DENZEL WASHINGTON ON PLAYING MACBETH AND THE LAGACY OF SIDNEY POITIER

By Chandrayee Roy Choudhury, Canada

Denzel Washington has been playing Shakespearean roles since he was 20. The latest is Lord Macbeth in Joel Coen's new Apple TV+ film The Tragedy of Macbeth.
Ahead of its release this Friday, the 67-year-old actor sat down with Tom Power to talk about working with Coen and Frances McDormand (who stars as Lady Macbeth), as well as the recent death of his friend and fellow actor Sidney Poitier.

Washington has said part of the reason he took the role was to work with McDormand and Coen, who are married.
The highly stylized rendition of Shakespeare's Macbeth had been in the works for a few years. The team started filming in 2020, based on a script adapted by Coen. It was shot in black and white with a very austere, almost stage-like feeling on screen.

"Shakespeare is Shakespeare. We have to step up. The standard has already been established, you know, 'Can you handle it?' is the question," Washington said.
On Jan. 6, legendary actor Sidney Poitier, who was one of Washington's friends, died at the age of 94.
Poitier later remarked in 2014 that he was indebted to the work Washington had done and grateful that he had "taken the concept of African Americans in films to a place where I couldn't, I didn't, and he has taken it there with the same kind of integrity that I tried to do and to articulate. So I thank him for that. He helped me that evening to a closing of my artistic life. He put the button on it for me. And I'm indebted to him."