Don Cheadle on difficulty of financing Miles Davis film without white actor

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Don Cheadle is one of Hollywood's most recognisable actors, thanks to a 29 year career that has included roles in Oceans 11, Crash, Traffic and Hotel Rwanda, for which he was nominated for a Best Actor Oscar. His new film is Miles Ahead about the jazz legend Miles Davis, in which he plays Davis as well as directs. His co-star Ewan McGregor plays a journalist who manages to interview Miles Davis during a reclusive period in the 1970s. "You said at one point about the difficulty of making the film and getting the financing, that at one point it became obvious that having a white actor in the movie was a financial imperative. What did you mean?" Mishal Husain asked. "Just that, that made everything go. I can put parentheses around white and I could have said international, someone that would have meant something to an international distributor, I could have probably cast a Chinese actor if I was going to get Chinese money, but just me and Miles Davis, the music, was not enough," replied Don Cheadle.