I think business has to be stupider. I want to do really

Host: The warehouse was quiet except for the buzz of a single fluorescent light. Dust floated in the beams, like tiny ghosts suspended in air. Beyond the cracked windows, the city’s skyline burned in the orange haze of late sunset.

Jack stood by a rusted table, his hands smudged with charcoal, sketching something that looked halfway between a machine and a dream. Jeeny watched him from across the room, arms crossed, a notebook clutched to her chest.

The sound of dripping water echoed in the distance, like a slow metronome keeping time for their tension.

Jeeny: “Kanye once said—‘I think business has to be stupider. I want to do really straightforward, stupid business—just talk to me like a 4-year-old. And I refuse to negotiate. I can collaborate. But I’m an artist, so as soon as you negotiate, you’re being compromised.’”

She read it softly, but the words hung in the air like a spark waiting to ignite.

Jack: “Of course he did.”
He laughed, a dry, brittle sound. “Only Kanye could call simplicity ‘stupid’ and make it sound like genius.”

Jeeny: “Maybe he’s right. Maybe business makes artists stupid by being too smart.”

Jack: “Or maybe it’s the other way around. Maybe artists just don’t understand how the world works.”

Host: A gust of wind rattled the loose shutters. The sketch papers on the table fluttered, scattering across the floor like lost ideas.

Jeeny: “Why do you always reduce art to logic?”

Jack: “Because art lives in the clouds, and business pays for the ladder to get there.”
He picked up one of his drawings, a rough design for a neon sculpture shaped like an open hand. “You can’t build this with feelings. You build it with contracts, budgets, and deadlines.”

Jeeny: “But that’s what Kanye meant. He’s not saying ‘stupid’ as in foolish—he’s saying simple, human, honest. Business has become a language only predators understand.”

Jack: “That’s because it is predatory. It’s survival. You can’t expect wolves to start discussing ethics with the lambs.”

Jeeny: “Then stop pretending you can collaborate. Collaboration means you see the other. Negotiation means you’re using them.”

Jack: “Come on, Jeeny. Every collaboration is a negotiation. You trade something—time, vision, ego—for something else. That’s the only reason anything gets built.”

Jeeny: “Built, yes. But at what cost?”

Host: The light flickered, casting moving shadows on the concrete wall. For a moment, their faces looked sculpted—half hope, half exhaustion.

Jack: “You know what happens when artists refuse to negotiate? They starve. Or worse—they become irrelevant. You think Kanye could talk like that if he hadn’t already won the game?”

Jeeny: “You’re missing the point. He didn’t say artists shouldn’t work with business. He said business should simplify, should remember who it’s serving. The moment art becomes about compromise, it’s no longer art—it’s strategy.”

Jack: “And what’s wrong with strategy? Michelangelo had patrons. Da Vinci negotiated with dukes. Every artist who ever lived had to make deals. You think they all died pure and broke just to prove a point?”

Jeeny: “Maybe they should have. Maybe purity matters more than success.”

Jack: “That’s easy to say when you’re not trying to pay rent with your purity.”

Host: Jeeny’s eyes darkened. She walked closer, the floorboards creaking beneath her boots. Her voice lowered, but her words burned with conviction.

Jeeny: “Do you know what compromise looks like, Jack? It’s when you cut a line from your poem because someone thinks it’s too sad. When you mute a color in your painting because the client wants ‘something friendlier.’ It’s when you stop feeling, just to make things ‘work.’ That’s not art. That’s advertising.”

Jack: “And maybe there’s no difference anymore. Maybe art is just advertising that’s learned to speak prettier.”

Jeeny: “You don’t believe that.”

Jack: “I’m not sure I believe in art at all anymore.”

Host: The silence that followed was heavy, like the pause before a storm.

Jeeny: “So why are you still creating?”

Jack: “Because I’m addicted to meaning—even when I doubt it exists.”

Jeeny: “Then stop treating business like a disease. Maybe it’s the frame that keeps the painting from falling apart.”

Jack: “Or maybe it’s the cage that keeps it from flying.”

Jeeny: “Only if you let it.”

Jack: “You think you can outwit the system with sincerity? They’ll brand your sincerity, sell it, and thank you for the authenticity.”

Jeeny: “Then we keep making anyway. That’s what Kanye means. ‘Stupid business’ isn’t ignorance—it’s resistance. It’s saying, ‘I will not play your game, I’ll make my own.’”

Jack: “And how long before your game gets bought, repackaged, and sold back to you?”

Jeeny: “Then we make another one.”

Host: The rain began tapping against the roof, soft at first, then fierce. The sound filled the warehouse, echoing through metal beams. Jack lit a cigarette, the flame briefly illuminating his face—a face both worn and defiant.

Jeeny watched, her eyes softening.

Jeeny: “You know… when he said ‘talk to me like a 4-year-old,’ I think Kanye was talking about truth. Children ask questions because they don’t know how to lie yet. They don’t complicate what’s simple.”

Jack: “And business complicates what’s simple because simplicity threatens control.”

Jeeny: “Exactly. A child doesn’t negotiate whether to draw the sun blue or yellow—they just draw it. That’s how art should be.”

Jack: “But a child also doesn’t have to worry about production budgets, marketing, or supply chains.”

Jeeny: “Which is why the artist must stay a child in spirit, even when the world demands adulthood.”

Jack: “And what happens when the world stops listening to the child?”

Jeeny: “Then the artist whispers louder.”

Host: The light above them buzzed, then died, leaving only the moonlight through the window, cool and silver. The warehouse looked like a cathedral of forgotten dreams.

Jack exhaled, the smoke curling upward like a question.

Jack: “You think purity can survive this century? Algorithms decide what we see, corporations decide what we feel. Even rebellion gets monetized before it’s born.”

Jeeny: “Then maybe the only rebellion left is refusal. Refusal to negotiate, refusal to pretend.”

Jack: “Refusal to survive?”

Jeeny: “No. Refusal to become less human.”

Host: The moonlight slid across the floor, touching the edges of Jack’s drawings—blueprints for a machine that could project light in the shape of human silhouettes. He looked at it, then at Jeeny, his eyes softer now, the skepticism turning into something closer to longing.

Jack: “Maybe the point isn’t to escape the system. Maybe it’s to confuse it so much it doesn’t know how to use you.”

Jeeny: “That’s what ‘stupid business’ means—clarity so honest it looks like madness to the clever.”

Jack: “Madness as strategy.”

Jeeny: “Or purity as rebellion.”

Host: They stood there for a moment, both silent, both changed. The rain had stopped, and a thin ray of light broke through the clouds, painting the warehouse floor with the faintest gold.

Jack picked up a brush, dipped it in paint, and dragged a bold stroke across the canvas.

Jack: “No negotiation.”

Jeeny smiled, the kind of smile that forgives and believes all at once.

Jeeny: “Only collaboration.”

Host: And as the camera pulled back, the warehouse looked alive again—filled with motion, color, and defiance. The city outside hummed, oblivious, while two artists inside rewrote the rules—not through compromise, but through creation.

And somewhere in the dark, the fluorescent light flickered back on, like a small, stubborn idea refusing to die.