James Earl Jones: The Man Behind The Voice

Q: You didn't meet your father until you were 21, but you knew that he was a boxer and an actor?

A: Oh yeah, I knew. You couldn't talk about boxing or acting around my grandma. But I kept abreast of his life.

Q: And then, while you're studying premed, you see an issue of Look magazine with your father in it and you decide to become an actor?

A: There he was, an actor, and making a living at it, I thought--which was not true. The Korean War was staring me in the face and I thought I'd be dead by the fall of '53 anyway, so why not do something I would enjoy? I dropped out of premed and spent my last two years in the drama department. But I had no intentions of following through to becoming an actor.

Q: When you left the army and saw the civil unrest among blacks, did you think you'd become a radical?

A: I fully expected there would be a race war, and I expected to use my military training to help defend people. But Jesus, I wouldn't dirty my hands with politics.

Q: It was around this time when you met your father for the first time. What was that like?

A: It was weird. There was an embrace, but it was very awkward. Later on when I hung out with him in New York City, this embracing thing was all over the place. I never saw so much hugging and kissing as I did among the theater world.

Q: How did you feel about your father seeing you act?

A: That was one of the two things that intruded on my work. The other was reviews. When I got over the fear of reviews I stopped reading them, around the same time I got over the fear of my father being in the audience.

Q: Ever give him money after you became successful?

A: He's asked for it. He claimed to me recently that he and I had promised each other that whoever made it first would take care of the other. I said to him, "I don't remember making that promise, but if I did, I take it back as of now because I've got a family to raise." He's sly, but he's not very clever.

Q: When you first started acting in summer theater, you fell in love with a white woman who was...

A: I fell in love with an actress. Why say white? We know she was white, but why say it?

Q: Because at that time there were interracial problems.

A: My main job is to try to keep my head above the race bullshit without losing my sense of reality. Racism is not politics, it's very personal. Whenever I list my genetic heritage I use all three anthropological words: Negroid, Caucasoid and Mongoloid.

Q: What about the Othello rumor--that every time you played Othello you slept with your Desdemona? Is that something you'd like to put to rest?

A: I don't know. [Big smile] I might want to perpetuate it.

Q: Two of your Desdemonas were Jane Alexander and Jill Clayburgh.

A: I think Jane was having a thing with the director and it was just coincidental that I was on the stage with her in those love scenes. Jill Clayburgh had just broken up with Al Pacino and she was very vulnerable. She and I never so much as kissed offstage.

Q: In 1964, though, you did break up a marriage when you fell for your Desdemona, Julienne Marie.

A: She wasn't just a good actress, she was also a vivacious actress. We all fell in love with her, and none of us knew that she was attracted to any of us.

Q: Your relationship lasted about eight years. Had she been able to give you a child, would you have stayed with her?

A: I'm sure, yeah. I had a strong need to be a father. I would meet somebody and pretty much say, "Hi, my name is James, can you have a baby?"

Q: By 1979, you were engaged to be married again, but then you became involved with Cecilia Hart.

A: The more we worked together the more I realized I was attracted to her. I said to my betrothed, "I don't think I should be marrying you, because I'm really attracted to somebody else."

Q: How well do you know your wife?

A: I'll never understand her. And that's part of my loving her.

Q: She does, on the other hand, feel she knows you?

A: I'm afraid so. I'm afraid she's deluding herself that she's got my number, but I'll never have her number.

Q: Has your attitude about women changed over the years?

A: I think we're coming out of a lot of confusion with feminism. Earlier, on a movie set, 10 people would have somebody's phone number quickly, looking forward to the flirtations, maybe some hugs, maybe some would get laid. Now, between AIDS and the feminist movement, no one knows what to do. I hope that if there's something women want they'll let us know, because we don't dare ask anymore!

Pages: 1 2 3 4