Wesley Snipes: The Wisdom of Wesley

Q: You were in college when you read Malcolm X's autobiography--what effect did it have on you?

A: Changed my life. Gave me purpose.

Q: How committed are you to Islamic beliefs?

A: They're still prevalent in my life and philosophy. But I don't call it Islam, I call it African spirituality.

Q: What one book would you recommend to people?

A: Without a doubt, The Spiritual Dimensions of Psychology by Hazrat Inayat Khan, who was a Sufi...I would make this mandatory for every artist, writer, creative person.

Q: In Architectural Digest you spoke about your ideas on color. Tell me about color theory.

A: Color has an effect on the human body and the emotions, just as sound does. If you want to study, you use more yellow. You want to create a cooler, open, compassionate environment, you use blue, turquoise, soft green. You want to create more energy, you use a white light or some reds.

Q: Why should rooms not have 90-degree angles?

A: Dust particles build up in the corner.

Q: Your interior decorator said you were "out there."

A: I wasn't so far out there that she didn't accept her check!

Q: You've also said you're interested in herbs.

A: I'm into herbology. I take whatever is necessary. I know my body I have studied with herbologists as well as acupuncturists. I studied massage therapy for a year. I've read many books, been my own guinea pig.

Q: Now that you have your company, Amen Ra Films, which produced The Big Hit and has set up deals around town, do you feel you're in a business among honorable men or among thieves?

A: [Long pause] Both. Even some thieves have some sense of honor, a code. I understand that the majority of people are in it for the money and the fame as opposed to the art and the craft, and that my artistic appetite can make me vulnerable to those people.

Q: Amen Ra means "an unseen source of all creation." Does that mean you leave everything in the hands of God?

A: Well, I don't think that's my place. I think it already is.

Q: What does the script you're developing on the life of Miles Davis focus on?

A: I've wondered why people who end up being labeled "great" so often have such turmoil in their lives. There must be something to the moment when you are accepted as the exception. It's got to add a certain unforeseen pressure to your life, because you never wanted it--you were only looking for that sound, that painting, that look, that word that identifies exactly who you are, the sum total of your love. You never wanted that label "great." But they put it on you, and when they did they began to expect you to live up to it. I saw Farrah Fawcett at a party--man, I tripped. I don't know anything about her life, but I could tell the woman was unhappy. This was a woman everybody loved, and now she's shunned and ridiculed? Where is the love? Why isn't anybody going, "We got you, we're gonna take care of you"?

Q: You're also producing a series of documentaries called African Scholars, aren't you?

A: It's an archival series of biographies of prominent thinkers and artisans from the African diaspora--the Caribbean, America, Africa. The contributions of African people that the rest of the world doesn't really know about. We have scientists, astronauts, thinkers, poets, but we don't have those images out there. After watching Bill Moyers's wonderful programs on PBS with people like Joseph Campbell, I thought maybe we should have programs about people who come from our experience.

Q: Assess yourself and your future.

A: Couple my formal training with the heart of a lion--I can do it all.

Q: What are you proudest of?

A: Besides the ability to give birth to a beautiful son? I'm most proud that I've stuck in there and have worked hard to make manifest the principles and the lessons that I was taught about how to have a happy life, how to have heaven here on earth.

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Lawrence Grobel interviewed David Duchovny for the July '98 issue of Movieline.

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