‘The Interview’: Denzel Washington Has Finally Found His Purpose

So many of Denzel Washington’s greatest performances — from the majestic title role in “Malcolm X” to the unrepentantly corrupt cop Alonzo Harris in “Training Day” — have been defined by a riveting sense of authority, an absolute absence of pandering or the need to be liked. There’s an inner reserve deep down inside his characters that is unassailable, a little enigmatic, and that belongs to them alone.

The commanding qualities that have helped Washington become a cinematic legend are also, as I learned firsthand, the same ones that make him an unusual — and unusually complicated — conversationalist. The first of our two discussions was done remotely. He was at a photo studio in Los Angeles as the fires were still burning there, and I was at home in New Jersey. Even putting our physical distance aside, the discussion felt, well, distant. Or let me put it this way: We never quite figured out how to connect.

The second time we talked, it was different. I met Washington in person, at a spare, drafty room in a Midtown Manhattan building where he was rehearsing for an upcoming Broadway appearance. He’s playing the lead in a new production of “Othello” that goes into previews on Feb. 24; it co-stars Jake Gyllenhaal as Iago and is directed by the Tony Award winner Kenny Leon. I can’t with any certainty really say why, but things just felt easier on the second go-round. What I do know, though, is that the entire interview experience was, for me, as indelible as one of his performances.

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I saw that at the end of last year you were baptized and earned your minister’s license. I got baptized, and I have to now take courses to obtain a license. I’m not an ordained minister.

Can you tell me about the decision to go through that process at this point in your life? I went for a ride one day. I decided to get in my car and drive up to Harlem. I stopped in front of the church that my mother grew up in. The door was cracked, so I went in. They were celebrating young students, members of the church, that were going to college. And I got involved in that, and one thing led to another, and weeks later, months later I got baptized.