John David Washington had dreams of playing in the National Football League; he was even signed by the then-St. Louis Rams in 2006, and bounced around NFL Europe and United Football League, before an achilles injury ended his career. Luckily, he had a backup plan: Washington is now the leading man in a Christopher Nolan movie, like Leonardo DiCaprio, Christian Bale, and Matthew McConaughey before him. It helps that his father is Oscar-winner Denzel Washington, but as everyone who saw BlacKkKlansman can attest, Washington is a damn fine actor in his own right.
It was actually at the BlacKkKlansman world premiere where Nolan took note of his future-star. Esquire recently spoke to Spike Lee, who told journalist Kate Storey to pass this message to Nolan: “Dear Chris, this is your cinema brother, Spike Lee. I’m looking forward to seeing Tenet, starring the great, great John David Washington. Thank you for casting him and making yourself look good. Thank you for casting him, for hoisting him into the stratosphere. My question for you is: Did you decide that you’re going to cast John David Washington at the world premiere of BlacKkKlansman?”
Nolan responded:
“Oh, very much. By the way, it was a pretty intense experience to sit in front of Spike Lee at the premiere. And no, it very much sort of felt like destiny to me. That was an extraordinary screening, and the audience response to Spike’s movie was really electric in that room at Cannes; it was quite something. And I just felt a sort of magnetism there. It really was an important thing for me in terms of feeling like it was meant to be somehow.”
Nolan also said that he had previously seen Washington on Ballers, where he played Ricky Jerret, and it’s fun to imagine the super-serious filmmaker cracking open some cold ones with the boys (Leo) to watch Ballers. Make that into a $200 million movie.
Tenet comes out on July 17.
(Via Esquire)