Denzel Washington can make a smile suggest that he has already settled the matter. We rate his restraint and comic timing most highly; the scripts do not always give him enough to work with.
Fi1m perspective
In Gladiator II (2024), Denzel Washington’s Macrinus smiles a beat before he speaks. He stresses an unexpected word and finds a laugh that the script has not supplied. He touches senators on the arm with a familiarity that feels faintly threatening. Ridley Scott’s film is decent but empty, and Washington gives it much of its pleasure. Macrinus finds the Roman establishment amusing and intends to own it, and Washington makes both impulses clear without asking us to like him.
Glory (1989) helped establish him as a major film actor. Spike Lee’s Malcolm X (1992) established him as a leading man; Training Day (2001) gave that authority a morally complicated use. He later directed Fences (2016), as well as appearing in it. There, his delivery can become too declamatory for the screen, and we prefer him when he does not press so hard.
In Much Ado About Nothing (1993), his Don Pedro does little to compete with Kenneth Branagh and Emma Thompson. That restraint gives the social comedy weight, particularly when Branagh’s direction becomes too broad. Washington and Thompson speak the lines to each other without making a performance of their accessibility. The film is easier company when they are allowed to talk than when it insists on proving how much fun everyone is having.
Antoine Fuqua gives him comparable room in the quieter stretches of The Equalizer 3 (2023). Robert McCall walks stiffly, drinks tea on a café terrace and steadies a hand on a railing. We enjoyed these quiet scenes more than we expected, because Washington makes the possibility of an ordinary day matter to a man accustomed to violence. The late-arriving smile does more for McCall than Richard Wenk’s familiar gangsters do for the story. Once the shooting takes over, the film has little new to offer.
Washington is still worth watching in films that have stopped giving him much to do. That is a reason to value the performance, not to excuse another thin script. Start with Much Ado About Nothing for the restraint, and save Gladiator II for an evening when one actor’s enjoyment will be enough.
Biography
Denzel Washington is an American actor. He was born on 28 December 1954 in Mount Vernon, New York. After training at the American Conservatory Theater, he began his career in theatre before gaining prominence in the NBC series St. Elsewhere (1982–1988).
Washington won Academy Awards for Best Supporting Actor in Glory (1989) and Best Actor in Training Day (2001). He has also received two Golden Globes, a Tony Award and other honours. His films include The Equalizer (2014), Flight (2012), American Gangster (2007) and Fences (2016).
He produced The Piano Lesson (2024), directed by his son Malcolm Washington, and appeared as Macrinus in Gladiator II (2024). He also produced and starred as Robert McCall in The Equalizer 3 (2023).
