The Africana QA: Gary DourdanOne of the stars of CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, speaks to Africana about his blossoming career in film and TV.
The Africana QA: Gary Dourdan
One of the stars of CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, speaks to Africana about his blossoming career in film and TV.
Once upon a time, Gary Dourdan was amongst the ranks of struggling black actors vying for screen time wherever it might be found. Fatefully, hard work, perseverance and strategic choices have worked in his favor. With a professional resume spanning just over a decade, he has emerged as a vision of primetime, mainstream success. And damned if he ain’t up in a TV Guide commercial, too.
Dourdan began his journey in Philadelphia where he honed his craft at the renowned Freedom Theater. After making the two-hour pilgrimage to New York to settle, for a few, he continued his studies and put his chops to use. While doing time in “bad theater” on the off-Broadway stage, he also began shuffling between the east and the left coasts. By 1991, he would saunter onto the small screen, dreads flowing, as the jive-talking, career student, Shazza Zulu, on A Different World. Two seasons later, he entered the world of film, in bit parts, and lent a helping hand to Sigourney Weaver in the good fight against foreign beings in Alien: Resurrection. More film and television work followed, as did a shift in momentum which ultimately led him to ponder his spirituality and shear his trademark dreadlocks.
Dourdan resurfaced on television in the Muhammad Ali biopic, King of the World as Malcolm X, a role he credits as a career highlight. He went on to headline the cast of the indie film, Trois, which just might go down in cult classic history…maybe. Turning his attention to cable television, he assumed reoccurring roles on Showtime’s’ Beggars and Choosers and also on Soul Food, as Jack van Adams, the less-than-stellar law enforcer who just so happens to be a cousin to Lem.
Since 2000, Dourdan has been blessing primetime audiences with his portrayal of Warrick Brown, a gifted, yet troubled Crime Scene Investigator. CSI: Crime Scene Investigation sat atop the ratings during the 2000–2001 season and has since garnered nominations for Emmy, Golden Globe and SAG Awards. This year, Dourdan, himself, took home an NAACP Award for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Drama Series.
One day following the Emmys and three days prior to the fourth season premiere of “CSI,” Dourdan sat down with Africana.com to sound off on the reciprocal relationship between artistic growth and creative energy and to his dismay, that film that just won’t go away. He is both proud and humbled to admit that he’s still a work in progress and looks forward to his evolution as a creative conduit, regardless of the medium. Needless to say, the brother is kinda deep.
AFRICANA: So, you’re about to embark on CSI’s fourth season. To date, we’ve seen Warrick Brown battle a gambling problem that he’s tried, unsuccessfully, to hide from his co-workers. What can we expect to see this time around?
I don’t know what the writer’s were eating over the summer, but they were definitely ambitious with the storylines this season. Our first show is almost like a movie — it’s two hours long and it’s being broken up into a “to be continued” kind of vibe. We’ve just finished a show called Invisible Evidence, which features Warrick up on the stand. His evidence is eventually thrown out and [as a result] he has to run around with Grissom for 24 hours to retrieve more [proof] so they can close the case. We’re working on a ticking clock and it’s a really good episode. There are some really well-written shows this season.
AFRICANA: Tell us about your experience of portraying an A/V specialist?
I’m really into electronics anyway, so I like that they throw that element into my character every now and then. Actually, they spread out the techniques among all of our characters so we each have skill in many different areas. So, there might be one show when I’m in the A/V lab and then there’s another show when I’m at the coroner’s office.
I think they’re trying to show the versatility of the characters and that we’re all competent in doing our jobs, which is pretty true to detail. There might be a fella who works in ballistics, but he’ll also have a lot of knowledge about DNA as well. Crime scene investigators have to know a great deal to do their jobs.
AFRICANA:Looking over your resume, you seem to have gracefully graduated from the “dreadlock’d guy” to portray characters ranging from an alien fighter (Alien: Resurrection), Janet Jackson’s past love interest (“Again” music video), a shady cop (Soul Food) to a Crime Scene Investigator. How do you know if a role is right, or wrong, for you?
Well, it used to be that any role was right for me. [laughs] Coming from New York, I was acting to survive and pay the rent. I was doing theater, little movies and student films and also, working in bars and clubs — doing anything I could get my hands on. At the time, the advice that I got from many directors and actors was, “Just keep working.”
Then again, [as an actor] you have to learn about the discipline, too. In Hollywood, it’s not just about the discipline of the work itself as much as it is about decision-making. Sometimes you have to say no to a job because it’s not right for you. After a while, you learn that once you’ve built a body of work, you don’t have to take just any role that comes around. If you get a little money in the bank, then you have a choice to take a role or not and you want to take roles that you feel are right for you. I’m learning that discipline as I get older.
AFRICANA:Well, you know we have to talk about Trois, right?
No, we really don’t have to talk about that. [laughs]
Oh, come on! It started out as this small, independent film and then all of a sudden, everybody was talking about it. Did you ever think it would become such a topic of conversation?
A lot of people still come up to me and say, “God, I loved that film, Trois, and I certainly have to question [the character of] that human being. [laughs]
It was a fantastic script and I wanted to get with these young filmmakers from Atlanta and Philadelphia. The story was a great mixture of Indecent Proposal and Fatal Attraction and I was looking to do something outside of the box that I was in. I wanted to try something unconventional with a gripping storyline.
It's funny because I did a great film called New Jersey Turnpikes, which co-starred Kelsey Grammer and Orlando Jones, but no one ever saw it because it was never released. But you do a film like Trois, and the whole world sees it.
I interviewed Debbie Allen a while back and she told me that you caught her eye while she walking down the street in Paris. Did you have any idea at the time that that meeting would act as the launching pad for your career?
Debbie Allen is an amazing, amazing woman with boundless energy. I don’t know where she gets it! When I met her, I had no idea [what would materialize]. At the time, I was doing very bad theater in New York and after I met her in Paris, I would send her tapes of my bad work. After about a year, she said she was going to write something in for me and she created that character [Shazza on A Different World].
Which of your characters do you hold close to your heart?
Looking the way that I look, I certainly never thought that I’d be a working actor, so when I was finally able to play a biographical role like Malcolm X [in the TV movie, King of the World], I was blown away. I got to delve into the history of this man. I found past publications, his writings and speeches, but there were also lot of things that were out of print. It almost seemed as though there was dust over his legacy.
He’d traveled to Africa and witnessed people of different nationalities under one religion and there were so many positive things he tried to do to help our society. Staying committed to portraying that character helped me, as a human being, and also, in my career. That was one of my favorite jobs.
There was a period where you were not very visible. How did you maintain your momentum when things slowed down a bit?
Well, I certainly lost some momentum. I was going back and forth between LA and New York, working, and then I went through a spiritual change with respect to the image I was providing on TV. I was probably the first guy with dreadlocks to be on a national TV show and I didn’t realize that [my image] had taken on such a life of it’s own. So, I was getting a lot of parts based on me being that Rastafarian fella with the ‘locks. Sometimes, I would play the consciousness of the plotline and other times I’d be the drug dealer, but eventually, the roles became caricatures.
I went through a lot of changes with friends and in my love life and even with things going on back in New York. I needed a change and I think a lot of things got caught up in my hair. So, I went to Egypt and I cut my ‘locks. I had a big buzz about me after I did Alien: Resurrection, but when I attended the premiere, I was bald-headed. People were like, “Who the hell is this guy? Was he in the film?” Then, I didn’t work for a while because no one knew who I was. That was definitely an experience for me.
I began to feel thwarted by the business and I tried to lay low for a while. I got into it for the craft and all of a sudden, the notoriety took over. I wasn’t ready for that. But now that I look back, I see that I probably broke a lot of molds and continue to do so.
So, might you be growing your dreads back?
It's always a possibility…I’m happy nappy.
Who or what inspires your creative work?
Gregory Hines inspired me a great deal. I would see him around and he’d grab me and hung me and tell me how well I was doing and how much he believed in my work. He’d give me so much good energy every time I saw him. I appreciate the collective awareness of artists who are not afraid to talk to other artists. It’s about having the security to give support to other artists — it’s not a competition.
Is there any more film on the horizon?
Yes. I’m working on the story of political prisoner, George Jackson. He’s a very intriguing character and I’m glad that I was approached with this film project. Sam Styles is directing and Cinque’ is the writer. It’s a great script; it’s like a piece of poetry. We begin shooting in about a week or so and I'm looking forward to getting into it.
My brother and I are also working on a film called A Song for My Father which is the story of a father, an avant-garde jazz musician, who leaves behind a legacy of debt to the mob for all of his recordings. His son, who later becomes a jazz musician as well, is chased by the mob for his father’s 30-year old debt. It’s an exciting story and we look forward to incorporating more music into film.
So, tell me about your work in music?
Well, we have a recording studio and have been releasing a lot of projects and compilations throughout the U.K. and Europe. I like to use pseudonyms for each project because there’s nothing worse than an actor trying to sing – no one’s looking for an old Don Johnson or Eddie Murphy album at a garage sale, you know? So, I’ve tried to put out good music and have people listen and make their judgment based on the music rather than the notoriety that I have as an actor. We’ve been pretty successful and we’re still building.
Garth Trinidad from KCRW (LA), Mathieu Schreyer (a producer) and I have a company called Metisse. We’re working on music supervising some films, cutting some tracks and also, trying to get more artists, who need to be heard, on the air with Garth. There are a lot of great artists, like Zero 7, Jill Scott, Beck, Bjork and even Norah Jones, who got their start through word-of-mouth. These kinds of artists don’t get played in the middle of the dial, so we’re trying to re-shape more radio and video stations. We want to expose the better music out there — that’s the strength of our company.
You’ve performed on stage, the large and small screen and also in music? Which medium offers you the most freedom?
Well, I want to mix mediums so that it’s not about making a choice between music and film or TV. I don’t want to have to make an either/or decision. It’s about incorporating each medium and then you can give a good show. I just want to give a great show.
How would you like for your story to unfold?
Well, I look to the boundless energy of those people who brought me up. I want to continue to work in every aspect to elevate the craft to the highest level and leave a legacy for the younger cats that is not held by boundaries.
About the Author
Regina R. Robertson is a freelance writer based in Los Angeles. Check her out on the web at www.reginarobertson.com.
