The movie Denzel Washington made because he had no choice: “I didn’t get 20 offers, I got one”
There are some actors who seem like they were destined for stardom, but of course, unless you’re a nepo baby and look like Robert Redford, nothing is certain in Hollywood, no matter how much talent and skill a person brings to the table, and Denzel Washington is the perfect example.
An actor who, in retrospect, seems like he was a shoo-in for a storied career, Washington, in reality, was barely a long shot, because, firstly, when he started his career in the late 1970s, movie stars of colour were few and far between.
For every Sidney Poitier and Richard Pryor, there were countless Paul Newmans and Steve Martins, and Hollywood was awash with whiteness, such that any young Black performer hoping to make inroads into the industry had to base their ambitions on imagination rather than example.
Secondly, Washington didn’t have any industry connections, which is one of the central factors making Hollywood such an uneven playing field. You might think that one standout role would be all that was necessary for a career breakthrough, but nothing could be further from the case, and yet, against all odds, by the late 1980s, the young actor had made his way from theatre to movies by way of an NBC medical drama, even earning an Oscar nomination for his performance in 1987’s Cry Freedom; regardless, none of it wasn’t enough.
“I didn’t get 20 offers right after Cry Freedom,” Washington told the Los Angeles Times in 1989. “I got one”, and that “one” was The Mighty Quinn, a genre mashup about a Jamaican police chief, played by Washington, trying to clear the name of his friend, who has become a murder suspect. To make things more entertaining, the title came from the Bob Dylan song of the same name, which was repurposed into a reggae version for the soundtrack.
As offers went, this one was actually pretty great; Washington was the star of the film, after all, which was a first for him, and it was written by Blade Runner screenwriter Hampton Fancher. It also had a supporting cast of established actors, including Sheryl Lee Ralph, James Fox, father of virulent racist and amateur keyboard warrior Laurence, Mimi Rogers, and M Emmet Walsh.
Roger Ebert loved the film, which was another big win for a relatively small picture; however, things were not so sunny behind the scenes. After it was given a limited release, the film’s producers accused its distributor, MGM/UA, of marketing it as if it would only appeal to Black audiences.
To make matters worse, MGM insisted that the producers cut a scene in which Washington’s character kisses a white character, played by Rogers, because, according to them, test audiences hated it. “I still think there’s a sensitivity when you have a Black man kiss a white woman,” executive producer Dale Pollack said bluntly.
It’s worth remembering all of this not simply because The Mighty Quinn was the only film Washington was offered after receiving a literal Oscar nomination, but because it illustrates just how much he changed the industry in the following decades. Not long after its release and its distributors burying it in a handful of cinemas, Washington was not just a leading man in Hollywood, but a romantic lead, and one of the ’90s biggest heartthrobs. Sadly, that experience with The Mighty Quinn shifted the actor’s perspective, and for decades, he insisted that scenes in which he kissed white co-stars be cut.
