by
Paul Fischer
He's an Academy Award nominee and one of the
truly great actors of his generation. 
Morgan
Freeman is also someone who doesn't suffer folks gladly,
is outspoken if need be and manages to effortlessly glide from mainstream
Hollywood to its Indie world. The esteemed actor will play cold renegade
soldier whose obsession with hunting aliens is imminently self-destructive
in Lawrence Kasdan's Dreamcatcher, based on
the novel by Steven King. A month later, Freeman stars
with Billy Bob Thornton in Levity, which opened
this year's Sundance Film Festival. Thornton plays a murderer whose life
sentence has been commuted and whose wanderings through an unspecified
town bring him to work for a mysterious priest (Freeman). Add to that
Freeman's recent Hollywood star of fame and talk of war, and Morgan Freeman
is never short of an interesting word.
CrankyCritic:
Because you do so many studio movies and big films, where do you fit in
the time to do a little film like Levity, and how do they come to you?
Morgan Freeman: Well you know you never get time for
anything; you MAKE time. So, if a nice little project comes along - I
shouldn't even say a little project because every role has its own size
and importance and some times it's the smaller independent films that
give you the most work to do.
CrankyCritic: Does doing a movie like that kind of re-energize
you in some ways as an actor?
Morgan Freeman: I'm not sure, I know what you mean, but
I'm not sure that re-energizing is what is going on, but it does offer
you better work. The work that you're going to do is going to be more
in your line of work you know, because there are those of us actors who
function better in action situations and don't have to do too much transitional
work. And, then there are actors who really enjoy the transitional work,
which I do, and that's what I eat up.
CrankyCritic: The older you get is it easier or harder to find
the really good roles?
Morgan Freeman: Probably the older you get the harder
it is because most of the writers are young writers, trained on television
and writing for a young audience, so.
CrankyCritic: And yet you're never out of work?
Morgan Freeman: I am, it just doesn't seem that way.
CrankyCritic: I mean do you get bored or frustrated when you're
not working?
Morgan Freeman: No I have enough toys and things to keep
me busy.
CrankyCritic: Your boat and . . .
Morgan Freeman: My boat, my plane, my horses. Between
those three I'm fine. You never know when you career is over until after
it's over. If the phone doesn't ring for three months, you start thinking.
And, after six months you know, well let's look at your retirement plan
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CrankyCritic: Well what would you do if you couldn't act anymore?
Morgan Freeman: If I couldn't act anymore I'd probably
be a paraplegic or something so.
CrankyCritic: Really?
Morgan Freeman: Yeah.
CrankyCritic:
It still gives you that sense of being?
Morgan Freeman: Yeah, I mean that's all I've ever been.
I guess if I was still mobile, I would produce and become a full time
producer.
CrankyCritic: You do attach yourself to films as a producer?
Morgan Freeman: Yes I do because I have a film company
and we've got a lot of projects in the pipeline.
CrankyCritic: That you're going to be in or just produce?
Morgan Freeman: We'll yeah; I'll be in some of them,
not all of them.
CrankyCritic: You have this I
guess onscreen reputation of being the master of sedate or do you like
to use gravitas?
Morgan Freeman: Love gravitas, oh boy.
CrankyCritic: Because it's a word that comes up often when we
talk to you at press junkets.
Morgan Freeman: Yes.
CrankyCritic: Are you tired of it?
Morgan Freeman: Well yeah, I guess I'm tired of the aura
of it. At the same time I choose my own films so that's not you know...
CrankyCritic: So you partly have yourself to blame.
Morgan Freeman: Yeah. I have only myself to blame but
I don't know why it is but it just seems like the best stories that I
read appeal to me.
CrankyCritic: What about the character in Levity?
Morgan
Freeman: I wouldn't see gravitas in this guy, I saw...well, let
me go back because maybe that is what defines yeah, too, gravitas. You
can get away from the idea of it, you know. The actuality of it, the actual
presence of it, whatever it is that comes and, obviously, it has to do
with the gravitas' character.
CrankyCritic: Right.
Morgan Freeman: And so, I think that probably because
maybe it tests too much.
CrankyCritic: Did you always feel acting to be a realistic profession
to embark upon?
Morgan Freeman: Yes.
CrankyCritic: Is it something you need to do?
Morgan Freeman: Yes, absolutely.
CrankyCritic: Why?
Morgan Freeman: Because that's who I am. I was always
able to pretend full out and nothing else that I even contemplated interested
me for more then, you know, a couple months at a time.
CrankyCritic: What was the worse thing you had to do while you
were struggling as an actor?
Morgan Freeman: Um, work as a counter man at Lee's which
was like working at McDonalds. The worse thing I ever did because, I guess,
it was because it didn't pay at all and they wouldn't let you get tips.
CrankyCritic: Really?
Morgan Freeman: Yeah. And I got the job after I had done
my first real card carrying professional job as a dancer, and that show
closed and I couldn't get anything else, so I had to wind up going to
work at Lee's. I remember one night, one of the dancers that I had worked
with, a guy named Bob, who came in and got a hot dog and saw me behind
the counter and said 'what are you doing here?'
CrankyCritic: That must have been hard for you.
Morgan Freeman: Sort of.
CrankyCritic: Do you bring in your life experiences to your work
now as you look back on those days?
Morgan Freeman: I always look back. I always remember
where I came from and I'm always amazed at where I am.
Morgan Freeman: Why does that amaze you?
Morgan Freeman: You have to know where I came from.
CrankyCritic: Do tell...
Morgan Freeman: It was a small town in Mississippi. And
then at the same time, that gave me this perspective. If you know what
you want, you can obtain it For those of us who don't know what we want,
we have trouble getting there
CrankyCritic: You now live in that same small
town in which you grew up, right?
Morgan Freeman: Yeah. I moved back there.
CrankyCritic: Why was that important to you, at this time in your
life, to move back there?
Morgan Freeman: I moved back about 12 years ago and I
did it because I live in Mississippi and having traveled around the country,
the world, particularly the country, I have discovered that there was
no place to go to hide from racism. If it's a problem for you, it's a
problem for you. You just find it wherever you are. And I was really sick
of the urban scene being packed in with eight million other people, living
in a box, you know, remembering that my parents had it. And they moved
back to Mississippi four years before and I'd go back and sit and realize
how absolutely beautiful and peaceful it was. That's how I grew up, just
kind of sitting, you know, taking my fishing cane and going down to the
creek and catching fish and sitting in the China berry tree and dreaming.
CrankyCritic: Sounds very idyllic.
Morgan Freeman: Well it was, but you have to put it into
perspective to realize it.
CrankyCritic: So when you make a movie and shoot in cities around
the world, do you enjoy getting back there as quickly as possible?
Morgan Freeman: Yes. I almost never hesitate. I never
stay in a place beyond, gosh I, you know 
if
I go someplace I'm only going to be a couple of days and the company gives
me a couple more days just to sight see and I'll, I'll take that, but
if I'm working three months in a place or even three weeks, most of the
time I want to go home.
CrankyCritic: Ironic since your next film
is going to be shot in Paris.
Morgan Freeman: Yeah. I agree with you, but Danny
the Dog is a very engaging story.
CrankyCritic: And who is Danny the Dog?
Morgan Freeman: Me. The human pit bull.
CrankyCritic: And you play the gravitas in this movie?
Morgan Freeman: Very serious gravitas.
CrankyCritic: Have you ever worked with Luc Besson before?
Morgan Freeman: No, I haven't.
CrankyCritic: Odd Frenchman.
Morgan Freeman: Yeah, I know he is. That's what I like
about him.
CrankyCritic: Really?
Morgan Freeman: Yeah. I like the things he's been attached
to.
CrankyCritic: What kind of character do you
play ?
Morgan Freeman: I'm going to play a piano tuner. A widow
piano tuner of a teenaged daughter.
CrankyCritic: Now I know you hate the cold so, from that perspective,
was Dreamcatcher a tough shoot for you?
Morgan Freeman: No. It really wasn't and the reason it wasn't was
that they spent a fortune on arctic clothing for it. You know, we had
these boots that kept us that far off the snow. Everywhere you went they
put on heat at you.
CrankyCritic: Was that an interesting experience,
generally, making the film?
Morgan Freeman: Yeah. It was a very interesting experience working
with Larry Kasdan.
CrankyCritic: Did you relish being the kind of villain in the
piece?
Morgan Freeman: He's not a bad guy. Only in that people
who are entrusted with a mission who get messianic about it, he's gotten
really dedicated to this and he's just on his way around the bend. His
young protégé can see it and doesn't quite know what to
do about it until somebody gives him some insight
CrankyCritic: How about dealing with special
effects which are plentiful?
Morgan Freeman: That's good movie making. He's not depending on
the effects to make the movie. If the characters hold you and you're not
just waiting for the next CGI, that's good.
CrankyCritic: What's the appeal of Stephen King
do you think?
Morgan Freeman: I think the appeal is there because Stephen is
not just a prolific writer but a really good writer, an excellent writer.
If you look at the things that were made into movies, they were made into
movies because they were really well drawn character studies. In the scary
ones, the ones outside of things like The Shawshank Redemption,
what do you want for visuals? Carrie for instance. That was a
character.
CrankyCritic: What about Bruce Almighty?
Morgan Freeman: Full blown comedy. It's a situation where
I just go on vacation for a while. He says to me at one point, 'You're
God, you can't go on vacation.' And my answer is, 'Did you ever hear of
the dark ages?' I don't make jokes, but he has a sense of humor.
CrankyCritic: Now you've talked about politics in the past and
stuff like that.
Morgan Freeman: I try not too, actually. I've got no business talking
about politics.
CrankyCritic: Are you generally optimistic about what's going
on in the world. Are you concerned? Are you worried?
Morgan Freeman: Oh, I'm very worried about what's going on in the
world at the moment because we have this Napoleonic president; by Napoleonic
I mean he's a man who just seems to need to search himself. It doesn't
make sense. I don't have any love lost on Saddam Hussein. If he needs
to be removed from office, fine. You have to find the right way to do
it, but going to war, nah, with the people. To do what. What is the real
reason? Because he's harboring weapons of mass destruction?
CrankyCritic: So it is with North Korea?
Morgan Freeman: So it is with North Korea. Why are we acting to
acquiesce to this? We do not need the Iraqi oil. We have Kuwait oil. It's
the same pool. That's why Kuwait's there. That's why Kuwait was set up.
You think that country could exist there without somebody backing it?
CrankyCritic: Yeah. Absolutely.
Morgan Freeman: We're talking about a piece of Iraq. So, we keep
this. That's my noise. I am terribly upset about the whole thing.