Despite winning the Best Actor Oscar for Ray, Jamie Foxx says he isn’t good looking enough to play lead roles and that, in spite of his fame, he doesn’t want to be a celebrity. He tells GQ:
People who do it great are people like Tom Cruise and Will Smith – they are built for that. I’m not. I’m more of a character guy…I learnt from Denzel Washington. He said, ‘I don’t want to be a celebrity, I want to be an actor.’ As long as you can maintain that it’s always great work.”
We can argue his looks if you want, but it’s refreshing to see a big star like Jamie Foxx make art without all the pretentiousness that unfortunately comes along with being paid millions to wear makeup and say lines that somebody else wrote. Like, for instance, while in the middle of shooting Miami Vice, Foxx stopped production because he refused to film any more scenes outside of the United States, causing the film to be rewritten. Or when Jamie made Universal supply him with a private jet after he refused to fly commerical. Or the time when he demanded and got a big raise after he found out he was being paid less than Colin Farrell (although Farrell was the lead, he took a pay cut to accomodate Foxx). I’m not saying that Jamie Foxx is a delusional diva, but it’s pretty safe to assume that the only way he could land back into reality is if his private jet was hijacked.
Some stills from Miami Vice:
