Oscar nominee Michael Clarke Duncan - Part One

By: Craig D. Reid
Date: Thursday, March 23, 2000

Every so often Hollywood hits us with a pleasant surprise that in fact really should not be a surprise. I cheered when I heard that Michael Clarke Duncan got nominated for an Academy Award for his supporting role of the wrongly convicted John Coffey in writer-director Frank Darabount's adaptation of Stephen King's THE GREEN MILE. In the film as in real life, Duncan is a large black man with a soft demeanor and honest soul, full of surprises that come out of left field. When you first see him, he really looks like the kind of guy that can rip your arm off (and probably could if he wanted to), but like his performance in GREEN MILE suggests, he is a gentle man whose sincerity is heartfelt and honest. Who can forget those unexpected moments in ARMEGEDDON when the burly, bulky Duncan would be shivering in tears of humor and fear while clasping for his dear life. Upon our initial meeting, and after he stopped his loud, friendly yet roaring laughter, we spent some time talking about Jackie Chan, Bruce Lee, martial arts and the Ultimate Fighting Championships, of which he is a fan. However, I am honored to share with you a little bit about Duncan's background, his love and respect for his mother, and his humble beginnings in film, including his role in ARMAGEDDON.

FANDOM: SO WHERE ARE YOU ORIGINALLY FROM AND WHAT WAS YOUR BACKGROUND BEFORE GETTING INTO FILM?

Well, I'm from Chicago.

REALLY, I ATTENDED THE UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS FOR NINE YEARS.

Aaahh, excellent, Champaign-Urbana. Well, then you know how cold it gets out there. I worked with the gas company, was a construction worker and a bouncer at bars but my dream was to one day come out to Hollywood to be an actor. Funny enough, when I was working for the gas company, I'd often start pretending to be an actor doing action, and my fellow working buddies would be joking, 'Hey man, it's Bruce Willis on line 2; he wants you to be in his new action movie.' We'd all be laughing. But they really didn't know what was in my heart. And once a person knows what is in his heart, there is nothing that can take him off that road. So I came out here to be an actor. My mother had told me when I was 5 that I would one day be an actor. Actually I really wanted to play professional football. Well, you can see how big I am, six foot five, 315 pounds. I ended up going to Alcorn State (Steve McNair was quarterback there). So I tried out and made the football team and then accidentally told my mother about it because I was just so happy to make the team. So my mama said, 'What did I tell you to do?' I said, 'I know, Mama. The coach said that if I just play for 2 years, I could be making 2 million dollars a year.' She said, 'Do you want to tell your coach that you are going to be an actor, or do you want me to call him up and tell him that you are going to be an actor.' So I called up the coach and told him that I wasn't going to play football anymore and that I was going to be an actor. So that was always the big joke around campus: I was one of the biggest guys on campus, but my mama wouldn't let me play football.


SO WHEN DID YOU FINALLY MAKE THE MOVE OUT TO LA AND GET ALL STARTED?

Well, I came out here in 1994 and ended up staying in the Centinella Hotel and only could afford to eat the 6 chicken nugget sized meals. So I started to think that maybe I should just go back to Chicago. I called my mother, and she explained to me that if I was to come, I would never get the chance again. So I decided to stick it out a little longer, but then 2 weeks later the LA earthquake hit and I said to myself, 'Well that's it: I don't want to be an actor; I'm going back to Chicago, where the ground doesn't move.' [heavy laughter] But my mother told me, 'God doesn't always make you have an easy task in life; he will put obstacles up in your way. If you really want to leave, I will get you a ticket.' So I stayed on and eventually got a job with a security company working at different movie lots. Then one day, some guy took a look at me and said that I should do some acting, and he took me up and introduced me to an agency. Well, for my first 25 auditions like for commercials, I got nothing. Once again I'm thinking, 'This ain't working out. I'm going back to Chicago.' I'm always going back to Chicago aren't I? [hearty laugh] But then my agent called and said that she got me this audition and told me to try just one more time, 'loosen up and me yourself and have fun.' It was for a Budweiser beer commercial, which was going to get national airing. So I went in there with the attitude of just thinking that whatever happens will happen, and whatever happened, it would be cool with me. I did it, then went back to my hotel room and started packing my bags. Then suddenly, my agent calls me saying, 'Yes, you got it, you got it, I knew you could do it.' It was just an incredibly euphoric feeling. So after that, things just start to happen. So basically, the acting was about to take overalthough right before these things, I had been strongly thinking about becoming an LAPD officer and had already done and completed most of their tests for entry.

I'M THINKING ABOUT HOW IRONIC IT IS THAT YOUR FRIENDS JOKED WITH YOU THAT BRUCE WILLIS WAS ON LINE 2.

Yeah. You know man, fate is just one of those weird things, and to top it off, Bruce Willis is the coolest guy to work with; him and Billy Bob Thornton, they were both fantastic. I mean, they are really up there when it comes to being stars so I didn't think they would be like that. And I recall that from the first day of filming, bam, we just hit it off like that and connected. But I got to tell you man, Billy Bob Thornton, I mean he is just one crazy man. He can imitate anybody and he'd have me laughing in tears. One day, I just wasn't feeling good, and he came up to me and starts imitating this drummer he knew and played with in a band back in Arkansas. Now this drummer was black and also didn't have any teeth. I was mad for some reason, so he breaks into this routine he has going and he is just cracking me up. I got to tell you everyone was great on the ARMAGEDDON...Michael [Bay] and Ben [Affleck]. I was actually up for a part in CON-AIR but didn't get it, but that was okay because within the next two days after that, I got 3 auditions and an audition for this film. I was really nervous; I mean, all I could do was see these names, but I wanted to do the film. So I called my mother and as always she said that this was going to be my big chance. So man, I went in there and told myself to just to let it all hang out. I poured water over my head, and just went crazy. By the time I got back home, my agent was paging me; I had gotten the part.

TELL US ABOUT YOUR CHARACTER IN ARMAGEDDON?

I played J. Ottis 'Bear' Corlean [hearty laugh]. We are all oil rigging guys, and there's a meteorite heading toward Earth the size of Texas, and it is up to us to dig 2000 feet into the surface of this thing, set of these nuclear detonators, blow it up, and hopefully it will split and go around the earth. We know nothing about outer space and are really rowdy. Bruce Willis is our boss. The government wants us to save the world and so we are all acting crazy and have crazy demands. Now the Bear is the strongest guy of the bunch and I would like to add for the record, maybe the most handsome [laughs], although some of them might want to debate that with you. Fourteen of us go up, and half comeback. I live. I had quite a few lines, and Michael Bay is the kind of director that wont just stick to the script. I mean he would ask me, 'Well, what would you say in this predicament or in that case?' And I think that's cool; he gives you all a chance to use your artistic mind and expression to come up with something that ultimately improves the film. So in my opinion, that is part of what makes him a good director.

WERE YOU CAST SPECIFICALLY AS A BLACK CHARACTER?

Yes. They had Irish guy, an Asian, African American--that's me [laughs]--and the rest were white. So the idea is that they could have this mix of people that would all go up together and save the world. There was a lot of people up for the role, and I recognized them all, all the usual big guys. I think maybe that they just wanted a fresh face.

SO WHAT WERE SOME THE CHALLENGES FOR THIS FILM?

Wearing this space suite and all the running. I mean, this suit weighs about 50 pounds and is lined with a bullet proof vest in the front and the back and has all of these interesting gadgets and lights and an air hook up in the back. The helmet was also quite heavy, but for some reason, when mine was on, I just started sweating so much and I'm like in there [does heavy Darth Vaderesque breathing sounds], and my helmet is on and I am sweating and fogging up. I mean, the minute I had to do a shot with this thing on, they would literally have to put on the helmet as the camera was rolling. If they had to put in on like 5 minutes before rolling, by the time they start the actual filming of the shot they would have had to remove it because if would have fogged up and you couldn't see inside and of course I couldn't see outside. Yep, that was definitely the biggest challenge. It has to look real, and it did. I also had to do lots stunts and that was pretty cumbersome, and we had to move all over in these things. But when you get right down to it, overall the greatest challenge of any film is that it has to be good entertainment.

DO YOU HAVE ANY CAUSES OR THINGS THAT YOU HAVE STRONG PASSIONATE OR EMOTIONAL FEELINGS ABOUT?

I would really like kids to know one thing: never, ever give up on any of your dreams. I know it sounds like a cliché, but don't ever let anyone tell you that you can't do anything in life. I am living proof of that, because for a long time, I would let people say to me that you can't be an actor. And man, that just brings you down. I mean those guy, they must be all that way, but you know what, in those times, I never tried. But my mother would always say that anything you want to do in life, you first have to have some kind of education and believe in your heart that you can do these things and pray. And I believed I could do these things and I am out here only because of that belief. So the bottom line is man, you got to always believe in yourself.

YOU SEEM TO ME TO BE A RELIGIOUS MAN. ARE YOU?

Yes.

ARMAGEDDON HAS A RELIGIOUS THEME.

Yes, the end of the world and this meteorite is a coming. But you know, if I can close by saying, that I was always taught to treat people right and have them be treated the way they want to be treated and by courtesy. You don't have to curse or swear to get your point across. I don't hit women; I am a big guy, but you wont see me getting mad and going nuts. There is no need to. To be a real lion, you don't have to roar.