.
"The irony of this whole thing is when I got arrested at the Moratorium in Washington I was a first-aid medic," Peters said. "Here in this movie I'm following the same path, so the sense of caring came easy for me. What was heightened was opening up more of a caring in me, knowing what these men had gone through. Clarke did that, not Otis."
"Da 5 Bloods" is currently available on Netflix.