How Anderson .Paak Turned His Fatherhood Journey Into a K-Pop Movie Starring His Son: ‘So Glad I Did It’ (Exclusive)

'It was one of the hardest things I ever done, but one of the most fulfilling things, too,' the Grammy winner tells PEOPLE of his acting and directorial debut

Anderson .Paak can thank his son for inspiring his debut as a feature film director.

The prolific solo artist, who is also one half of the Grammy-winning duo Silk Sonic, didn’t see a movie in his future. But then came the pandemic, and with it, a grinding halt to his life touring.

“I got to hang out with my son and my family and see what he was into, and he was into YouTube at the time,” recalls .Paak, who began to invest in his now 13-year-old son Soul Rasheed’s burgeoning passion: YouTube. “He wanted to be a YouTuber, so I was like, ‘All right, I guess we're going to be YouTubers.' "

Together the two began doing “funny little skits,” .Paak shares at the PEOPLE/Entertainment Weekly studio at the Toronto International Film Festival, and a new bond grew.

"That's when I really just became obsessed and started to see, ‘Wow, he's such a natural talent. He's hilarious. He's fun.’ And we started really creating a bond together,” says .Paak, who got an expansive education in K-pop and began to stay up late editing their videos, watching their views grow.

Soon, an idea was born for a movie called K-Pops!, which had its world premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival on Sept. 7.

"That's when I started developing the script because I started to see how much Korean culture that his mom had passed down to him,” recalls the artist, who shares Soul and son Shine Tariq with Jaylyn Chang (the couple split earlier this year).

.Paak credits Chang with his son’s fluency in Korean culture, noting he "knows full Korean and all about his heritage... And I was always trying to get his African culture in there too."

"I'm like, 'You know about BTS, but you don't know about BET! You've gotta know about this too.' And I was like, 'Wait, that's kind of funny.' "

Three years later, the idea has bloomed into a film in which .Paak also stars as BJ, a washed up drummer who travels to South Korea and work on a pop idol show, where he meets a young performer Tae Young (Soul Rasheed) in competition to be the nation’s next music star.

“Soon, BJ is introduced to Tae Young’s mother, Yeji (Jee Young Han), a woman he had a brief relationship with more than a decade ago. Tae Young is the son he never knew existed,” reads the plot’s description.

Working on the script, “I was like, 'What if I didn't know I had a kid, and I had to catch up?'" recalls .Paak, who borrowed from his own feeling of needing to catch up on his children's lives when home from touring.

On set, Soul Rasheed tells PEOPLE it was “pretty easy” to work with his dad in director mode.

“At the end of the day, he's my dad, but when he has his director's hat on, it's still very easy for me because he's just very straightforward when he's directing, and even when he's acting. So when he has some kind of complicated notes, he's able to translate that into simpler ones," says Soul Rasheed, adding: "And honestly, he could have hired another actor, but…”

.Paak grins, sitting next to his son: “I could have, you're right.”

"But he chose me,” smiles Soul Rasheed. “But I think one good thing about choosing me is that it adds the authenticity of the father and son bond.”

.Paak nods. “Some would say we got chemistry.”

The prolific musician is proud that this movie exists, noting it almost fell by the wayside.

“When things started picking up again, I had to really make a choice if I was going to really do this or not,” he says. “And I bounced around and did tours. I did Silk Sonic. And all the while I was coming back to this working on the script, trying to get it right. And eventually I thought for a second I wouldn't be able to do it, it's going to be too much work. And I talked to Soul, I was like, ‘You still want do this?’ And he's like, 'I better do it. I've been in acting classes and choreo classes.' "

.Paak knew the moment had come to commit. “I was like, well, I got to show him when you start something, you got to finish strong. So we got in there and did it. I'm so glad I did it. It was one of the hardest things I ever done, but one of the most fulfilling things, too.”

K-Pops! is up for acquisition at the Toronto International Film Festival, which runs until Sept. 15.

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