Switching up screen personas for his latest movie, The Book Of Eli, Denzel Washington met with the press to talk about getting post-apocalyptic, when not just plain down ’n’ dirty, for this Hughes Brothers-directed doomsday thriller. Unusual topics on the table for discussion and debate included the art of smelling bad guys in a movie, Denzel’s love/hate relationship with some of the characters he’s played, and sharing credit with his designer sneakers. Denzel also let on that he doesn’t mind drudging away kicking butt in a movie, as long as he gets enough closeups to claim beatdown bragging rights later.
DENZEL WASHINGTON: Hey, it’s warm in here! Is it me, or is it warm?
Q: Yeah, it’s warm in here.
DW: No oxygen!
Q: Now, The Book of Eli could be pretty controversial, in the way it deals with religion and the Bible. Does that worry you?
DW: Why are you saying that’s controversial?
Q: Because the movie is saying that religion has that much power.
DW: OK, and if they say that…so? You’re the one using the word “controversy,” so you run with that. I’ve never used that word, actually.But I think there’s nothing wrong with debate and conversation-slash-argument, whatever. Good. Imagine that. An idea! A thought. A point of view.
Q: Do you care what people take away from your movies, or do you just put them out there?
DW: I always say, what people take away depends on what they bring to it. It’s not for me to say, you know? That’s the way I look at it. I don’t over-analyze it. Or, I want them to get this. Because it shouldn’t be that narrow; that’s just the way I think. If I start thinking in result terms, like, I want you to get this from it, then I might start showing you something so that I’ll get the result I want. And maybe I’m not right.
Q: Did you relate to this character on a personal level?
DW: I’m sure, yeah. I’m sure it has a lot to do with my personal experiences. I couldn’t give you one off the top of my head. But as a director myself, I really want to flesh out, and flesh out the characters. But it just felt right.
Q: What about your fighting talents in this movie?
DW: I trained for five or six months. We started stretching and moving, and doing stuff with our eyes closed, and just getting into the whole vibe. And when you get older, stretching is good! I don’t do it enough, but it helps. A lot. But I said to [the on-set trainers], I don’t want to be Karate Man. I didn’t want to do any of that. And just, you know, moving through people.
Q: Do you still practice your fighting skills a lot?
DW: No. Of course not! You know, there’s a part of me that definitely wants to continue. But there’s the actor part that also says, “OK, I gotta put that down. I’m not that guy now. I gotta go play another guy.” And I haven’t even been…I think I’ve been in a hotel almost 10 months this year. So I’m just glad to be home. Like for a week.
Q: What’s the difference between those Hughes brothers, anyway?
DW: Alan is more the people kinda guy. And Albert, he likes all that geek stuff. He’s not the communicator. And they obviously know each other well. So they didn’t step on each other’s toes. And once you got the rhythm of it, and knew who was responsible for what, it was not bad at all.
Q: How did you get so smoothly into all that cool action stuff?
DW: You don’t see it, but I’ve got on a pair of LeBrons. Yeah, I got LeBron sneakers on, but you can’t tell.
Q: Are your choices of characters by design or coincidence?
DW: Most of the characters I play, a lot of them, there’s been some kind of an evolution, a spiritual evolution. You look at even Malcolm X, who went from hatred to a whole completely different doctrine. Or Hurricane Carter. Even something as dark as Training Day, The first thing I wrote on my script, was “The wages of sin is death.” In the original version of Training Day, they had him dying in the smallest way. Like, you heard it on TV. And I was like, nah, nah. In order for me to justify living in the worst way, I have to die in the worst way. So there was still, in my mind, a lesson to be learned there. Or an evolution. In the case of Man on Fire, and in this case. Same thing. I mean, a very dark man meets this young angel who awakens him. And he gives his life for her. So I guess there’s a somewhat similar theme here, in that he has this mission. And the mission has turned him into this violent killing machine… In his spiritual evolution, this was part of the process. He had to go down through the valley of the shadow of death.
Q: Did you get into other post-apocalyptic movies for this one?
DW: Nah. I usually take that approach, not to look at [other movies for influence]. So whatever I come up with, at least in my mind, I came up with it on my own. I don’t want to be, you know, hemmed in by exactly what somebody else did. But maybe I have! I don’t know, because I didn’t look.
Q: What about the influence of westerns?
DW: There is a western vibe to this. In fact, early on, there was like this saloon thing. And we de-westernized it a bit. But it’s the basic loner-come-to-town story, yeah. He walks into a saloon, kicks some butt, takes some names…
Q: So what was it like watching yourself on screen kicking butt?
DW: It was great. I was like, “Make sure they know it’s me! There’s no stunt men!” And [the Hughes Brothers] said, “We’re showing you in silhouette.” What, silhouette? I was like, “What? Hard as I’m working, you’re not even gonna show me! After all of that? Well get closer, or something! That’s me!”