Two-time Academy Award winner Denzel Washington is clearly one of our finest actors (he’s been nominated ten times in total for various Best Acting and Best Supporting Actor turns). The actor, who has worked with many of the greats, Spike Lee, Ridley Scott, Tony Scott, Jonathan Demme, etc. is also a very fine director. Washington has directed four feature-length efforts, “Antoine Fisher” (2002), “The Great Debaters” (2007), the critically acclaimed, Oscar-nominated “Fences”—arguably his biggest of all of them, nominated for Best Picture and winning Viola Davis the award for Best Supporting Actress—(2016) and “A Journal With Jordan,” a movie that kind of came and went in 2021.
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So, what might be next on Washington’s director’s slate? Well, according to a new Variety’s Directors on Directors conversation, we might not get anything at all. In a long, worthwhile-to-watch conversation between Spike Lee and Bradley Cooper, primarily discussing Cooper’s latest directorial effort, “Maestro,” but other topics as well, Lee let it casually slip that Washington is “done” with filmmaking.
The conversation began because Lee and Cooper were talking about their various collaborations and Lee joked that after “Malcolm X,” Washington told him, “You and me we’re not doing this no more.” Lee laughed, and clearly, he meant acting side by side (not for nothing; Lee had never appeared in an acting role in a movie he directed Washington in since). And Cooper then went on to effusively wax about how much he loved Washington’s “Fences,” and then Lee revealed that his friend and collaborator seemingly has no more desire to direct films.
“He says he’s done,” Lee said casually after Cooper brought up “Fences.”
“He’s done doing that?” Cooper asked, seemingly not knowing precisely what Lee was talking about.
“Directing,” Lee clarified.
“Really? he said that?” Cooper said, looking forlorn.
Affirmative Lee replied.
“No kidding, how do you even know that?” Cooper said, genuinely looking shocked and disappointed. “Huh?”
Lee just laughed, but c’mon, they’re buddies and pals; Lee has directed him in four movies—“Mo Better Blues,” “Malcolm X,” “He Got Game,” and “Inside Man”— and clearly, it’s something that Washington shared with Lee in private (and maybe Lee is accidentally speaking out of turn).
One has to wonder if “A Journal For Jordan” was the culprit and maybe forced Washington to hang it up. Released by Sony in 2021, still during the pandemic, the movie earned all of $6 million worldwide and was met with resoundingly negative reviews. Directing can be an arduous task, and all that effort and hard work for that kind of result, especially after “Fences” was nominated for four Oscars and was such a big hit, might have disabused Washington from climbing that hill again. Let’s hope that’s not the case and Washington musters the energy to do it again (not to mention work with Lee again).
Regardless, it’s a fascinating conversation, and you can watch the whole thing below.
