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CNN SPOTLIGHT

CNN Spotlight: Denzel Washington

Aired September 27, 2014 - 19:30   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DENZEL WASHINGTON, ACTOR: What do you see when you look at me?

NISHCELLE TURNER, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): A major talent.

WASHINGTON: Don't do that.

TURNER: Charisma to burn.

WASHINGTON: Come on now. Come on now.

TURNER: Denzel Washington. A side you've never seen.

WASHINGTON: Oh! Where did you get this?

I was police commissioner for a day.

TURNER: His journey from star athlete to Hollywood star.

WASHINGTON: I think it's a greatest act of working today. Numero uno.

TURNER: CNN "Spotlight, Denzel."

July 1974. "Death Wish" hits theaters starring Charles Bronson. The vigilante here confronting alley mugger number one. An uncredited actor named Denzel Washington makes his first film appearance.

September 2014, the script is flipped. Forty years after that "Death Wish" debut, it's Denzel going vigilante in his latest, "The Equalizer" with director Antoine Fuqua.

(on camera): I know it's acting, but you convinced me. Make the wrong move with Denzel, he can equalize a fella or two.

WASHINGTON: Ah! I'm not that guy. No, I'm a nice love - no, it's just a role. It's not Denzel.

TURNER (voice-over): Who is Denzel? The story begins in Mt. Vernon, New York. He's born in 1954. The second of three children to Lenis, a beautician and Denzel Senior, a Pentecostal minister.

(on camera): I played a little this is Denzel's life. I want to show you a couple.

WASHINGTON: Ah. TURNER: I would like to bite these cheeks.

WASHINGTON: Where did you get this?

TURNER: I want to bite his cheeks.

WASHINGTON: Where did you find this? You've got to go through my family.

TURNER: I have my ways.

WASHINGTON: And you know who that is? That's my older sister. And we're sitting on the porch. This is 1955.

I know, we should have used this in the movie. Yes.

TURNER: You look serious.

WASHINGTON: Wow.

TURNER: This is the one I love, though. This is suited -

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There he is.

WASHINGTON: This we use for the boys and girls club. My mom - I had a little vest on.

TURNER (voice-over): It's his mom who brings him to the local boys club in Mt. Vernon at age six. He meets Billy Thomas, who becomes a mentor.

WASHINGTON: Billy Thomas. He ran the boys and girls club where I grew up.

TURNER: His first membership card is issued in 1962. It's a lifelong connection. The club experiences begin to shape an artistic, athletic and competitive young man.

BILLY THOMAS, BOYS & GIRLS CLUB: Whether it was the basketball, football team, arts and crafts.

TURNER: As Denzel turns 14, his parents split. Mom sends him to Oakland Academy, a private boarding school about an hour away from home. Andrew Penny is a student there too.

ANDREW PENNY, HIGH SCHOOL FRIEND: He was very opinionated, very charismatic. The kind of guy that people gravitate to like a magnet. He was a great dresser. He always came with nice knit sweater that was part of the scene. I remember the first time I saw patent leather shoes, he was wearing them.

He was a half back on the football team, had a lot of speed. He played varsity basketball.

WASHINGTON: That's high school.

PENNY: He's just an overcall competitive and very good athlete.

WASHINGTON: I think I was a junior in high school. And I had learned to keep my mouth shut because my teeth were all broken. Yes, I had this cut under my lip. I still have. Because I was playing ball, and I jumped up and as I was coming down, he went up. Busted me in the lip.

I was playing basketball. I played football as well.

TURNER (on camera): Which one was your first love, basketball or football?

WASHINGTON: Football.

TURNER (voice-over): That first love breaks his heart.

This is footage from 1972. Oakland Academy's final game. Team captain, half back, number 32, Denzel Washington. Teammate Andrew Penny remembers the game day well.

PENNY: Unfortunately, we lost the game. And I remember after the game he was sitting there, and had tears rolling down his eyes. Because he was so passionate about winning and being competitive. That's Denzel.

TURNER: Denzel heads to college at Fordham University in New York City. Academically, he jumps among majors in pre-med, poli sci and journalism. Athletically, he gives basketball a shot.

P.J. CARLESSIMO, FORDHAM ASST. COACH (1971-1973): In the early 70s, I was coaching the freshman team at Fordham.

TURNER: P.J. Carlessimo just beginning a coaching career meets a walk- on.

CARLESSIMO: I think we tried out 70 or 80 guys. Denzel made the team. Wasn't a good offensive player, but he was a good defensive player. Played very hard. He was really competitive.

TURNER: Between practices, games and classes, Denzel explores college theatre. Eventually, basketball takes a back seat.

CARLESSIMO: He took a semester off. And I think when he came back, he first started to know he wanted to get into acting, because he had a couple different majors, as we all did going through school. He finally settled on that. He started to know what he wanted to do. And that was when he started going down and watching theatre and meeting people.

TURNER: He graduates with a theatre degree in 1977, the same year he gets his first credited role in the TV movie "Wilma." on-set, the actor meets Pauletta Pearson, the pretty co-star who later becomes his wife. Hopscotching through off Broadway work, he lands at the prestigious Negro Ensemble Company.

WASHINGTON: I don't like have I've been hearing. I've been hearing the strangest and most preposterous things about me. TURNER: The unknown gets critical notice as Malcolm X in "When the

Chickens Come Home to Roost" in 1981. And Charles Weldon, another actor in the troupe, recognizes he's in the presence of something special.

CHARLES WELDON, ARTISTIC DIRECTOR, THE NEGRO ENSEMBLE COMPANY: He had whatever it is, and as we say in this business, it was just - he just stood out. It was just great. He didn't - you didn't see pretentiousness at all. You know, he was the character. He was the character.

TURNER: His next character, Private Peterson in the award-winning "A Soldier's Play." The "New York Times" heaps praise on the rising star. "A cooler kind of young renegade theater," critic Frank Rich called him. But the cool renegade is just getting warmed up.

Up next, Hollywood comes calling.

WASHINGTON: Bang!

WELDON: And a TV show is about to make Denzel Washington a household name.

CARLESSIMO: When you watched him then, you kind of had to say this is not going to be the end. This is going to be a one show and that's it. He's going to go even higher.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

WASHINGTON: The patient has vanished, disappeared.

TURNER: 1982, Denzel moves from the stage to the screen. Landing a role on the TV medical drama, "St. Elsewhere." Denzel is a television rookie among a cast of veterans. But his talent is obvious to his cast mate, William Daniels, right from the start.

WILLIAM DANIELS, ACTOR: He was just a really good actor. You knew it from being at that table.

WASHINGTON: Get away from me!

DANIELS: He was always kind of the cool, calm, collected person.

WASHINGTON: Nurse, Mrs. Zenvari, 302, she get a 4 a.m. Keflex -

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You wrote it, we gave it.

TURNER: Denzel gives it as Dr. Phillip Chandler for six seasons. His star is rising. Daniels isn't a bit surprised when Denzel makes the leap to movies.

DANIELS: I had the feeling that he belonged in film. He had a certain gravitas.

TURNER: Film success for Denzel is immediate. His first major movie "Cry Freedom," earns him a supporting actor Oscar nomination for his performance as anti-apartheid activist Steve Biko.

WASHINGTON: A South Africa for equals, black or white.

TURNER: Denzel doesn't win, but he's nominated again in the same category just two years later for his work in the civil war film "Glory."

WASHINGTON: If you boys just turn right around, head on down that and you let us head down there where we are fighting.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Them men dying up that road.

WASHINGTON: And it wouldn't be (INAUDIBLE) dying if they let the 54 (INAUDIBLE).

TURNER: Denzel plays Tripp, a former slaved turned soldier in the Union's first all-black regiment. The role earns Denzel his first Academy award.

REBECCA KEEGAN, WRITER "LOST ANGELES TIMES": There is no question that "Glory" was a career-making moment for Denzel Washington.

TURNER: Film offers flood in. Denzel begins starring in multiple movies a year, collaborating frequently with top directors like Spike Lee.

(on camera): Was there a moment in any one of those films where you had had that kind of light bulb moment and said, "Good lord, there is nothing like this man."

SPIKE LEE, DIRECTOR: Every film.

TURNER (voice-over): In 1992, the duo takes on the ambitious pick "Malcolm X." Spike recalls his awe as he watched Denzel perform this scene.

WASHINGTON: I'm telling you, Mr. Mohamed said these things were going to come to pass and now these things are starting to come to pass.

LEE: It was clear that Malcolm X was in Denzel at that moment. He prepared for a year for that role.

WASHINGTON: Let the black man separate from his house. Let the black man have his own house. Let the black man have his own land and his own crops.

LEE: You don't give a performance like that by just showing up.

TURNER: "Malcolm X" brings Denzel his third Oscar nomination, but this time as lead actor.

(on camera): He's had this 40-year career that has not been a plateau. He's still ascending today. How unusual is that, number one. And number two, for a black actor?

LEE: Astonishing. I will say this. Repeatedly. He's the greatest - I think he's the greatest actor working today.

TURNER: I was just talking to Spike Lee a couple days about you. And he said "Denzel Washington is the greatest living actor in the world."

WASHINGTON: I'm just trying to be the best me I can be. The greatest? Life has taught me try being the best you can be.

TURNER (voice-over): Denzel's best Denzel is undeniably impressive with unparalleled acting range. Among his nearly 50 films, 1993's "Philadelphia."

WASHINGTON: What happened to your face?

TOM HANKS, ACTOR: I have AIDS.

WASHINGTON: Oh. Oh, I'm sorry.

TURNER: As an attorney, reluctant to represent a man with AIDS, Denzel's character carries the public fear of the disease predominant in America at that time.

WASHINGTON: How many lawyers you go to before you call me?

HANKS: Nine.

TURNER: His "Philadelphia" co-star, Tom Hanks, says he felt privileged to work side by side with an actor as skilled as Denzel.

KEEGAN: The fact that a Tom Hanks would refer to a Denzel Washington as schooling him really tells you a lot about how actors feel about Denzel.

TURNER: Denzel is fine for being known for his acting. Just don't call him a star.

(on camera): You said at one point that your professional job is to be the best or a better actor.

WASHINGTON: Right.

TURNER: But you don't know how to be a celebrity. What do you mean by that? Denzel Washington?

WASHINGTON: That's not a profession. Well, it is for some people. It is. Yes, they're professionals - and I'm not knocking the hustle. Hustling is hustling.

TURNER: You are a celebrity.

WASHINGTON: That's something someone calls you. That is not my profession.

TURNER (on camera): Denzel's profession? A master of the art of transformation.

KEEGAN: He has an unusual combination of vulnerability and a real man's man quality. You know, people buy him as a boxer or a gangster or a former special ops agent.

WASHINGTON: You want to see a hurricane? Go ahead and see it. Come on up in here.

TURNER (voice-over): His turn as a boxer wrongly convicted of murder in 1999's "The Hurricane" earned Denzel his second Oscar nomination for actor in a leading role. The trophy eludes him in 2000, but not for long. As rogue LAPD detective Alonzo Harrison "Training Day" Denzel is riveting.

ETHAN HAWKE, ACTOR: Denzel walks through life the way I felt the last two weeks of high school. You know? Just a confidence and a self assuredness that is really admirable.

WASHINGTON: Training Day, Officer Hoist (ph) show you around, give you a taste of the business here.

HAWKE: We were there to make a movie. He has a kind of respect for the fact people are going to pay money to watch this, you know. So we're going to give them something worth watching or are we not.

TURNER: "Training Day" finally earns Denzel the Oscar for best actor in a leading role, becoming only the second black actor, after Sydney Portier to do so.

WASHINGTON: I'm in debt to Sydney in so many ways. I just love him.

TURNER: Coming up, Denzel on faith, family -

WASHINGTON: Why are you so mad? Don't worry about it.

TURNER: And the co-star who raised his game.

WASHINGTON: She brought it one day in rehearsal. And I was like, I don't know what it is I've been doing, but it isn't that.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

TURNER: September 2014, Denzel's itinerary reads Washington to Toronto.

He's booked at one of the world's biggest film festival to unveil "The Equalizer."

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yo, pop (INAUDIBLE).

WASHINGTON: Guilty as charged.

TURNER: In the movie based loosely on the 1980s TV series, Denzel plays a man with a murky past who dispenses rough justice on behalf of the vulnerable.

WASHINGTON: (INAUDIBLE) I want to know who he really is.

Had enough? Because I can keep going.

TURNER: The film would reunite him with Antoine Fuqua, his director from "Training Day."

(on camera): If I had to write a headline for this film, I would say Denzel Washington is a bad man.

WASHINGTON: He's a bad man.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: He's going to take out five pimps. He took out the East Coast hub of the Russian mafia.

TURNER: Let Denzel have some light moments in this film (INAUDIBLE).

ANTOINE FUQUA, DIRECTOR: I didn't let him do it. He just does it.

WASHINGTON: Don't do that. Don't do that. It's called the spin.

FUQUA: HE just does it. He does it.

TURNER: So that spin. You took the spin.

WASHINGTON: Come on, now.

TURNER: One of the things I think that Antoine really took advantage of in this film was those tight shots of your eyes.

WASHINGTON: Sixteen seconds.

TURNER: You've had those expressive eyes, though, I mean, throughout your life.

(voice-over): OK, Denzel. Time to lay another picture on you.

(on camera): That looks just like you.

WASHINGTON: This is a funny story. You used to go to the department store to get the pictures. And my mother got pissed off, she thought the woman that was taking the pictures was giving my father too much attention. Talking about the equalizer. She was like. It was like, mom, why are you so mad?

Don't worry about it! That's the photo you should have gotten. Oh, yes.

TURNER: The public eyes on him on Toronto, at his side, Pauletta, his wife of more than three decades.

PAULETTA WASHINGTON, WIFE: Thirty one years, still - well, more than 31 years.

WASHINGTON: Thirty five. We met when we were three.

PAULETTA WASHINGTON: Yes, we did. I might have been, like, two.

TURNER: For a major star, he keeps a low profile. A life built on core values.

(on camera): He talks about his faith. How important as someone knows him as the actor.

LEE: That's the rock. Paula, his beautiful wife, partner and all of the kids.

TURNER (voice-over): Four kids, the first born in 1984.

WASHINGTON: When I was a young actor, I was, like, oh, acting is my life. And when my first son was born, it was, like, wait a minute, acting is made of living. This is the miracle of life!

TURNER: He's given millions to charity and gives his church in Los Angeles and gives his time to the Boys and Girls Clubs, the place where he learned life lessons and, all of those years ago, won a badge as police commissioner for a day.

WELDON: I get very personal sometimes and I think about some good things. He's a good person.

TURNER: And a remarkable actor, surprisingly he tells me that a few years ago, he felt a need to reboot.

WASHINGTON: We can get complacent, you can just start riding the waves, and sometimes, it's good to go back in the shed and remember where you where when you started and how you got to where you are.

TURNER: For Denzel, that means returning to the Broadway stage.

WASHINGTON: Film was not even my first love as an actor. Period. And I got back to New York. I've done three shows now for the last nine years.

WASHINGTON: You just tell me what it is you want to be and you'll be it. Yes, sir, anything you want to be.

That reawakened in me, that's a word, for film.

TURNER: In 2010, he wins a Tony for the August Wilson play "Fences" opposite the dynamic Viola Davis.

WASHINGTON: I watched Viola Davis and she woke me up. She brought it one day in rehearsal and I was like I don't know what it is that I've been doing, but it isn't that. I've got to get back to that. So she helped to jump start me, to really re-focus, dig deep.

TURNER: He digs deeper in 2012 for the movie "Flight," earning another Oscar nomination and more admiration from his piers.

HAWKE: Without Denzel Washington, that's like a little indie movie but his performance and his insight into who that person is is so powerful that it becomes a very major movie.

WASHINGTON: This toxicology report states that you are drunk.

HAWKE: Everybody in the world can see themselves as him. That's the kind - Henry Fonda did that.

TURNER (on camera): We know that you love acting. But what's next? What's left?

WASHINGTON: Plenty.

TURNER (voice-over): There are plenty of people with suggestions. Spike Lee says he's ready to make a fifth movie with Denzel.

LEE: I got to write it. Denzel has to like it. And then someone has to pay $20 million.

Give him his money, it's well deserved.

TURNER: Earned.

Leave it to P.J. Carlessimo, the basketball coach who long ago taught Denzel the Xs and Os, he diagrammed his path to success.

CARLESSIMO: He test himself, (INAUDIBLE) to go outside his comfort level.

WASHINGTON: Captain, I relieve of your command of this ship.

This is who you are. Beautiful.

48-0 read. Let's go.

CARLESSIMO: I think it's one of the reasons that all the recognition that come his way and all the respect he has in the profession - he's never been afraid of expanding. He goes everywhere.

WASHINGTON: We didn't land on Plymouth Rock! Plymouth Rock landed on us!

(CHEERING AND APPLAUSE)

(END VIDEOTAPE)