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Does Heaven Have a Ghetto?

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NEW YORK, NY, USA - With the incredible buzz about "Ray," comedian Jamie Foxx's work in the Ray Charles bio pic is being hailed as a shoo-in for the best actor Oscar. And that's no joke; this former Texan has made the transition from TV funny man ("In Living Color"/"The Jamie Foxx Show") and comedy star ("Booty Call") to a serious actor tackling hard-hitting, complex roles such as the taxi driver in "Collateral" or Bundini Brown in "Ali." Yet this 30-something actor continues to defy expectations as he talks about tour plans, future films and his own comedy festival.

G21: Has it been hard to convince Hollywood that you have dramatic chops?

JAMIE FOXX: I never factor Hollywood into anything. I'm a black actor, so I can't really [worry about] what Hollywood thinks. I've got do my thing. My jokes have to be funny. Whatever I do has to be great. When I first got on "In Living Color" it was not like I thought it was going to be. If you weren't on time -- if you got there at 10:01 -- you had to explain that one minute. Keenan Ivory Wayans was like, "The reason I'm on you so tough is because when you're mediocre you're not going to make it as an African-American actor, actress, comedian or singer. You've got to be top of the line all the time." I ran into Keenan at the Comedy Awards and he's still echoing the same thing. He said, "You're doing what I told you to do. Try to stay at the top of your game." So I never worry [about convincing Hollywood of anything]. You've got to blaze your own trail. It's like how hip-hop pulls everything. Fortune 500 companies are calling Puffy: "What do we do? How do we sell this project?" It's that mentality that we all have as young cats out there in Hollywood. You're never going to convince anybody. The only thing you can do is stay true to the art. I'll drop another name, a white man, Lorne Michaels, from "Saturday Night Live." I was asking him, "How come people fall off?" He said, "Jamie, they don't fall off. It's the projects that they choose. If you choose the right projects you don't have to worry about anything as long as you do that."

G21: What made you think you could handle "Ray"?

Jamie Foxx: I had done Ray Charles impersonations before. They'd never made it on TV or anything like that so I knew that I could get into that headspace. But it was still the challenge of can you really make people believe it? When you look at a biopic, it's really tough to do. When you look at other biopics it's like, "Wow, that person looks like him, but --" So it's -- can you go beyond that to where people, when they see it, go, "Wow, I'm not seeing Jamie Foxx?"

I had a little bit of training in trying to transform into another person by doing "Redemption: The Tookie Williams Story." Then I did Bundini Brown [in "Ali"].

I call it under and over. Bundini Brown was underbite; that alone gives you Bundini. So there were all these different things to do to try to see if you could take what you feel on the inside and have people trip out on it.

G21: ["Ray" Director] Taylor Hackford said Charles was tough on you before he gave his blessing.

Jamie Foxx: When I met Ray he said, "Oh, let me check those fingers out. You got strong fingers." So we sat down at dual pianos. He was playing one piano and I was playing the other, and we were singing the blues. He said, "If you can do the blues, Jamie, you can do anything."

He?s singing, "All, right, right," and we?re singing the blues back and forth. Then he said, "Well, how about this?" And he goes into [something by jazz pianist] Thelonious Monk.

It's like the equivalent to riding a mechanical bull when you've had too many drinks. You just fly all the way out to the bar. Then I hit a wrong note and he said, "Now why the hell did you do that?"

He was very serious about it. He wasn't laughing.

I said, "Well, I don't know."

He said, "You didn't know what?"

I said, "Well?"

And he said, "Notes are right underneath your fingers."

I started listening to him as he was speaking and he was very serious. His music is his harmony. If it's off, his whole life is off. He said, "The notes are right underneath your fingers, Jamie. You've just got to take time out to find them, young man."

So I used that as a metaphor through the whole movie -- that our life is just notes underneath our fingers, and we've got to figure out which notes we want to play to make our music.

So that?s what we started doing right there. I said, "OK, I'm going to play the right Ray Charles' notes and then I'm going to play this Ray Charles story."

G21: And did you get the notes right?

Jamie Foxx: After I got the Monk riff, he said, "There it is! That's what I'm talking about. Now come on." When I finally got it, he jumped up, slapped his thighs and said, "The kid's got it." And he walked out. That's when I knew we had it.

G21: How did you stay on the right side of the thin line between mimicry and acting?

Jamie Foxx: It's called nuance.

In order to get to Ray Charles, you had to pray a little because everybody knows who Ray Charles is. Young kids, hip-hops kids -- I don't say "old people," I say "seasoned people" -- everybody knows who Ray Charles is.

The first thing I did was lose 30 pounds. I'm around 190, so I [went down to] 157 pounds with the help of my trainer. We had to change my metabolism.

Eddie Murphy said, "You're going to do good because you got that Ray Charles jaw." That was one of the things that worked in our favor.

I said, "Eddie, I don't know what that means, but I?m going to run with it."

When you're not on, that's the realness of it.

The best Ray Charles thing that I liked in doing this movie was when he'd answer the telephone -- when they were calling to tell him that the charges were dropped because he opens his legs and he sits down?

That's what I call a "down-home" way of answering the phone. That's what you're feeling in the movie. It's the nuisance.

Once you get that you're not watching Ray Charles anymore, you're watching a blind man go through some things -- a blind man blessed with talent, that's on a journey -- and how is he going to get through that journey. Then it's like, at first-- You?re looking at Ray Charles but then you look past it -- especially when he's going through the drugs.

It's like, "Man, this dude is really going through some things." So all the different things we did were the ingredients we needed to really get that character.

G21: You chose to be blinded in playing Ray?

Jamie Foxx: Ray couldn't cheat. So there were certain things when I played it blind that you couldn't get around. I couldn't get up and move or look up and see what was going on. We had to stay singularly focused in order to keep it true.

G21: Did you remain in character when the camera stopped?

Jamie Foxx: No, no. [Actress] CCH Pounder taught me one thing. "Characters are like putting on a coat. You put the coat on while you work, you take the coat off after it's over."

You need that freshness. I know people who stay in character, and it's the worst thing in the world. You can't go out. They're still in their character and the residue is too much. I like to flip it on like a light switch and then flip it off. Then, when we come back in the next morning, I flip it back on. And that's what keeps things fresh for me.

G21: Since you've moved into drama, how important is the comedy now?

Jamie Foxx: Hey man, I have to let them know every day, "Don't sleep on me."

For all those comics out there that think I've gotten soft doing the dramatic stuff, I had to go to the comedy awards and let them know I still got that comedy sword. We were at the ESPYs not too long ago and Cedric the Entertainer was there; I had to keep the heat up on him.

So it's a fair competition between all the comedians. We really have a great community right now. We honored the whole Wayans family for all the comedy they've given us.

It's a great time right now for comedians, because we are stepping into other roles, but we're still keeping our comedy side fresh.

I ran into Chris Tucker at the Ray Charles tribute recently and he's coming down to Laughapalooza. That's where I'm getting 60 comedians together and we're going to go all night -- every five minutes, another comedian.

G21: Will you go on road or do more big-screen comedy?

Jamie Foxx: Yeah, one of the films is coming together. Even with that, I will get out on the road soon.

G21: Does it make you nervous that your future work will probably be judged against what you?ve done here?

Jamie Foxx: Oh yeah. What I'm telling everybody [is]: "This is the Cinderella time right now."

Everybody's saying, "Oh, we love ya."

But it's like flying out of Los Angeles.

When you fly out of LA, it's pretty and everything is nice and then the pilot comes on and says, "We?re having a little weather over ... " So we're coming up to weather, I'm sure, as far as the different projects we'll choose. But to be honest with you, I've got a couple of decent projects that, for now, I can sit back and say, "This are still going to be some great things."

So it's great right now but it does make you a little, not nervous, but -- I go back to my man and ask that question and Keenan said. "You just gotta make sure it's top dog."

G21: Who would play you in your life story?

Jamie Foxx: He's not born yet [spoken in an old man's voice]. Hopefully, I've got a little living left to do.

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