Movies rarely come with pedigrees as impressive as this: two-time Oscar winner Denzel Washington, starring opposite two-time Oscar winner Jodie Foster, along with Oscar nominee Clive Owen, all in a crime thriller that turns the heist genre on its ear directed by two-time Oscar-nominated director Spike Lee. Hollywood.com sat down with the three stars and got the inside word on Inside Man.
On working with Spike Lee:
Washington: It is a shorthand. I like working with Spike. It’s familiar territory… I really first started improvising with Spike, some seventeen years ago on Mo’ Better Blues. That was the first time that I can remember going, “Oh, okay. We’ll just fool around.” Or they would set the scenario and see what happens. There was a scene I can remember in Mo’ Better Blues where we’re just coming off of stage, and then we go back stage and I sort of get into an argument with Wesley Snipes’ character, and that was one of the first times I can remember really just sort of like going, “Oh, OK. We’re going to improvise this.” So it just sort of started with Spike many moons ago.
Foster: I love working with Spike, and that was the foremost reason why I wanted to make the movie. I’ve never been right for any of his films, and here was an opportunity to do something that I would be right for, and mostly just to stand behind his shoulder and see how he sees it. I just want to know how he does it and why he thinks the way he does and why he would set the shot the way he does. To me, that’s the impulse now to make films as an actress, is to really watch the directors and see what they’re doing and why they’re doing what they’re doing and why they choose what they choose. He was different than I thought he was going to be. First of all, he’s such an adorable, sweet guy: big kisses every day before shooting, and just a really nice guy. He literally had the courage to kind of just turn the camera on, shoot two takes for six pages and walk away, and that’s not what I thought. I really thought that it was going to be a much more manicured experience, a much more technical experience and it wasn’t at all. It was a very free-form, very free Spike, and I didn’t anticipate that at all.
Owen: I not only like him and respect him as a director, but now as a guy as well. He’s got an attitude and a sort of visceral-ness about the way he makes his movies that no one else has got, I think. He’s very incredibly dynamic with the camera, he’s’ very assured about how he wants to shoot a scene, and he’s always very sort of visceral and strong. He does that unusual thing, which has been talked about a bit, where for the last six movies he’s shot in both directions at the same time, which I’ve never done it before with any movie. It’s often just too difficult for the guy to light the scene if you have got to shoot in both directions. But I think that Spike has discovered that it keeps a spontaneity and aliveness in the scenes. Also if anything unpredictable happens you can go with it because it’s so present, it’s like shooting live. It’s a very exiting and very live way of working. I’ve got just the absoluter respect, I’m a huge fan of Spike so I think he’s a very special filmmaker… Right from his early films I think he sort of exploded into movies really because there was no one doing what he was doing. I love the fact that every time you see a Spike Lee film, Spike is trying to make a really serious movie, you know that he is a proper filmmaker: he goes in there and he is making films about subjects, and he’s unusual in that way. He’s always been true to that, and there is something very special about that. I love his attitude and I love what he has done…Spike has been around a long time now, but when Spike first exploded on the scene he really opened a huge amount of doors for a lot of filmmakers, and he still seems very true to that same ethic when he started making his movies. He hasn’t changed in that way.
On their characters in the film:
Washington: I felt like he’s sort of settled in his ways and he’s had his routine and he’s in over his head. I was actually in better shape while I was doing the play [Julius Caesar, which Washington starred in on Broadway in 2005] and I sort of let that go. I never wanted to look too neat. I mean, he had style, but he didn’t have money… Part of the reason that I liked the idea of doing the film, was it was very wordy–I was like, “This guy talks a lot.” I was getting good practice playing Brutus, so it was like “Shakespeare goes to the street” or something like that. But to be honest I didn’t do a whole lot of extensive research. I just didn’t have the time… I did most of my research listening to my driver who was from Brooklyn, and it’s just a feeling and a vibe that living in California I just don’t get. I don’t know what I’m doing out there other than raising my family.
Owen: I think that he’s not the usual guy who takes over banks in that way. He’s doing it for his own very particular reasons and as the thing unravels and develops you realize that it’s a very unusual heist and he has planned a very clever, smart, situation here… It looks like it’s one thing, he takes hostages and it looks like it’s going to be a very violent sort of, this guy in there to rob the bank and make a lot of money for himself, and that isn’t quite the case. The guy’s motivated by other things and it is ambiguous–it’s not a straight forward, clear-cut thing. I think that goes for every character in the movie.
Foster: She’s the one who’s done this before, and she’s done it a lot of times before. So in her profession as a kind of fixer figure, she has been in these dangerous situations where you have two dead hookers and a mayor. I think that there is something wonderful about how she approaches it with such kind of wit and breeziness. She’s someone who doesn’t judge and most of the time that’s a good thing, right? Someone who doesn’t judge people, but at the same time she’s sort of neutral the way that Switzerland is, and that does make her morally wrong because she is negotiating between evils and so I do consider her a bad guy. I do like the fact that in this world of kind of macho guys that are very powerful and they say things like, “I’m going shove that down your head.” that there’s kind of breezy, very feminine presence who has all the power that they do, but doesn’t raise her voice. She always smiles. She always says please and thank you, and has time for fake tans and extensions and high heels. It’s such a contrast to this man’s world. And yet she has entirely inhabited this man’s world without necessarily taking it on herself.
On their mutual admiration society:
Foster: I’ve been wanting to work with Denzel for 20 years, and for whatever reason we never find ourselves in the same movie, and that happens to leading actors. You never get to work with another leading actor because they only have room in the budget for one leading actor, and so you’re always by yourself or you’re with someone new or with someone who is coming up. So I’ve never had the opportunity to work with him, and a lot of people I know have known him and said that it was great to meet him. He literally is truly the best actor that I’ve ever worked with, and I shouldn’t say that it’s intimidating, but it’s just awe-inspiring to watch someone be able to read the phone book or the racing form and just blow you away with such ease and without any real, seemingly, energy invested in it. He’s so surprising, too. He comes up with all of these things. Half of the things that you see in the movie were not scripted. Almost all of that stuff is Denzel and him just being cheeky and being silly. I mean, that’s just total Denzel, and I know that’s why Spike loves working with him–he brings so much to the process. So it was a great moment working with him for me, even though I only got two scenes with him and they were over in about a minute.
Washington: Jodie is cool. Jodie is great. I like her. She’s just there and is like, “Hey. Alright.” I like her a lot and obviously she’s a great actress and I was excited about the opportunity to work with her and her character, they’re on this other level that these kind of guys that I played will never get to. He’s not invited to their parties. He didn’t make it to that barbecue in the Hamptons or whatever they talk about.
Owen: I’ve been a huge fan of Spike Lee‘s for his whole career, really, and to be in a movie directed by him with Denzel Washington and Jodie Foster, they are both absolutely as good as it gets. The whole role for me in the last year or two has been incredible, and the biggest thing is working with people of that caliber, really. Yeah, it was a big thrill working with both Jodie and Denzel, because I just respect them both so much.
Playing characters that are not always good guys
Owen: Sometimes people get the idea that I play a lot of bad guys in my movies, and I’ve never seen any of them as that bad. Maybe it’s just me. [Laughs] It’s always much more interesting to play a character that’s got some sort of conflict going own or is ambiguous, it’s much more interesting to play. To play route one good guys, none of us are, so it doesn’t feel real to me. I’m always much more interested in playing characters that are full of contradictions really… I think that Spike liked what I did in Closer and talked about doing this particular film. I don’t know, I mean there was every reason for me to do this film. I didn’t even ever think about it in terms of it being a noir, I just saw a very smart script with Spike directing and the rest of the people involved. If that’s noir, then I’d love to keep doing noir.
Foster: [“Bitch”] is just a word [Laughs]. I love my dog and that’s what she is, too. It’s just a word. Clearly that’s a big stereotype and a big part of our history, but I think that we’ve grown a little bit beyond that. This movie could’ve easily been a man, and I really don’t know why they wrote this character as a woman. I’m really happy that they did. I don’t know why they did, and I love playing parts that could’ve been a guy or a girl. I tend to do that over and over again. That’s true of Flightplan, for example, which was written for a man. It’s true of The Silence of the Lambs–it could just have easily been a man and didn’t really matter at all that she was a woman. However, when you put a different gender in this circumstance of course that changes everything and it fuels it with a completely different feeling and different sense of history… As a woman, of course I bring my past to this, and that’s why I say to you that, yes, I consider her a bad guy. But I feel like there’s a long history to her that’s interesting, and if you look at her and know that here’s a woman that 20 years ago said, “In a corrupt system, I’m going to own the best cathouse in New York,” and then used every opportunity and pieces of information, every piece of loyalty in order to get into a legitimate business, and yet still brings that lack of morality, still does that thing where it’s like, ‘Well, I’m going to screw someone, but I’m screwing the man.’ that’s true. That’s true to who we are and it’s interesting bit of psychology, I think.
Washington: People like the bad guy. I did. I enjoyed Training Day. That was one of my favorite parts. I liked it. I had a good time… Do I think that they only give awards to black actors for negative roles? I think that they have the right to feel that way. I mean, I don’t know if there’s any truth to it. I don’t sit down with all of the voters and poll them, and I can’t speak for what people think. It’s not like we all get together and have a Hollywood meeting and decide. To be honest with you, that’s the deal. I’m not making light of it. I don’t know what people think. You’d have to ask individuals. I do think that sometimes you’re awarded something over here when you may have won over there. I don’t think that’s new with me. I don’t think that Scent of a Woman was Al Pacino‘s greatest performance, but that’s what he won for. So if I had been in his shoes would people have said that it was because of race? Do you know what I mean? I mean, he’s been nominated eight times and he didn’t win until Scent of a Woman, and now if that was me and I had been nominated eight times and I finally won for Scent of a Woman or for Training Day, let’s say, would people say that that was a racial issue or that “We owe you one” issue? I think that there’s definitely something to be said for the “We owe you one.”
On working in Lee’s beloved locale, New York City:
Owen: New York is the best city in the world–the capital of the world, in my opinion. It’s the only place I ever come where I can always stay longer. I shot actually one or two of the BMW [ads] in New York, but this was the first time I’d come to New York to shoot a movie. And to be shooting on Wall Street with Spike was a really fantastic experience. I’m crazy about this city, I think that if it wasn’t for the fact that I’ve got a family and kids that are very settled in London, I’m pretty sure I’d probably be living here.
Washington: I like going to Brooklyn, rehearsing and being able to walk around the corner and have all the art department and everything right there. It’s like coming home for me. I’m born and raised here. It was hot. All of the stuff outside, downtown, it was hot. That’s a real tight little area and it’s noisy and there’s construction going on everyday… I’m trying [to move back]. Talk to my wife. I’m trying. I’m trying, and we’re almost done because they’re getting up there now. So in fact, I’m looking at real estate on Monday. Trying to get here.
Foster: I go [to Ground Zero] every day when I’m here. It’s really become part of the New York landscape and as we all know it, I don’t live here full-time, but it’s our most desperate, horrible moment–but also the most shining moment for New Yorkers. After 9/11 is when I wanted to come here, because how my friends were and what they were doing here and the kids that I knew that grew up here, the beauty of this community and how it came together, specifically New York and how it came together. It’s such an international place, with people from every different walk of life and every different accent. That made me proud and made me want to be a part of it. In some ways, yeah, it’s that chilling thing, but it’s also New York’s shining moment.
On the movies and themselves:
Owen: There was never a plan B, it had to happen for me because that was all I ever wanted to do. I remember way back in my school they used to say, ‘You need to have another career, you need to do something else.’ And I was always like that’s what I’m going to do. Sometimes having a back-up career… there is something about when you have got to do it, you have got to do it. You certainly need the breaks. I’ve had some very big important breaks, but there was nothing else I ever wanted to do. It scares me, the idea of not doing this, because I don’t know what it is I would have ended up doing.
Foster: I love movies. I have always loved movies. I will always love movies. It’s just that I love them. I think that if I could do one thing on a day off that’s what I would do: I would go see a film. So I see everything that comes out, even the bad ones. But in terms of the business of Hollywood, I’m not in that. I don’t know. I’m just not. I don’t go to those events and I don’t do that stuff unless I have to for work. For me, I consider that work–premieres, parties, that sort of thing is sort of work to me. If I have to work and I’m in the mood to work and I’m promoting a movie then I do it, but if I don’t have to work then I don’t.
Washington: You know what? I didn’t watch the Academy Awards. No. I went to Tower Records, actually, and I took my daughter out to teach her how to drive… I’ve never been a big movie guy.
