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Tired of Being So Bad
 Actor
Ving Rhames, who plays Diamond Dog in Jerry Bruckheimer's new action
thriller Con Air, is tired of audiences thinking he always plays
the bad guy. "Sometimes when you're in a particular film, you're
stereotyped by the character you play," Rhames says. "As far as
I'm concerned, I'm an actor who puts on many faces."
Rhames makes a clear point, for already in his relatively
young career, he's proven his range. He's portrayed a drifter (Rosewood);
a street hustler (The Saint of Fort Washington); a Secret Service
agent (Dave); a bouncer (Striptease); a Vietnam War veteran
(Jacob's Ladder); a wizard computer hacker (Mission Impossible);
and the unforgettable crime lord Marcellus Wallace (Pulp Fiction).
Not all bad guys certainly, his characters usually reveal some complexity
and edge. So he still wonders why he is perceived as only playing
sinister roles.
"Look at [John] Travolta," says Rhames, making a comparison.
"He played a killer in Pulp Fiction, then he played a bad
guy in Broken Arrow, then he played another tough character
in Get Shorty, but no one asks him if he gets tired of playing
the bad guys."
Perhaps it's Rhames' stone-faced demeanor, his burly
build and the incredibly deep timbre of his voice that keeps the
public's perception of him perennially bad. In person, he's a quiet
intellectual, but his physical characteristics exude immense power,
a kind of dormant power that feels akin to a sleeping dragon.
And that bad boy image might stay with Rhames just
a little while longer, since his current role in Con Air is a
menacing criminal nicknamed Diamond Dog, who is serving out a life
sentence for murder. Rhames' character is among a group of ruthless
convicts being transported via Con Air, a prison airline transport
system that utilizes specially designed, high-security airplanes.
Once airborne, the criminals skyjack the plane in a daring escape
plot. "It's heightened reality," says Rhames, describing the film.
"It's a big action movie that was basically fun to make."
To become the pathological Diamond Dog, a steely convict
who claims to have killed "more men than cancer," Rhames read a
great deal of material on killers and Death Row inmates, including
books such as In the Belly of the Beast, Life Sentence, and
Poems of Prisoners.
"Acting is one of the most spiritual art forms that
there is," explains Rhames. "If I'm transforming myself for a role,
I'm also transforming my spiritual nature, depending on the character
that I'm playing. It can be dangerous psychologically, emotionally
and spiritually if you're playing an evil character like Diamond
Dog and you don't go through some metamorphosis to cleanse yourself
of that energy when the performance is done"
When Rhames read the script, the Diamond Dog character
was poorly developed. But the opportunity to work with such excellent
actors as Nicolas Cage, John Malkovich and John Cusack made Con
Air a must for Rhames. "Any time I'm working with a good actor,
I'll learn a lot just by watching him," confides Rhames. "I jumped
at the chance to work with John Malkovich."
Another big lure was the chance to work with Jerry
Bruckheimer. "He is very generous with his actors," says Rhames
of the top action film producer. "He has a good understanding of
actors and respects them. He doesn't get in the way, but he's always
available for you."
During the Con Air shoot, the cast and crew spent
a grueling summer month in the Utah desert, where temperatures frequently
soared to 110 degrees. Over 300,000 bottles of water were consumer
by the production staff during that time.
When asked about the working conditions, Rhames shrugged
it off. "I'm not a whiner, so it wasn't that much of an issue for
me," he says. Putting it in perspective, he adds, "Actors should
be happy when they're working. We're blessed to make an extremely
good living for doing something that in some ways is difficult,
but in many others is not."
It's a long way from the mean characters in Con Air
to the mean streets of Harlem, where Rhames' mother Reather raised
him and his brother Junior. His father Ernest, an auto mechanic,
would come and go, so it was his mother's support and his own convictions
that kept young Ving (short for Irving) from the allure of the drugs
and crime so prevalent in his neighborhood.
"Acting was an emotional and creative outlet for me,"
he recalls. "But I wasn't a kid who grew up wanting to be an actor.
Events happened that led me to acting. It wasn't of my own calling."
His calling began when Rhames was a high school freshman.
Encouraged by his English teacher, he auditioned for and was accepted
to the High School of the Performing Arts, then accepted a scholarship
to study at the Julliard School, where he was immersed in classic
plays. The week after his 1983 graduation, Rhames was playing in
Manhattan's annual "Shakespeare in the Park" festival.
For the next few years he performed in regional theater,
including Broadway and off-Broadway productions, and he landed small
roles in daytime dramas such as "Another World" and "The Guiding
Light." Steadily, Rhames' reputation as an actor led to more and
more film roles, with an occasional stint as Eriq LaSalle's brother-in-law
on the hit d television drama "ER." LaSalle is one of Rhames' pals
from his Julliard days.
"My approach to work has been the same since I got
out of college," Rhames explains. "I take it very seriously. I've
always made my living as an actor; it's just that now I'm in more
films that get media attention."
In spite of his increased popularity and fame, Rhames
keeps his feet firmly on the ground. His intensity and power on
screen come from the balance he cultivates within himself. "This
body, this flesh, these bones: hopefully people can look past the
shell and see the real Ving Rhames," he offers. "It would be great
if they could see the real person inside everyone they meet on this
planet."
With an elevated personal philosophy like that, nobody
can really think of Ving Rhames as a bad guy... although he'll probably
still play one on screen once in a while.
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