Mike Poe
Filmmaker
Born in Little Rock, AR, Mike Poe's passion for filmmaking began at age 12 when his aunts gifted him a 35mm camera and enlarger. Mike earned a BA in Radio, TV, & Film from the University of Arkansas and has since worked on documentaries, short films, and hundreds of art events for film festivals across Arkansas. A few of his credits include: 45RPM (producer, music supervisor), Not Even God (producer), and West of Memphis (camera).
Poe's most famous work is as director of Voices For Justice, a short documentary bringing attention to the wrongful convictions of The West Memphis Three in advance of their hearings with the Arkansas Supreme Court.
Mike Poe's life took a sharp turn in 2014 when his best friend, TC Edwards, was murdered. The killer was never caught, and Mike has dedicated his years since to honoring the legendary rocker with a full-length documentary film, TC is Metal. Beyond his quest for justice and closure, Poe's goals involve creating and sharing Arkansas art with the world, and bringing in talent from around the globe to teach and inspire Arkansan artists.
Listen to Learn:
- Mike's early inspiration to find art through a camera lens
- Poe's work with Arkansas Take Action in pursuit of justice
- About the legacy of TC Edwards, and more...
Podcast Links
TRANSCRIPT
EPISODE 454
[INTRODUCTION]
[0:00:08] GM: Welcome to Up in Your Business with Kerry McCoy, a production of flagandbanner.com. Through storytelling, conversational interviews and Kerry's natural curiosity, this weekly radio show and podcast offers listeners an insider's view into the commonalities of entrepreneurs, athletes, medical professionals, politicians, and other successful people, all sharing their stories of success and the ups and downs of risk-taking. Connect with Kerry through her candid, funny, informative, and always encouraging weekly blog. Now, it's time for Kerry McCoy to get all up in your business.
[DISCLAIMER]
[0:00:41] ANNOUNCER: The opinions expressed by guests on Up In Your Business with Kerry McCoy do not necessarily represent the opinions of the show, its hosts and producers, or flagandbanner.com.
[EPISODE]
[0:00:52] KM: Thank you, son Gray. This show began in 2016 as a way for me and other successful people to pay forward our experiential knowledge. It wasn't long before my team and I realized that we were the ones learning. Listening to our guests has been both educational and inspiring. To quote the Dalai Lama, “When you talk, you're only repeating what you already know. But if you listen, you may learn something new.” Before I introduce today's guest, I want to let you know, if you miss any part of today's show, want to hear it again or share it, there's a way, and son Gray will tell you how.
[0:01:25] GM: All UIYB past and present interviews are available at Up In Your Business with Kerry McCoy's YouTube channel, Facebook page, the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette's digital version, flagandbanner.com's website, or wherever you listen to podcasts. Just ask your smart speaker to play Up In Your Business with Kerry McCoy. By subscribing to our YouTube channel, or flagandbanner.com's email list, you will receive prior notification of that week's guest. Back to you, Kerry.
[0:01:51] KM: Thank you, again, Gray. My guest today is filmmaker and Little Rock, Arkansas native, Mr. Mike Poe. Mike has an impressive resume. He's worked at many levels on many films, mostly documentaries, in a mix of positions ranging from producer, director, cameraman, music, and even the talent. I've chosen the films I want to talk about today, but Mike may have more to say. On my list are Gutsy, Apple docu series with Hilary and Chelsea, Voices for Justice. Oh, my gosh. About the wrongly accused West Memphis 3. This film of Mike's is what brought awareness and led to the boys now men being released from prison. This is a good one. I threw this in for fun. Merpeople, underwater performers. I mean, who doesn't want to know about people that perform underwater? That's crazy. Black Oak Arkansas - 40 Years of Heaven. I'm telling my age. What's that guy's name? What was his name?
[0:02:49] MP: Jim Dandy.
[0:02:50] KM: Jim Dandy. Go Jim Dandy. Uh-huh. Yeah. This one, I don't know what it's about. You're going to have to tell me, because it creeps me out. Not Even God, a cult film that opens with a statement, are you ready for this very first opening statement that somebody put in there? This may have been you, Mike. I don't know, but it says on the little trailer I read, “What if I told you in order to live your best life, you have to kill yourself?”
[0:03:15] MP: Yeah.
[0:03:16] KM: Yeah. Yeah. I got to find out about that. And his reason for being here, his passion project, TC is Metal, the film, a tribute film to his friend TC Edwards, an autistic, creative heavy metal singer that was murdered December of 2014 and the killer is still at large. That's the nuts and bolts of this show. It is with great curiosity, I welcome to the table, the interestingly complex and hardworking filmmaker and activist, Mr. Mike Poe. Yay, Mike.
[0:03:47] MP: Hey, that was an incredible introduction. Thank you so much.
[0:03:50] KM: Well, you should see the one that I made for you.
[0:03:53] GM: Oh, geez.
[0:03:56] KM: I didn't use it, but I was like, wow, that's good. I may read. I did copy it and print it, though. I may read it later on. In fact, I will. I will definitely read it later on in the show, because I don't want to wear everybody out with me talking. Before we jump into life's work and your current passion project, TC is Metal, a film about the murder of your friend, TC Edwards. I want to learn about you, where you grew up, what your parents did, your school, your love life, how you got in film. Are you a Little Rock native?
[0:04:25] MP: Absolutely. Yeah. I was born at St. Vincent's infirmary.
[0:04:29] KM: You grew up in Little Rock. Your parents are paralegal?
[0:04:33] MP: Yeah. My mother is a paralegal, and my dad has passed, but he was an interior designer out of Dallas, Texas. Had a business called Corporate Interiors There. Yeah, my mother is a paralegal, court reporter, a process server, entrepreneur. She's worn a lot of hats as a mom and a dad, because she was a single mom.
[0:04:58] KM: You called her an entrepreneur. What does that mean?
[0:05:01] MP: Well, in the 80s, she started a personnel business, where she was manpower, where she found the best candidates for jobs and helped place people in temporary positions. She started that company and her and a partner ended up going different directions, and so did she. She ended up in Florida doing some real estate work. Then went from selling real estate at a place called Topsoil down in Destin, near Sand Destin, to New York City when I was in high school, when I was a junior in high school. I saw that she was falling for this guy that was in the Coast Guard, and that she really needed to do her own thing. I was old enough to know at 17. I came home here and got my own apartment, because I didn't want to spend my senior year in Long Island, New York, going to school where I didn't know anybody.
[0:05:59] KM: Where'd you get the film bug?
[0:06:03] MP: Ever since I was a little kid, I wanted to be like Robin Williams. I wanted to be a stand-up comic, I wanted to be a filmmaker, I wanted to be an actor, director. I really study takes and facial expressions and the way people act. Of course, all my favorites, like Richard Pryor and Eddie Murphy, and number one, Robin Williams, but Rodney Dangerfield, George Harlan.
[0:06:29] KM: Where did you want to do film? How did you get your fingers on film?
[0:06:33] MP: I'll tell you, I came about it by getting into photography. I got into photography, because both of my aunts, one gave me some darkroom equipment, the other one gave me a camera when I was about 12. I made my own yearbook at junior high, and then went on to work in a yearbook in high school. As a darkroom manager at the high school for years, I really found my love for photography. I went to UALR in the photography department. I did pretty well there and really enjoyed it. But when it came time to do a show, I realized that I was going to end up putting an NFS on all of my work, which is not for sale, because it was so personal to me and I didn't want to sell it. I realized that that wasn't a good business plan and that's no way to pay back your student loans.
I said, well, what else am I interested in? I've always been interested in investigations and journalism and writing. I'd written for the spectrum and the free press dozens of articles. I went into journalism. I quickly found out in journalism, thanks to Dr. Sonny Sanders, giving me triple Fs, because you lost a letter grade for every mistake you made that I was not a journalist, because I couldn't write copy and I couldn't do it correctly and my grammar was awful.
[0:07:47] KM: Yeah, I noticed that when you filled out your biography.
[0:07:51] MP: It’s awful.
[0:07:53] KM: Good thing you’re in film.
[0:07:55] MP: The ADHD doesn't help, because you read a paragraph backwards and forwards and then you don't read the next one. It can get confusing. What ended up happening is I said, “You know what? I love photography. I love journalism. What could I do with these things that won't have to be as professional and give me some leeway to be a little more myself and more creative, instead of technical?” That's how I found film.
[0:08:22] KM: I don't think I've ever interviewed a successful person that didn't lend their success to some sort of a failure.
[0:08:28] MP: Oh, absolutely.
[0:08:29] KM: I mean, that's why I'm in the flag business. It seems like that's where the biggest growth comes. All right, before we go to a break, I want to read you what AI said about you.
[0:08:38] MP: Okay.
[0:08:40] KM: Hailing from the heart of Little Rock, Arkansas, filmmaker Mike Poe is a rising creative force whose work captures the depth and complexity of southern storytelling, drawing inspiration from the rich culture heritage and striking landscapes of Arkansas. From the historic central high school to the scenic beauty of the Ozark foothills, Poe weaves narratives that are as visually compelling as they are emotionally resonant. With a keen eye for character and an instinct for authentic voice, Poe has become known for his ability to merge regional texture with universal themes. His films often explore identity, resilience, and the untold stories of everyday people earning recognition in regional film circuits and sparking conversation across audiences. Whether he's shooting on location in the bustling river market district, or evoking the quiet introspection of rural life, Mike Poe brings an unmistakable Arkansas soul to the screen.
[0:09:43] MP: Wow. It’s pretty impressive AI.
[0:09:45] GM: All right, ChatGPT.
[0:09:46] KM: All right, put that on your LinkedIn page, because your LinkedIn sucks. No, I’m just kidding. As yours. Yeah, if you have problems writing, AI is your best friend. All right, it's time for us to take a break. When we come back, we'll continue our conversation with filmmaker, Mr. Mike Poe. Up next, his impressive resume of documentaries and his reason for being here, to bring light to the murder story of his best friend, heavy metal singer, T.C. Edwards, through his documentary, TC and Me, and what Mike is still doing a decade later to jail the suspected murderer. We’ll be right back.
[BREAK]
[0:10:23] ANNOUNCER: The opinions expressed by guests on Up in Your Business with Kerry McCoy do not necessarily represent the opinions of the show, its hosts and producers, or flagandbanner.com.
[0:10:33] GM: You're listening to Up in Your Business with Kerry McCoy, a production of flagandbanner.com. In 1975, with only $400, Kerry founded Arkansas Flag and Banner. Since then, the business has grown and changed, along with Kerry's experience and leadership knowledge. In 1995, she embraced the Internet and rebranded her company as simply flagandbanner.com. In 2004, she became an early blogger. Since then, she has founded the non-profit Friends of Dreamland Ballroom, began publishing her magazine, Brave, and in 2016, branched out into this very radio show, YouTube channel and podcast.
In 2020, Kerry McCoy Enterprises acquired ourcornermarket.com, an online company specializing in American-made plaques, signage and memorials. In 2021, Flag and Banner expanded to a satellite office in Miami, Florida, where first-generation immigrants keep the art of sewing alive and flags made in America. Telling American-made stories, selling American-made flags, the flagandbanner.com. Back to you, Kerry.
[INTERVIEW CONTINUED]
[0:11:38] KM: Thank you. We're speaking today with the talented filmmaker, Mr. Mike Poe, from Little Rock, Arkansas. Before we talk about the film, TC is Metal, the murder of your – is he your brother? Is he your adopted brother? Did I hear you say that?
[0:11:52] MP: A lot of people call him brother, because he's such an angel and everyone loves him. He didn't have a family. Me, my mom and my sisters asked him through me, of course, said, “Would you like to be a part of our family?” We just started taking him to birthday dinners, Thanksgiving, Christmas. He would call them his sisters and call that his mom. I've been calling him brother ever since. He was adult adopted, and not legally.
[0:12:23] KM: Yeah. I got you. You have a wide, wide heart. Let's build your street cred and talk about some of your notable films.
[0:12:30] MP: Okay.
[0:12:33] KM: Gutsy. Apple docu-series with Hilary and Chelsea.
[0:12:36] MP: Sure.
[0:12:37] KM: Well done. I'm not sure what role you played, because you do lots of different roles on those. What was your takeaway? They interviewed so many people, from Kim Kardashian to, what's the name of the lady that lived in the woods with the apes?
[0:12:50] GM: Oh, yes. Jane Goodall.
[0:12:52] MP: Jane Goodall. Yeah.
[0:12:52] KM: From Jane Goodall. That's why I have it right here. He has to do all my nouns.
[0:12:56] GM: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Proper nouns.
[0:12:59] KM: From Jane Goodall to Kim Kardashian, to Goldie Hawn, I mean, it's bizarre, the people that she's entered. Did you go on every one of those interviews?
[0:13:11] MP: No, I did not. That came about in a really bizarre way, which a lot of the things that I do come to me. A couple of my best friends since high school, David Bevins and John Atkins. David Bevins is my friend. He met Johnny later. They asked me if I wanted to come DJ something really interesting at their house. I said, of course, and they connected me to this crew that needed an on-air DJ for a party that they were hosting for Simone. She's the drag queen that won RuPaul's Drag Race here from Conway, Arkansas. Yes. She was one of the interviews.
The Little Rock Show, they did the Little Rock Nine, of course, and Simone. Those were the two people that they interviewed here. For Simone's part, because she is a member of what's known as the House of Avalon, that is a group of friends of mine that I've had for a long time, that I met through David and Johnny and a bunch of other mutual friends, that are – they're all performers and drag queens and artists. Their house is called Avalon. The House of Avalon was having an event with Simone at Dave and Johnny's home out in West Little Rock.
I arrived and put together what they needed and realized that it'd probably be smart for me to try to hop on the production side of things, because they could use my help. One thing particular was Dave and Johnny wanted to build a stage in their swimming pool. They wanted Simone to perform on the stage in the swimming pool, versus anywhere else that they could think of. The production crew could only find, I think the cheapest they found, the ability to build that was about $9,000. I told them, I could do it for $1,000. I just called some contacts, that's what you do. That's what you do as a producer for anything. That's the most important thing you have is your cellphone. I called plenty of people, I found a place where I could rent it for 300, hired the people to build it and then use their crew as well to put the finishing touches and security on it. We built a stage in the pool.
We're talking, I brought my lighting out and fog machine and everything just to make this an unbelievable performance. At the same time, I needed to, as I do at every event, I needed to prepare my DJ table, my turntables, my records, all the music and stuff. I do remember this one pretty funny part is that when I was putting the last final touches on the lighting on the edge of their swimming pool, which is raised out of the ground about two feet, I slipped and fell and cracked my head open.
[0:16:02] KM: That's not funny.
[0:16:02] MP: Off on the side of the pool. Well, it is when you do it. When you injure yourself, it's funny. You can't help it. I injured myself and I had, of course, nothing to hide the huge gash in my forehead and Chelsea and Hillary are still coming, like Secret Service. I'm going to be on screen, possibly. What am I going to do? I went into my friend, David's closet, which is about half the size of this room. Such a crazy huge closet. Simone’s in there getting ready.
I just tried all of these – I mean, just being honest, all these super gay hats. They just didn't fit me. This weren't my thing. I tried. I kept trying. Then I was like, “Do you have a bandana?” He had nothing but silk scarves? He's so gay. God bless him. He's just like, got all this really expensive stuff and nothing I can put on that I could get blood on. I ended up taking a dinner napkin, a black dinner napkin and making a headband out of that. Thankfully, I was only really shot from behind in the show. It never really came about.
[0:17:06] KM: What do you think about Hillary and Chelsea?
[0:17:09] MP: They were super kind to me. I thought that they really connected with the people that they were talking to and really brought themselves back home, I would say. They brought themselves back home and made that group of people really comfortable and really happy, because the House of Avalon were the only people there. There was only about 25 total people there.
[0:17:30] KM: I think Hilary gets a bad rap all the time.
[0:17:33] MP: I could believe that. I know that politicians in general get a bad rap. That is probably the scariest industry to get into.
[0:17:43] KM: Yeah. I can't believe anybody wants to do it. Voices for Justice. You are famous for this. It’s the wrongly accused West Memphis Three. This film, you started the conversation – You didn't make the film, or it was, or another film I made about it after yours that was with Johnny Depp and all of that, but you got the conversation started. Tell us about that.
[0:18:03] MP: I would absolutely say that I just continued the conversation. I would say that Joe Berlinger started the conversation, because he's the documentary filmmaker that made all three of the Paradise Lost series. During the time I made Voices for Justice, he was working on the third Paradise Lost series. There was another group led by Amy Berg doing a movie called West of Memphis. She was with Peter and Fran Jackson, who did The Hobbit series, out of New Zealand. I started becoming a filmmaker for both of those larger projects and shot 75 gigs of just footage here locally for things they couldn't be at. What I was really hired to do by Arkansas Take Action, which was led by Lori Eckles or Lori and Brent and Kathy Peck, or Peterson, they hired me to manage one of their restaurants and in the same conversation, they said, “Well, our ulterior motive is for you to produce this show for us, because you're one of the only people we've found that has done these multiple band concerts, book shows with all these different genres of musicians and artists and capoeira fighters, or burlesque dancers, or whatever,” because it's just been my passions in high school.
They asked me to film the event. That came first. The event came first, and that event was called Voices for Justice. We started planning it at a Methodist church downtown, which was fantastic, but it would require generators, shutting off the streets, lots of police protection, lots of things that would be pretty cumbersome come the day of the event. Thankfully, Eddy Vedder decided to do it at Robinson Center and make it to where more people could attend from a much cheaper ticket. That's where the event was getting planned. We had about three weeks to put it together. They came to me a few days later and set a group out of Fort Smith was offering to do a film, a 15-minute documentary for 15 grand. Did I think that that was fair? Was that a fair price? I said, yeah, absolutely. $1,000 a minute is actually the pretty base price for a documentary film and everything considered.
I think that you could do that, but honestly, I could do it for you for free. I can do it, as well as what I'm doing. I can do it at the same time, but I'll need a crew. If you just pay the crew, maybe a third of that, 5 grand, we could knock this out. In the next three weeks, we went and interviewed Damien and Jason in prison, but not Jesse. His attorney just gave us access to some previous footage. We got footage from Eddie, from Henry Rollins, from both of those film crews from New York, LA. Seven different sources sent us the information to make what you see.
I was compelled to find a new way to tell this story, but also, to catch everyone up that already knew the story. In that 15 minutes, I tried to wrap up everything that Joe had done with two major features and make something that was compelling, as well as the very impactful interviews from death row and from –
[0:21:25] KM: How did Johnny Depp end up in it?
[0:21:28] MP: Depp was a huge supporter for a long time. Eddie and him connected. Again, when I got hired and I said, yes, I didn't know who was going to be involved. When he said, when Kathy said that it was going to be Eddie Vedder and Johnny Depp and Natalie Maines was absolutely incredible. We actually got surprised by Ben Harper and Fistful of Mercy. They were praying with Eddie the night before and decided to just get on the plane and come here.
[0:21:56] KM: Oh, I love it.
[0:21:58] MP: That morning, about 6 am, I had to find him all, or his band, all of their equipment from Guitar Center, which is not that easy. They wanted 5 grand. Our guy from Live Nation said, we don't pay. Then a few minutes later, we got a call back to come pick up our stuff. Apparently, Eddie had called and said, “We don't pay.”
[0:22:18] KM: Love it. We don't have time to talk about all of your films, but you did this one, I think, Not Even God.
[0:22:26] MP: Yeah, for sure.
[0:22:27] KM: What does it mean when it says, what if I told you in order to live your best life, you have to kill yourself?
[0:22:34] MP: That term is actually a self-help term. It's about getting rid of your old self. It is not about suicide, whatsoever.
[0:22:42] KM: I was like, “Whoa.”
[0:22:44] MP: Yeah. It's also a rap term, very much so. Adrian is a rapper, as well as a producer.
[0:22:52] KM: All right. The reason you're here, your passion project is about TC Metal, about your murdered friend.
[0:22:58] MP: You got it.
[0:23:00] KM: After hearing the story, if anyone has any information that they want to give us to convict the murderer, we're going to give you a number to do that. We're talking to filmmaker, Mr. Mike Poe.
[BREAK]
[0:23:09] ANNOUNCER: The opinions expressed by guests on Up in Your Business with Kerry McCoy do not necessarily represent the opinions of the show, its hosts and producers, or flaggandbanner.com.
[INTERVIEW CONTINUED]
[0:23:21] KM: You sent me so many links about you. You are ADD. You sent me so many links that I watched. I watched this one that was done of you on a interview on a news story of the TC's murder. This is what they said, “TC Edwards was shot and killed in December of 2014. No suspect has been apprehended. Mike Poe, Edward's best friend, found out about the killing from a voicemail. In his inbox was an unthinkable message. Edward's has been found dead in a garage in Little Rock. He had been murdered.” Talk about that day.
[0:24:02] MP: I had a startling sound wake me up. But I live in the city, so there's a lot of sounds. What I'd missed were police officers knocking on my door. I figured that out, because when I walked down and looked outside, I saw them in the parking lot about a block away. I went inside, checked my phone, and saw I had a message from Weasel. His name is Wes. Wes Broadstone from the Crisco Kids is known as Weasel to everyone. He was TC's roommate. I saw that Wes had given me a call, and I found out in his voicemail. He said that the police had just come there and that TC had been killed.
It broke me down to ashes. That's what it did. Once I gained myself back, of course, I called my mother and she came over and helped me navigate talking to the police, arranging a time to go give a statement, help comforting me and things like that. then I did the same for Wes. Contacted him and tried to comfort him. Then from there, if you've ever had something devastating like that happen to someone you love, it becomes a blur, because so many people are contacting you, and you've got to relive that so many times and go through those emotions so many times. It's overwhelming.
I had just seen TC. I can't even think of the hour that I'm talking about right now, that time of the day, what it was. I just know it was daytime. I no longer worked at the bar where he was at, but I'd gone there the night before, because we'd had a problem with this person already, with a suspect, Andre Demetrius Smalley Jr. We had had issues with him, because he had held TC at gunpoint before and robbed him and pushed crack on him multiple times.
[0:26:14] KM: What?
[0:26:16] MP: I had not found that out, because I've been full-time caregiver for my grandmother. One day when I was going to downgrade her bed from a full size to a twin, so we could put rails so it'd be safer for her, I was in the garage at TC's place. TC's place was in my name. He didn't have a credit, or ability to get a lease, so it was in my name and I used the garage for storage. As I was getting the bed out of there, I saw Andre pull up in his fake cop car and get out in his tracksuit. I could just tell from the corn rolls and the gold teeth and the tracksuit and the determination and stride, everything. I'm a pretty good judge of a person. I just saw him walk his way into TC's home. No knock. Nothing. Just walked in.
I took some pictures immediately. I knew something was up. I told my friend who I've never named and I can't, because he has his family and he doesn't want to be a witness or anything, but I went inside as I was telling him to lecture TC and tell him that, “Hey, I thought you were sober off of hard drugs for a decade now. Life is good. What are you doing? You know that we have a rule. You've got in trouble before where drugs have been found on you. Anything else could get you a felony. You could go to prison.” One of the rules was you never bring drugs into the house, other than cannabis, alcohol.
Knowing that TC, even though he was black, he didn't have any really black friends like that. He had more of the black metal friends, and some of our rapper friends, of course, were good friends of his too, but not this guy. You could tell. when I went in, he wasn't there. It's not really hard to process what's going on if TC's not there and the guy just let himself in.
[0:28:04] KM: What was he doing?
[0:28:06] MP: Well, he basically had broken the door to where TC couldn't lock it.
[0:28:12] KM: You think TC owed him money?
[0:28:14] MP: That was his point. Yeah. What TC finally told me, because he's autistic. It's hard for him to lie when pressed. He'll either say, “I can't say. I can't really say, or I'm not sure.” When I finally got him to open up about this, what would happen is that guy would show up at his house between 6 and 8 in the morning. TC would have been coming from Midtown at that time, because he didn't have my place to come after hours anymore, because I needed to go to bed to get up to take care of grandmother.
He had ended up at Midtown and this person saw him as a mark. He broke the rule. He let that person find out where he lived and the guy brought drugs into his home. How many times he contacted him wanting the drugs? I'm not sure after that. What I do know is that he absolutely had wanted to stop it for many months and was super embarrassed about it. Wouldn't let me tell any of our friends about it. Didn't want me to talk to anybody about it. What he told me had happened is that when he tried to stop him many months ago, the guy pulled a gun on him. What the guy would do is he would – if TC wasn't already naked, he would make him get naked.
[0:29:31] KM: What?
[0:29:33] MP: He would go through everything he owned, his shoes, his socks, his underwear, his sheets, his pillowcases, and search for all the money he could find, which TC earned anywhere from $40 to $80, maybe $100 a night in tips between two jobs. He would take all of his money. He would say, “This is what you owe me, and this is just business. But this is what I have to do in order to get my money.”
[0:29:55] GM: Shake down.
[0:29:56] MP: Yeah. Then he would say, “But we're friends. I'm not leaving until you smoke with me to show we're friends.”
[0:30:01] KM: Oh, no.
[0:30:03] MP: Then make him smoke at 6, 7, 8.00 in the morning. Make him smoke crack. Ask him if he wanted more. Of course, he did. If he refused, or if he was sullen, because a lot of times he was, I mean, each, each time TC was arrested, wrongfully arrested, by the way, he got a resisting arrest, because his brain wouldn't let it put his arms behind his back.
[0:30:23] KM: Oh.
[0:30:24] MP: If he would swell up and be like, “Get out of my house.” That’s what he’s thinking. Or, “I hate you. “Oh, here's this guy again. I thought I locked you out.” He pulled the gun on him multiple times and forced him to smoke and then told him he owed money and he would be back. When we tried to stop, he would take his keys and his cellphone and break the door and then extort us for money. He wanted to get to TC's social security. Kind of that was his pay. And so, he was threatening me that he was going to kill me if I allow that.
[0:30:54] KM: He was?
[0:30:57] MP: In person.
[0:30:57] KM: Were you frightened?
[0:30:59] MP: Yeah. Absolutely. At first, I wasn't, because I just thought, “Who's this idiot? He’s just a crackhead, or a drug dealer, or whatever. I'm going to let him know that TC has family and that you're going to leave him alone.” Then one day he blocked me in while I was picking up TC to go to the laundromat and came over to the car and forced TC to get out of the car and go inside. When TC came back, he was high. He had forced him while I was there.
[0:31:28] KM: You hear about stuff like that. Why did everyone love TC so much? Everyone loved TC.
[0:31:37] MP: He's a literal angel.
[0:31:39] KM: That's what everybody said. You've got people on your documentary just talking about how great he was.
[0:31:44] MP: He really is. I mean, he is a kitten. That was one of the phrases he said a lot was that, “Bet you wish you were raised by kittens.” He just had a way to connect with you and talk with you that people felt it was in path, that maybe he was psychic and he would say things like, “You have your mother's eyes.” He would grab your elbow and tell you that you have your mom's elbow. He’s guess your shoe sizes. He'd tell you that you were used to like metal when you were younger, but now you just sit in a couch, watch TV, but you used to be metal. Or he’d come up to me while I was typing and he'd say – He'd lift up his shirt, scratches, abs, and be like, “Paul, bet you wish you had abs. But you never have abs like me. You’re fat.” And he’s pinch me. “You’ll never be vainy like me.”
[0:32:33] GM: He was a brother.
[0:32:34] MP: He'd show me his veins on his arm. “You’ll never be like me.” He definitely was my big brother, absolutely.
[0:32:42] KM: Why did he get into metal?
[0:32:44] MP: He got into metal at Pulaski Heights Junior High.
[0:32:47] KM: No way. Junior High.
[0:32:50] MP: Yeah. Pulaski Heights Junior High, now known as Pulaski Heights Middle School. One of his teachers, one of his favorite teachers gave him a Hit Parader Magazine that had Ronnie James Dio on the front of it. That was the first thing, his first introduction to it. He became the biggest Kiss fan ever. That's his favorite band on the planet. He just got into everything that was 80s metal and 80s rock, all of the Van Halen and Guns N' Roses.
[0:33:20] KM: Are you a metal guy? Is that how you met him?
[0:33:23] MP: I actually met him through V-Nose and going to shows.
[0:33:28] KM: For metal?
[0:33:30] MP: Yeah. He was in a band called TC and the Eddie's and he performed with a band called Reagan's Pollock. I was mutual friends with some of his band members in Reagan's Pollock. That's how I met him is through them. We ended up working together at P2D, where he would come 364 nights of the year to close up shop, get his Heineken's and a shot of Jaeger Meister and get tipped out by the bartender and the bar backs for doing all the work.
[0:33:57] KM: Oh, nice. How old was he when he was killed?
[0:34:01] MP: It was about 10 years ago. He was about 43-years-old.
[0:34:04] KM: He was older.
[0:34:06] MP: He's one year older than me.
[0:34:07] KM: Still doing heavy metal.
[0:34:09] MP: Oh, absolutely. Yeah. He would still be doing it now if he were around. He absolutely would.
[0:34:14] GM: Go check out the audiences for the heavy metal shows across the street now. You'll –
[0:34:17] KM: They're your sister's age, 45?
[0:34:19] GM: Yeah.
[0:34:20] KM: Megan is still –
[0:34:21] GM: They were all into Kiss. 80s and 90s.
[0:34:22] KM: Megan’s still into heavy metal. I forgot.
[0:34:23] GM: Heck, yeah. Heck, yeah.
[0:34:25]MP: My first best friend, Brent Philpot, he's blind and he was a huge Kiss fan. He introduced me to Kiss when I was eight-years-old.
[0:34:33] GM: Oh, that's interesting.
[0:34:34] MP: That's how I got into it.
[0:34:35] GM: You always think about Kiss and the visual element of Kiss. I like that. That's cool.
[0:34:41] KM: What’s the purpose of the film you're making, TC and Me? It's a decade old now, too, isn't it?
[0:34:47] MP: It is. It is actually longer than that now. We started around ’98. I started filming –
[0:34:55] KM: You mean, before he died?
[0:34:56] MP: Yeah.
[0:34:57] KM: He died in 2014. You started in 1998, just doing him, doing gigs of singing.
[0:35:02] MP: Just filming shows and stuff like that.
[0:35:03] KM: Yeah, just because you're a film maker.
[0:35:05] MP: When I really started filming TC, to film his life, actually, was when he was wrongfully arrested. He was evicted from his apartment at Crestwood Manor. US Pizza Company got a new manager and the new manager didn't understand that TC closed every night, because he would get everybody out of there a half hour early, because he's so fast and good. He always got his tips. The way they're arranged there is the people that get off early, they don't get cash tips, but they get their hourly. The people that close get to split the tips. He always split the tips.
Well, they had arranged, as a previous employer at Ariana's, had arranged, they had arranged for all of his bills to be paid through his paycheck, because he wasn't on any disability. His paycheck went to all of his bills and he lived off of that cash. That's how he got his cannabis. That's how he got his alcohol. That's how he got his food, snacks, whatever he needed. Nikes. That's how he got it was through those tips. When the new manager said this other girl was going to close tonight and that TC could go home early, he threw a fit and said, “I close every night.” It didn't end in an agreement.
He walked and he thought that he was let go, that somebody had replaced him. He just went home and he's autistic, he didn't check the mail. He had gotten evicted. A couple months later, because Arkansas is the only state in the nation that has zero renters rights, he was forcefully evicted by the police. They arrested him. Of course, he got a resisting arrest, because he didn't know why he was being arrested in his own home. He was taken to jail. In order for us to get those charges dropped, my idea was to go and film his apartment, film all the things that we cleaned up, because it was the weirdest – It's messy. It was like a teenager lived there and never took care of the kitchen, or the bathroom, or anything. Refrigerator. Oh, my God.
We cleaned up and filmed everything to deliver to Crestwood Manor's management to ask them to drop the charges, which they did. We were able to get him out of jail by doing so. Then one of the nights, I honestly, I probably had a couple of beers and I pulled up and I was picking TC up to go to Midtown. I just turned to him and I said, “You know, you're probably the coolest MFer I've ever met. You should have a documentary made about you, shouldn't you?” He was like, “Absolutely. I'm already famous. It's like, I'm too damn famous for this town. I need a documentary made about me.” I was like, “Well, done. We're going to do it.” We started doing it together.
All of the interviews I shot for the first decade, he would go with me. He would be sitting there as a producer, as one of the people making the film, listening to people tell stories about him. We filmed all of his shows and concerts and then started really creating the content, because it was so hard being from behind the camera to get him to talk to me. I needed to be on the outside and have a cameraman do it. I didn't really realize that, until we went to New Orleans and I had to fly in my friend, Kevin Breton, to help us, so that I could film to get him to talk to TC, to get him to talk, which we ended up with some of our greatest interviews there and definitely some of the most fun. We went New Orleans, we went to Hollywood. Our last trip was to Austin, to go see Judas Priest and Paul Bearer and Jello Biafra. We filmed all of these things. We're putting together just this really wonderful uplifting rockumentary. At that time, it was called TC and Me: A Little Rockumentary.
[0:38:49] KM: I like it. A rockumentary.
[0:38:52] MP: When we lost him, for some reason, I couldn't tell you who decided that that – who was the first to say it. But TC is Metal became his battle cry that we did. It was the way we mourned him. It went on the marquee at Pizza the Action and when hundreds of us marched through the streets of Hillcrest with a candlelight vigil, that's what we called out, was that TC is Metal.
[0:39:18] KM: Your mission that you wrote is simple. Bring attention to his case, to bring a murder charge against the subject scheduled for released this year.
[0:39:29] MP: Yeah, it was released December 21st of last year.
[0:39:33] KM: 2024.
[0:39:34] MP: 2024.
[0:39:35] KM: To tell the story on screen and stage, anywhere to help others with trauma, especially if it's involving a current, or future potential risk to the community. How are you accomplishing your mission?
[0:39:49] MP: I feel like, polite persistence will get you almost anything you want, if you do it correctly. I constantly call and compel the chief of police. I've probably, I've left him dozens of voicemails every other week to try and get a homicide detective assigned to the case. I'll call the homicide department and do the same. I'll call the prosecutor's office and do the same. Many of those things that I found through what I call creative justice is just searching for the justice you don't feel you're getting, or that you might not be able to attain. I've realized that because four months after TC was shot, this person who's still free and still out, and I'm living with some friends. I'm in hiding for months.
[0:40:39] KM: Oh, really?
[0:40:41] MP: Yeah. Carrying a gun everywhere I went. Going back to their place a different way each time that I went. It was a really dark and scary time, because this guy had threatened to kill me, too. I had a friend of mine who wasn't want to be named, found an article in the paper that said Andre Demetrius Smalley had shot two people at the Wright Community Market. What happened, which they have on audio and video, he pulled in there and asked a couple of guys if they had any loud, which is cannabis. He asked them if they had any weed. They said, “No. Oh, gee. We don't have any weed for you.” He just shot them, because that's what he does. He shot them both for laughing at him.
[0:41:23] KM: He’s in jail?
[0:41:27] MP: He shot them both below the belt as a warning shot. They know, as many people say on the south side know like, “You don't snitch.” While you can make a report, you're not going to court. Report, no court. People showed up, the vehicle described, officers were able to find the vehicle and take him into questioning. But Smalley, he's a five-time felon at the time, so he knows how it goes. It was just questions and set free. Later, he was picked up, failure to make a left-hand turn. That police officer saw an AR-15 with a banana clip in the back seat with a camo jacket draped over half of it. He was ultimately arrested for that gun and then had two other guns in the vehicle. Nothing was happening in the state courthouse. We watched the video. We watched the audio. We watched what he did. I knew what else he had done and nothing was happening. When he was sentenced, it wasn't enough. He was going to be out in a year or two.
[0:42:39] KM: Just having possession.
[0:42:40] MP: Just gun possession. State, gun charges, felon in possession.
[0:42:43] KM: Felon in possession.
[0:42:45] MP: His mom's in a wheelchair. She said that he could come and live with her and do a sentence there. This was absolutely not going to happen. He did this several times in court. This time in court, he said my name. He said, “It's all his fault. It's all Mike O.” He's screaming my name, because he's being taken away by the bailiffs.
[0:43:13] KM: Were you in court?
[0:43:14] MP: I'm in court. Yeah.
[0:43:15] KM: Oh, you're brave.
[0:43:18] MP: It gets worse. His mom rolls up next to me in her wheelchair and she looks up at me and she says, “Is that true? Did you do this to my son?” I said, “Ma'am, your son did this to himself. I'm really sorry for your loss. But your son is lost.” She passed while he was in federal prison, which I was thankfully, able to get him nine years through an affidavit, because I panicked. Once we left that courtroom and I was like, “I can't live in Little Rock with him out in a year.” I called every agency, FBI, CIA. I landed on the ATF and this wonderful agent named Shannon McKittrick. She said, “This guy sounds like a POS. It’s Friday, but if you will get with me on Monday and you'll sign an affidavit and promise to show up in federal court as a witness, you can sign an affidavit and we'll arrest him.”
This Shannon McKittrick had told me that there is a – I don't know if you really call it a loophole. It's just a creative justice thing. It's like, you can be a part of a federal case if you were a victim in a previous case. Since I was a victim in a previous case, I could write a victim's impact statement to that judge telling him everything. Thankfully, honestly, thankfully, because we had good friends of ours that were in the PD that went to junior high school with us and they were on that force that took Smalley down, thankfully, people like that that could have made an issue with it didn't. They were like, “Yes, that's your brother. That's your family. Yes, you are a victim.”
That's the way that he was able to get in front of a federal judge with those charges was through that affidavit that I signed. Of course, I showed up in court that day, too, as well and had to be. Otherwise, it wouldn't work. I saw Shannon bring the gun up on the stand. They did all the talking. Then, even though the judge, because he's trying to absolve me of responsibility, and his probation officer of responsibility says, “Look, my judgment is based on what's presented in court today, not by a previous victim's impact statement, or the statement from the prosecutor.” I'm going to not just give nine years as a prosecutor as. He gave another year, because he said, “I want to make a point about felons with guns.” He gave him 10 years, but he had already done some jail time. He received some time off for that. We did ultimately nine years in federal penitentiary.
That time he was livid. He was in shackles on his ankles and wrists and they were shackled together. He was shoving the bailiffs with his shoulders and trying to knock them down to get towards me, and screaming my name that I did this.
[0:46:26] KM: He's out in December.
[0:46:28] MP: Yeah, he's out right now.
[0:46:30] KM: Your life has really had to change, because of a good deed you did for TC.
[0:46:35] MP: So much.
[0:46:36] KM: Then staying with it to make sure that justice is done for his murder. You really –
[0:46:42] GM: Yeah, that's the part I can't really get over. How far is to go out on a limb.
[0:46:47] MP: It's been about 10 years of isolation. That's nothing, like no dates. I just done what I felt was important.
[0:47:00] KM: If people wanted to give you information.
[0:47:03] MP: Yeah. For sure. I'd say, the easiest way to get me is just getpoe@gmail.
[0:47:12] KM: That's good. If they've got information, they can email you at getpoe@gmail.com.
[0:47:16] MP: Absolutely. Sure. There’s still a reward.
[0:47:20] KM: What's the reward?
[0:47:20] MP: The reward’s $20,000.
[0:47:22] KM: What?
[0:47:23] MP: Yeah. I called his parole officer who told me that no one has ever called him in the seven or eight years that he's been doing this to ask about a suspect’s whereabouts. But that unfortunately, he can't tell me. The only way I'll know is to just, I have to periodically check Court Connect and Pacer and Vine and see if he's been arrested. That's it. I just lay low. I can be as vocal about it as I want –
[0:47:49] KM: Oh, there you go.
[0:47:51] MP: - on things like this, on podcasts, on TV, on stages, or like the Kill Tony thing, for instance. I don't mind doing all of those things, because honestly, that's creative justice to me. That's what I'm going to be doing the rest of my life is just talking about this and telling this story and getting the justice that TC deserved.
[0:48:10] KM: You have brought up twice now your stand-up comedy routine. What was the name of the place? Tony's?
[0:48:19] MP: Oh, the Kill Tony.
[0:48:20] KM: Kill Tony.
[0:48:21] MP: Yeah. The number one live podcast.
[0:48:23] KM: I went there and watched it the first time. You bombed so bad.
[0:48:28] MP: Dude.
[0:48:28] KM: Dude.
[0:48:30] MP: If you're not aware of what the show is, to look it up, you would look for Kill Tony episode number 707, at the 34-minute mark. You will see me bomb for a minute, attempting to tell tested material, some jokes that I had in the pocket that I've done many times on stage, but just didn't have ready. It is a whirlwind. Once they call your name, you have one minute before you're on stage in front of millions of people. You can be a seasoned vet. It could be your first time ever.
[0:49:01] KM: It's the world's largest open mic show. Is that true?
[0:49:03] MP: It's the world's number one live podcast.
[0:49:06] KM: Really?
[0:49:06] MP: Yeah, absolutely. What it is, is because –
[0:49:09] KM: You are brave.
[0:49:10] MP: - a lot of people don't understand is that they expect you to bomb, and that's part of what they want. That's why they do it at one minute, because that's really the most difficult thing to do is to just get very concise jokes that are hilarious in one minute.
[0:49:24] KM: What mark did you say it was at?
[0:49:25] MP: 34 minutes.
[0:49:26] KM: 34 minutes, because it's hard to find.
[0:49:29] MP: Yeah. Episode 707. Once he asked me what was most interesting thing about it, I was going to say, I'm a federal witness. Then I was going to bring up this killer, because that was my whole plan. Because I need to get his name out there. I need to get the justice that we're not getting in court.
[0:49:48] KM: The guys kept saying, “You know this is a comedy show, and he's up there talking about murder and being a federal witness.” They're like, “What are you doing on this show?” He's like, “Well, you asked me what I was doing, and I'm just telling you what I'm doing.” Then was talking about his autistic, adopted brother who's 40-years-old and they're like, “Dude, you're the most interesting person we've ever had on this show.”
[0:50:06] GM: So interesting.
[0:50:08] KM: You bombed, but it's fun to watch.
[0:50:10] MP: A lot of people think that they're just ripping people up. The truth is when you look over there at Tony Hinchcliffe and Brian Redban and James, anybody that's sitting at that table, you feel back a lot of empathy. You feel that they don't just want their show to be successful and funny and entertaining, but they want you to succeed, too. That's the way I felt. To hear him say that this was the perfect podcast for this when, of course, I also agree that it probably belongs on a true crime podcast, and maybe not there.
[0:50:38] KM: It does. It does.
[0:50:41] MP: But I'm not going to take a microphone in an audience that big without doing what I came to do.
[0:50:46] KM: Are you still doing a podcast?
[0:50:47] MP: I am. I'm working on a second podcast, which is just me, called Poecast.
[0:50:53] KM: You got a good name for a bunch of stuff. Getpoe, Poecast. Po vault. I don't know.
[0:50:58] MP: Dude, I had dozens of domains. I bought one for almost every idea that I had for so long, and I just let –
[0:51:04] GM: We should do that around here.
[0:51:05] KM: I have chinacrap.com.
[0:51:07] GM: Oh, yeah. I forgot about that. That's probably really relevant in this day and age.
[0:51:12] MP: They should check on the value on that one. You never know.
[0:51:15] KM: This is a quote that you really have given up your life and this is your quote. “This is my life's work. I've given up love for this. I've given up opportunities moving, but when I give them up, it doesn't feel like a loss to me. For Poe, Edwards will always be a legend.” That's a beautiful note to end on. Again, if anybody wants to talk to Mike, or has any information for him, it's getpoe@gmail.com. I have a gift for you, because you are a true Arkansan. You get a US and an Arkansas desk set –
[0:51:48] MP: Awesome.
[0:51:49] KM: - for you to put back into your ever moving homestead, wherever you lay your head tonight, because you're a rambling rose, aren't you?
[0:51:59] GM: It's that we're going to call you from now on.
[0:52:00] MP: I’ll take that. Under the rambling rose.
[0:52:02] GM: Poe the rambling rose.
[0:52:05] KM: We've been talking today with a filmmaker, Mr. Mike Poe about his TC is Metal film, where he's trying to bring attention and awareness to his friend who was murdered by what's the guy's name?
[0:52:18] MP: Andre Demetrius Smalley Jr.
[0:52:22] KM: Who is out right now.
[0:52:24] MP: Absolutely. This is our opinion. He's not an officially named suspect, because unfortunately, there isn't a homicide case right now. This is a cold case.
[0:52:34] KM: Oh, we need to get it back.
[0:52:36] MP: Yeah. What we need is a homicide detective. What we need is a team. What we need is the crime lab to test the evidence, the gun that they have from the other arrest.
[0:52:46] KM: We need to get him locked up so you'll be safe and you can go back to spinning discs, doing stuff.
[0:52:50] MP: Yeah, absolutely.
[0:52:52] KM: Wow. Yes. Any homicide detectives out there, we have you a cold case. Thank you so much, Mike, for coming on. Man, I knew this was going to be a good interview and it really has been a great interview. I want to tell our listeners, the show was recorded in the historic Taborian Hall in Downtown Little Rock, Arkansas and made possible by the good works of flagandbanner.com. Mr. Tom Wood, our audio engineer, Mr. Jonathan Hankins, our videographer, Mr. Delora Devore, production manager, and my co-host, Mr. Grady McCoy, the fourth, AKA son.
To our listeners, we hope you've heard, or learned something that's been inspiring, or enlightening and that it, whatever it is, will help you up your business, your independence, or your life. I'm Kerry McCoy and I'll see you next time on Up in Your Business. Until then, be brave and keep it up.
[END OF INTERVIEW]
[0:53:44] ANNOUNCER: The opinions expressed by guests on Up in Your Business with Kerry McCoy do not necessarily represent the opinions of the show, its hosts and producers, or flagandbanner.com.
[OUTRO]
[0:53:56] GM: You've been listening to Up in Your Business with Kerry McCoy. For links to resources you heard discussed on today's show, go to flagandbanner.com, select our podcast, and choose today's guest. If you'd like to sponsor this show, or any show, email me, that's gray@flagandbanner.com. All interviews are recorded and posted the following week. Stay informed of exciting upcoming guests by subscribing to our YouTube channel, or podcast, wherever you like to listen. Kerry's goal is simple, to help you live the American dream.
[END]
