Together, they create magic.
Who can forget the iconic words of Hollywood legend Denzel Washington in Training Day?
“King Kong ain’t got s*** on me.”
"You’ll be playing basketball in Pelican Bay…shoe program.”
“I’m the man up in this piece!”
With that movie, he clinched his first Oscar award, alongside director Antoine Fuqua, whom he has worked with on five films.
This pair know how to create winners and The Equalizer franchise is one of them.
The third installment of this franchise will be in cinemas soon and if the previews are any indication, it's filled with enough action to provide enough entertainment for the rest of the year.
Reprising the role of Robert McCall
Drum was able to touch base with the actor prior to the Screen Actors Guild strike currently happening in America, the Academy Award winning actor famed for such roles as Alonzo Harris in Training Day (2001), Malcom X (1992) and the notorious drug kingpin Frank Lucas in American Gangster (2007) says that this film was a lot different to filming the other two because of the location used.
“Well, number one it was very different because we were in Europe, Italy, specifically, which was great and specifically on the Amalfi Coast, which was beautiful,” the icon says.
He was somewhat familiar with the location but had never visited the exact location on the Amalfi Coast where Equalizer 3 is shot.
“It’s a part of Italy that I love. I’ve been all over Italy and for the last 30 or so years we’ve gone to that part of the world almost every summer. But I’d never been there for a job before. And it’s absolutely beautiful. It was a real pleasure to be there, to work there.”
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In this sequel, Denzel reprises his role as Robert McCall, a former CIA operative with obsessive compulsive impulses who uses his skills and resources to help people in need. This time, he faces his most personal and dangerous mission yet: to protect his estranged daughter from a ruthless gang of human traffickers. Along the way, he will encounter old friends and enemies, and discover some shocking secrets from his past.
Robert gets drawn in by an aggressive adversary who pushes the protagonist to his limits in a variety of sadistic ways.
“He gets drawn into the lives of the people in this little town where he finds himself. And he can’t help himself. Initially he is injured, and he needs help and that’s a part of it, Robert is a person who is not used to needing or wanting help. He has been very much a loner. That’s not the case now. He can go no further alone. He’s forced to deal with people, he’s forced to rely on people, and he’s forced to ultimately learn to enjoy other people.”
His stoic and no-nonsense character finds himself in a foreign land but he is anything but a fish out of water, according to Denzel.
“I wouldn’t say that he is not in his element but there are obviously language differences, cultural differences, and the food - all those things. So, McCall has challenges to face – but then, he always does and he’s a man who loves a challenge.”
After what were two tumultuous chapters in this saga, it would be easy to believe that Mcall is perhaps in need of some peace which he hopes to find in Italy.
“I think so definitely. And not in the way that he thinks when he first gets there but as it develops, the people that he meets, the town that he becomes a part of. I don’t know if we can say that he is seeking something that doesn’t have anything to do with him being in Italy in the first place. But I think it speaks more to his restlessness and not really being able to put his job down.”
Robert McCall is the only character he has returned to on the big screen, which of course begs the question, why?
“What I’ve found from talking to people is that they like the character because he stands for justice. Just different people I’ve talked to really like that character and they are like ‘well, he can get the bad guys that we can’t get. He can get those in authority, the people in power, and bring them down’ and that seems to be something that they like about him.”
Filming in such a picturesque place didn’t harm the cause either.
“I’ve got to find a reason to want to do it, a reason to get behind it and that was the obvious case in Equalizer 2. And with Equalizer 3 it was ‘we’re going to Italy? Great!’ That had something to do with the reasoning,” the spirited titan of pop culture says with a laugh.
Denzel is a serious actor who can just as easily provide you with a skop skit and donner film like The of Taking Pelham 123 (2009) or yank your heart strings as he did in works like Fences (2016).
This franchise has made him rethink his approach to filmmaking and the roles he chooses.
“I was talking to the doormen in my building, and I had just done Fences and I was talking to them about Fences, and they were like, ‘yeah, yeah Fences is great but when are you going to do another Equalizer?’ You know, that seems to be one that they can relate to and get excited about and want to root for.
“I remember years ago, in the 1980s in fact, I did this very serious movie, Cry Freedom, about anti-apartheid activist Stephen Biko and it was ‘oh it’s very important…’ and I remember talking to a friend of mine about it who was a doctor. I was telling him about it, and he was like ‘I deal with life and death every day, I go to the movies to escape, to have fun, not to deal with life and death.’ And I was like, ‘I never thought of it that way.’ Just because it was important to me doesn’t mean it was important to him.”
Robert is the kind of character who exudes a lot of compassion for people he cares about which has been met by audiences in turn, caring a lot about him.
“Interestingly he gives people a chance before he executes – no pun intended – justice. You know he tries to give people the chance to do the right thing, but he just keeps running into the wrong people.”
Working with longtime collaborators
Filmmaking is an artform that leans heavily on the spirit of collaboration, one need only watch the credits at the end to understand just how large of an undertaking creating a studio tent pole is and Denzel relishes the energy this brings to a project.
“You know now it’s such a shorthand. We had tremendous success right off the bat with Training Day and we got to know each other over time and our families got to know each other and all of that. Five movies I’ve done with Antoine now? Yeah, it is. And I've done four movies with Spike [Lee]. There are certain filmmakers that I just got along with. In fact, Spike and I will be working together again next year.”
He also continued a long-standing run of collaboration with Richard Wenk who wrote all three Equalizer films and Todd Black who produced a string of Denzel features.
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“In fact, talking about Todd Black this was really his idea. He wanted to find something to develop for me and this was what he developed over time, and it’s turned out to be quite successful.”
The biggest coup surrounding this film is Denzel being reunited on screen with child star Dakota Fanning who he starred alongside in the legendary Man On Fire (2004) which was released almost 20 years ago.
“Yeah, that’s not strange in a bad way but it’s just interesting looking that little girl in the eyes 20 years ago and now she’s a grown woman. It’s just a little strange for me personally. But she is just lovely and needless to say very talented.”
Preparing to Equalize
Preparing for this role-albeit a blockbuster offering- took two years for this masterful actor, “just my physical transformation, going back to the beginning of 2022 I lost about 30lbs and now I’ve lost probably another 15lbs or whatever. Just reshaping. There’s a line in The Tragedy of Macbeth where he talks about the ‘yellow leaf’ of his life and I think I’m in that place now, I think I’m in the yellow leaf period, the leaves aren’t going to be that green anymore,” he chuckles heartily.
“And that’s Ok. So, I’m at a present where physically, spiritually and mentally, I want to be at my best. I want to see what the limit is, what do I have to offer.”
The physical challenges are something he still enjoys and shows no signs of tapering off of in as far as taking on roles the require him to exert himself in this manner.
“I don’t want to say you have to reinvent the wheel, but you need challenges, and you know in this case and even going forward in preparation for doing Gladiator 2, just the physical challenge and, you know, you have to look the part. You’ve got to look the part man! And I’m getting there,” he explains with another laugh while revealing that the sequel to the famed Ridely Scott film Gladiator will be getting a sequel scheduled for release in November next year.
Director Antoine once said that he thought that Denzel put a little bit of himself into this role and when asked in what way he mentioned that in Equalizer 2 when Robert mentors the young man Miles (played by Ashton Sanders) and he said, ‘that was pure Denzel.' Denzel would tend to agree with his cinematic compadre.
"Yes, and you know I’ve got to find more of a reason than just running and jumping around and shooting people. And the answer to me, anyway, was obvious and in Equalizer 2 the story with the young boy. The streets were calling him, as they call so many young people, and it was literally a matter of life and death.”
You may recall a Jaimie Foxx skit in which he impersonates Leonardo DiCaprio who is completely convinced that Denzel might actually know how to dismember someone and is probably as proficient with weaponry as some of the characters he plays. This stems from Denzel doing a lot of the action scenes himself but naturally an asset as valuable as he is protected by the studio.
“Well because I’ve been training and boxing for years, for decades, I’m good at throwing punches and being physical. But to answer your question I’ve got a great stuntman and I try to let him do as much as he can, and I try to take credit for all of it," he laughs.
"So, when it comes to throwing punches usually it’s me throwing them. When it comes to catching punches usually it’s him,” he adds.
Even at 68 years of age, Denzel still enjoys boxing, “In fact, when I get up in the morning it’s part of my workout. And you know, Father Time is undefeated,” he says with a grin.
Bringing this feature to life was however a strenuous process and taxing on the body.
“My knees know where we filmed in Atrani, Italy, there were like 700, 800 that felt like 10,000 steps up to the top of this mountain where the church was and it was rough and the roughest part wasn’t going up, the roughest part was going down when you’ve got bad knees. Oh man. And on stones! And you have these 90-year-old Italian grandmothers passing you like you were walking the other way and she is just going up the steps with her hands behind her back like ‘I do this every day, what’s wrong with you youngster?’
"It really was hard. It’s a unique position to be in as an actor because you get to go places and be there for longer periods of time than you ever would as a tourist there on vacation and you get to spend time with the local people. They see the magic of movies being made and that lasts two or three days and then they are just sitting around watching you come to work and unload the trucks and do what you do. And then you pack up everything and go home at the end of the day.”
Being among the real people was special to him.
“I met this little old lady, and she didn’t speak any English, I didn’t speak any Italian, so I told someone to tell her that she was my new girlfriend, and she was in her high 80s, let’s say, definitely somewhere in her 80s, and I said, ‘tell her she’s my new girlfriend.’ And she started pulling on me and everybody started laughing and I’m like, ‘what’s everybody laughing about?’ And she was like, ‘yeah, well I’m taking you home. If you’re my new boyfriend I’m taking you home with me.’ And people were just cracking up. You know, it’s a privilege just to be a part of a unique culture that you would never become a part of in any other circumstances other than working somewhere for an extended period and in this case working on a film, it’s just unique.”
The Amalfi Coast is just a magical place. I sound like I should be a tourist guide. I’ve got to call up my agent to get me a commercial,” he quips.
We are clear on what these films are about, all out action, but there is a moral to the stylishly shot skirmishes that will unfold on our screens.
“I hope that [you] will feel the warmth that’s a part of it. You start to root for these people. I think the town of Atrani has only about 800 people and in our story they all join together to fight. They have strength in numbers, and they help to fight against the bad guys. They are no longer afraid to be bullied anymore and you know it was just fun to be a part of this story and I hope that people enjoy it in the way they enjoyed the first two films. It’s got lots of spectacular action and brilliant performances from a great cast.”
His knees and body have taken a hammering but as he is a man of the people, he doesn’t completely shut down the idea of another return to this role.
“There’s got to be some crime in Paris or the South of France maybe? I smell bad guys in the Greek islands! There’s got to be some bad guys there,” he jokes warmly.
The Equalizer Three will be in local cinemas from 1 September.
