By Jenny Halper in New York City

Studio execs wanted a rapper to play the pivotal role of D Jay in “Hustle and Flow,” but director Craig Brewer pushed for Terrence Howard. Smart move. Fearlessly taking on the challenging role of pimp/aspiring hip-hop artist D Jay, Howard turns in a performance that’s absolutely powerhouse.

Howard took the time to tell press about his preparation for “Hustle and Flow,” and how his original career aspirations- chemical engineering- were waylaid by inevitable acting success.

Q: You’ve had an amazing year between “Crash” and this. You’ve obviously been making movies for a long time, but how does it feel to suddenly have everyone discover you?

TERRENCE: Well, you know, I think a basketball player knows he’s a good basketball player before he gets in the NBA. Believe in yourself first. I’m not really aware of people being aware of me beyond you guys telling me, you know? The only thing that really matters in the initial part of my career, the worst mistake I’ve ever made was try to do things to please the audience thinking how the audience is going to respond if I do this. And when I stopped doing that and started thinking about what feels natural and what feels right to me and started pleasing myself, then it became good. So I’m appreciative that people are liking what I’m doing, but whether they like it or not, it doesn’t matter, because I won’t change what I’m doing.

Q: The two roles are so completely different and the role in Ray. Are you focused on finding disparate roles?

TERRENCE: No, most of the decisions that I make with regard to taking roles, I just look for something that’s challenging, something that I think I can accomplish, you know. “Hustle and Flow” I didn’t think I could accomplish. I didn’t think I could pull off the rapping. I didn’t think I could pull off the pimping it. I didn’t think I could pull off half of the things that was necessary and Lawrence Fishburn took me to Beverly Hot Springs and made me get naked in the damn water around all these men, which I was uncomfortable with and then he slid over next to me, put his arm around me and now, I’m really uncomfortable in this hot tub. And he’s not gay. He’s just very free and easy. And he looked at me and was like “You know, you’re going to have to take one of these movies under your own wing, and it can’t be something easy.” And I said Okay, and that’s when I told John I was going to do the movie. It was like it was time to step into something more and try something deeper then what you think you can do.

Q: How did you get into acting? You went to Pratt?

TERRENCE: Yeah, chemical engineering. I am an engineer, but what I find important and necessary is that you just learn things as you go along. You know, one day I’ll go and get my masters in physics and go and do all that stuff, but right now, I got deviated into this artistic world and I’m so appreciative that I have the opportunity. I feel like the alchemist that’s supposed to be a shepherd with sheep and now I’m in this caravan learning to be an alchemist.

Q: Did you ever thing you’d drop out of this and go back to being an engineer?

TERRENCE: Yes, I mean my thing wasn’t just engineering. I just wanted to be a scientist. I wanted to be a scientist, and people like Craig Brewer saw me as something more. I was ready to drop out years ago and Stephanie wouldn’t let me leave.

Q: Did your great grandmother influence your acting?

TERRENCE: Well, I watched her. I didn’t have training, but for 20 years I watched her and she would have a little tape recorder like this and she used to record all the parts of the other people and then she would say her lines. That’s how she rehearsed. She found that I had an excellent memory because one day, when I was 7 years old, and she hit the stop button before going to the next thing, I said the other person’s line and she responded to me and then I said the next one and we did the whole scene, and we did all her rehearsals together with her. And she used to thank me, like I’d done something great for her. If you saw “Ain’t Supposed to Die a Natural Death,” that was my great-grandma Minnie Gentry. She was the best actress in the world. That was my training.

Q: Does this open up your rap career opportunities now?

TERRENCE: No, it was a wrap when they yelled “wrap” on August 4th and to clear something earlier, I’m still three credits short of my (engineering) degree.

Q: “Crash” was made before this. Did it have any effect on you or did it ever resonate even unconsciously, the contrast of the one to the other?

TERRENCE: No, but I had this accent with DJay for four months and I couldn’t talk without talking like him, but the moment they yelled “wrap” and I went to North Carolina to start “My Life in Idlewild” it all disappeared, and it’s funny it’s like that. You just drop a character like this that and the other and it’s done. And I’m sure it affects me now in my present life because I don’t know, you go a little crazy and you can’t help it. But you’re able to drop something and move on, drop it and move on and it was like a dream. Every little job becomes a dream, and you don’t recall it anymore, and maybe you might have a déjà vu moment, but it’s like something you dreamed earlier. That’s what dropping out of “Crash” was and coming into “Hustle and Flow.”

Q: And then you’re continuing your relationship with John (Singleton, one of the producers). What’s it like going from this to something like “Four Brothers”?

TERRENCE: “Four Brothers” he was a director and this movie he was a producer. I had never worked with John. John’s style of directing is that old style, “Hit your mark, say your line. Don’t ad lib.” That’s not me. I don’t know how to just hit my mark and say my line. I ad lib. I’ve gotta bring my own into it. So that was very very difficult, because even though I love him and respect him as a producer and as a person/writer, but our ways of working doesn’t really coalesce together. So we’re going to be friends. (Laughs)

Q: D Jay is such a full character and there’s so much depth to him. Was that all in the script from when you first read it or is that something that developed over time?

TERRENCE: Craig had him from Day 1. That was the only movie I really didn’t ad lib on was Craig’s because I didn’t need to. You ad lib to fill holes.

Q: There was no improvisation?

TERRENCE: Not for D Jay in this movie. Every word, beyond me saying “N*gg*r”. The cursing and the “N*gg*r” was what I put in there because was what I felt and heard on the streets, and I wasn’t going to take that out. I was like this is missing here. This is unreal and we need this. I make documentaries. Even though they’re staged documentaries, but that’s what I like to shoot, is a documentary.

Q: Would you make a film yourself?

TERRENCE: What’s funny is that Jim Sheridan told me two weeks ago, because I’m doing a film with him now, is that “you really should direct, Terrance, and when you direct, I will executive produce you.” So I’ve got some ideas.

Q: How did you like being in Memphis and was it different from what you expected?

TERRENCE: It was hot and muggy and …peace? I mean, you had to be careful with some of the people down there, but most of the people were so genuine and nice to me.

Q: Did you meet some pimps?

TERRENCE: 123 pimps I interviewed and 78 prostitutes over the course of two years to gather the information for this character completely.

Q: One of my favorite lines was when Anthony said “some walk the walk, some people talk the talk.”Has anyone ever said anything similar to you in your life?

TERRENCE: Nah. (laughs) I mean, there’s people that said some incredible things to me like “you must maintain your majestic composure at all times.” That’s something my uncle said to me. He said “You’re a young prince and someday you’re going to become king,” but nobody ever told me to “shut up and walk. D Jay needed to hear that. He needed to hear that because all he was was a fast talker.

”Hustle and Flow” opens on July 22.