Interview – Louis Gossett, Jr
[This interview took place in 1986.]
When Louis Gossett, Jr. was a struggling student at NYU, he had little notion of what life had in store for him. Balancing pre-med classes, drama studies, and basketball, he excelled in each. When the New York Knicks invited the 6’4″ Gossett to their training camp in 1958, it quickly became decision time for the young athlete. He made the Knicks’ squad, but turned his back on professional basketball. He turned, instead, to drama.
“I was already a professional actor by the age of fourteen,” Gossett explains. “I also got Golden Boy with Sammy Davis, Jr. the same year I made the Knicks. So I said, ‘I’m going back on stage.’ That was my choice.”
Some choice. He has since won great critical and popular acclaim on both stage and screen. He received an Emmy award for his memorable portrayal of Fiddler in Roots, and an Academy Award as Drill Sergeant Foley in An Officer and a Gentleman.
Gossett is currently in the enviable position of having two major motion pictures out at the same time: Enemy Mine and Iron Eagle. Enemy Mine is a Christmas release about a human fighter pilot and an alien “Drac” who crash-land on a barren planet and must cooperate in order to survive. Gossett plays the Drac, opposite Dennis Quaid.
“For Enemy Mine,” says Gossett, “I was responsible for bringing that alien character together from scratch. I went to the zoo every day and picked several different animas to study: the lizard, cat, ostrich, kangaroo – and of course there’s a little Stevie Wonder thrown in there.”
For the part of the reptilian creature, Gossett was required to tackle his thespian pursuits under a thick coat of make-up and latex. “It was the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do.” He laughs a bit at the memory. “In all my years in the business, I’ve never been so beleaguered with difficulties. I practiced the reptilian movements constantly.”
But the throaty, sing-song dialect used for the character has entirely different origins. “That vocal, guttural thing came from my childhood. I’ve been making those noises for years, though I’ve only now had a chance to apply them.”
Gossett wasn’t the only one beset with difficulties. The entire production was nearly scratched before it ever got off the ground. Only a costly change of directors saved the picture from an early trip to the Hollywood graveyard.
“Richard Longcrane, who was originally in charge, is a brilliant director. But it was unrealistic to shoot in Iceland. He was digging a hole for himself. It’s just impossible to shoot there. The weather changes too often, you can’t match shots. He got into trouble early, and was let go by the studio. Dennis Quaid and myself were paid a full year and a half’s holding salary until the production started back up under Wolfgang Petersen’s direction.”
Despite the film’s well-publicized problems, Gossett is note entirely unhappy with the results. “I think the film turned out very well,” he offers, “but I still might agree with some of the critics. It did look like two different movies. It should have stayed more with the initial relationship.”
Gossett also had an experience that few, if any, of his colleagues can claim: his character, a hermaphrodite, gives birth. “That was very, very difficult. I had nothing to relate to but a sore stomach. Then again, it’s not every day you get to give birth onscreen.”
As for appearing with Dennis Quaid in their second film together: “We promised each other to redeem ourselves after Jaws 3-D.”
In Gossett’s other film, Iron Eagle, he plays a retired Air Force colonel who teams up with a young kid to save the kid’s father from Middle Eastern terrorists.
Considering America’s [then-]current relations with Libya, some people may try reading some sort of sociopolitical message from Iron Eagle‘s brash patriotism. Gossett begs to differ. “If the message was there, it came afterwards, because we didn’t know much about that situation when we were filming. I have a feeling everyone will be calling us wizards for dong this movie so quickly. We didn’t have that in mind at all.”
Gossett says he chose this particular role because, “this time I play the part of a real hero. There aren’t any black heroes these days, and this was the sort of role I wanted to do.”
Growing up in Brooklyn, Gossett learned Spanish as well as English, a definite asset when dealing with international crews. “Yeah, I was raised in Brooklyn. I got a tongue transplant and a passport and got out of there,” he says, though New York is still home.
“You really know that you’ve made it in New York City when these hard-bitten taxicab drivers and bus drivers stop and ask for your autograph. When An Officer and a Gentleman was out, I was taking a slow walk down Fifth Avenue from Central Park. I get to about Fiftieth Street and a whole busload of people climb out for autographs. Then a cab driver jumps out with his fares and starts a traffic jam. Now all four corners are full, everyone’s honking. They can’t get anywhere. Then the cops finally come to see what the problem is. But they didn’t clear up the traffic – they had to get autographs first!
“That’s home.”
Gossett doesn’t like to play favorites, but of all his roles, one does stand apart from the rest. “My favorite film was Sadat. My favorite character was Sadat. But otherwise, I take things one film at a time. Each film I do is my favorite – except Jaws 3-D.
“There are some scenes in Sadat that I don’t remember doing. For example, it was the first thing in the morning and we did two death scenes in a row – my (Sadat’s) brother and best friend. I did them each with one take, but I don’t remember doing them. It feels like Sadat came and took over.
“I remember the night Maria Shriver was on the set working for Entertainment Tonight. It was cold; it was the last day of shooting; everyone was waiting to go home. And finally I remember the director saying ‘action.’ It was the scene where Sadat walks down the steps to Israel. I got so many goose-pimples, because down at the bottom of the steps they had an actress that looked just like Golda Meir and an actor that looked just like Begin. It was the strangest feeling ever, shaking those hands and saying those historic lines.
“Sadat comes over to Golda Meir and says, ‘I’ve been wanting to meet you for a long time.’ And Golda Meir says, ‘So what took you so long?’ That’s something I’ll never forget.”
Gossett just recently got an addition to his family – an adopted son. “There was a special on Good Morning America about hungry and homeless children in America. I didn’t know that they amounted into the millions. That shocked me. It kind of stopped me, and I watched. The interviewer got to this one eight-year-old kid, Sharon Anthony Jones, and she put the microphone in front of him. She asked, if he had one wish what would it be? He didn’t even think. He didn’t talk very loud, he just said, ‘I want something to eat. Some place to sleep. Some place to live.’
“And now he’s in my house.”
Though Gossett doesn’t anticipate adopting any more homeless children, he continues to work on their behalf.
“It’s a whole movement,” he explains, “to get all those kids off the street; to see that they have food, education, health, and shelter. Whatever I have to do to achieve that, I’ll do. There’s twenty-one acres in Arizona available for a ranch. It’s still in the planning stages right now, but there’s enough financial support to take care of our current needs.”
Despite his successes, there are still ambitions he has yet to fulfill. Says Gossett: “I wish I could work with Brando. I think I’m going to make him work again, send him a script. I’m going to go down and get him off his butt, and tell him ‘this is the one you got to do.'”
He also does a bit of writing in his spare time. “Yeah, I’ve written a treatment for An Officer and a Gentleman II, called Foley. Richard Gere would do a little cameo. The story may wind up in Lebanon, with film in the Middle East. I’m not sure.”
As for the near future: “I’m exhausted. I’m going away, disappearing for awhile. No telephones, no calls, you can’t find me till I get back. I need a vacation. I really, really do.”