*Fueling up for an unprecedented race to the #1 spot at the box office, Jeffrey Wright and Daniel Craig made a pit stop to New York the day before their film “Quantum of Solace” opened.
Director Marc Forster, who preceded them, told The Film Strip he wanted Wright to have a bigger part than in the last Bond film because “Jeffrey Wright is one the greatest actors around. He’s so brilliant.” No one could dispute Forster’s words because Wright is an actor’s actor and has yet to attain the recognition he deserves. Since his astounding portrayal in “Basquiat,” Wright has gone on to do wonderful work. He was almost unrecognizable in “Shaft,” as Peoples Hernandez and should’ve gotten an Oscar nod for that characterization.
His concise performance in “W” as Colin Powll was one of the best reasons to see it. But it’s the CIA operative Felix Leiter that lit a fire to Wright’s creative drive. With exuberance he explained how he landed Leiter. “My agent called me and said, ‘They want you to be in the next Bond movie. I’ll send you the script. The role is some CIA guy’. And I got the script and I said, ‘What do you mean some CIA guy? He’s Felix Leiter, man!’ For me Jack Lord sprang to mind who, you know outside of Miles Davis, was like the coolest cat on the planet in the late 60s as far as movies and music go. I was very excited about the idea of trying to reinvent that character.”
Since he played Colin Powell in “W,” I asked Wright if he was surprised when Powell deserted his party and supported Obama? “I don’t think that his resigning from the administration was a seal of approval for how they had been leading the country,” he offered. “I think it was just an evolution of his opinion about how the country had been led and how it needed to be led. I thought his endorsement was stunning and articulated so beautifully the dangers of the type of political dialogue that we heard from the McCain campaign.
“That kind of dialogue was divisive, small minded and exclusive, you know, that tried to carve out some section of America as the real America. Those who didn’t look like or didn’t live in that section of America was somehow marginalized. And that’s been going on for too long in this country. Finally, I think we’ve turned a page on that type of political discussion and we hope we’ve laid it to rest forever because we’re a complicated people. We’re a complicated country and we don’t need a simplistic small-minded politics and political leadership. We’ve had that for too long and we can see how damaging [that was].”
Wright is just as excited to play Muddy Waters in “Cadillac Records.” “I would love to have ‘Cadillac Records’ be received in the same way as this film [‘Quantum of Solace’] and I think it’s possible…I mean we have elements of that film that have a global appeal as well. It’s the biggest music star in the world. He has a significant role in this film. It’s also about a music that’s shaped half of popular music in the last half of the 20th century. So it has a global appeal. So if it’s handled right it could have great success and I think it will.”
There were quite a few nay Sayers when Daniel Craig was chosen as the new 007 agent James Bond because of his blond hair. Although “Casino Royale” went on to make big bucks at the box office, he is still taken to task for his blonde hair. A day before my interview with Craig, the NBC Today show kept flashing across the screen “Blond Bond” during their interview.
As a lead up to The Film Strip’s first question, it was mentioned that in a lot of circles he was just “what the doctor ordered” when he was born with the blond hair and blue eyes. Suspicious of what might come next, the blood began to rush from his blue gray shirt to his face. So Daniel, did you ever think in your lifetime you would have to deal with reverse prejudices? Laughing hysterically, he said, “ I did not. I mean, what could I do? ‘You’re blond, you’re too blond.’ I’m too blond? Some said to me, ‘Did you ever think about dyeing your hair?’ and I went, ‘God, No.’
“The whole thing was a nightmare to think about. A lot of the criticism was directed through the Internet, because that's where a lot of people—obviously, for good reason—go to get things off your chest. But I couldn't respond. There's nothing that I could say. I could start my own blog [laughs] going, ‘I don't think I'm too blond [typing on the table as if he was typing on a keyboard]’. So what do you do?” Agreeing that once it gets started, it’s hard to stop, especially when network TV continuously flashes the ‘Blond Bond’ across its screen. “And they’re never, never ever, ever going to get rid of that line. Aw, never mind,” he laments.
Edi Gathegi met his “Twilight” critics with an education they apparently lacked when he was cast as the vampire Laurent. “At the beginning, I think all of us were very, very curious because I don't think any of us had been a part of anything this big before and, for me, I saw that the fans were sort of disgruntled about my casting choice because Stephanie doesn't have an African-American in the book. But Laurent is described as being 'olive-toned' so what I did is I decided to address the issue head on and I said, 'listen, she describes this character as being 'olive-toned' but there are many different types of olives. Black olives anyone? (laughs). Then the next day the fans read it and they became instant supporters and believers. As far as I'm concerned, black olives are the only olives in my world and he's perfect for the job.”
Describing how he got into his character, Gathegi says, “The book was the source material. That's where I started from and I did my own personal research and imaginative work. I was trying to, and this was never going to make it in the film because it was just too much, but I was trying to model parts of my character after Saint George (Monsieur de Saint-George) who was this famous French black man. He was a fencer and a renowned lover. He was also a general of an army who was like the Renaissance man; very regal. And I thought maybe Laurent, in his human form, was like friends with this guy and that was the circle that he traveled in.”
Lead character Kristen Stewart who plays Bella Swan had not read the book before casting and was no fan of vampires—and shares very little with her character. “I mean I grew up watching vampire movies but never occurred to me that I wanted to,” she admits. “I've never gone out with someone-I'm 18 years old, whatever-but like, I've never been interested in anybody I ever thought was attractive when I first looked at them.” She, however, understands the fans getting into a frenzy when it comes to “Twilight.” “It's important to me. I don't want to upset people. People are so passionate about the book. The responsibility I feel that overpowers that is something that I've got to put down because I'm done with the movie. I've done my job and all of the responsibility was self-inflicted. It had nothing to do with people who loved the book.”
It was on the job training for “Harry Potter” star Robert Pattinson also. “I wasn't familiar with it [the ‘Twilight’ book] either,” he noted. “Obviously I'd heard about ‘Harry Potter,’ because everybody had heard of ‘Harry Potter.’ But I'd only read the one that I was in because I knew I was going to do the audition. And ‘Twilight,’ I hadn't heard of it. I was living in England. I hadn't heard of it.
Now it seems the whole world has heard of “Twilight.”