Comedian Norm Macdonald likes to describe Eddie Murphy as uproariously funny but one who never feels compelled to be so. He turns it on only when he wants to. Comparisons are sometimes drawn between Murphy and Jamie Foxx, but almost definitely not for that reason. Though both launched their careers in standup and on sketch shows - Murphy famously on Saturday Night Live, and Foxx on In Living Color, before moving to the big screen - Foxx separates himself from Murphy (and indeed almost everyone else) in two seemingly paradoxical ways.
Watching him in interviews is to get a sense of a man who will never feel old. At fifty-two he remains wide-eyed and brash, frequently sharing tales of brushes with celebrities, often breaking into dead-on impressions that seem like they sprung out of him in that moment. He forever acts and feels like a Hollywood newcomer, even now decades into his career.
Watching him onscreen, however, as I did this week, in Destin Daniel Cretton’s Just Mercy is to witness an instinct for the dramatic rarely seen from him. It felt rare, because it is. He burns in the same way here that few other comedic actors do, and it’s difficult to think of parallels; Mo’Nique, certainly, as the abusive mother in Precious (2009), and Robin Williams in Good Will Hunting (1997), too. Jim Carrey went in a similar direction in Peter Weir’s The Truman Show (1998), though his comedic gifts were instrumental in his success in that role.Also worth noting was Michael B. Jordan and Brie Larson, fresh off the sets of the Marvel films for which they were both lead or co-lead stars, opting for low-key performances opposite Foxx here, even with more lines and screentime, a generosity that should not go unrecognised.
Playing Walter ‘Johnny D’ McMillian, a father and husband falsely convicted of murder, Foxx brings a genuine vulnerability and weariness, disengaging entirely from his natural, more well-known talents for almost the entire film. More than the performances listed above, it was, for me, most reminiscent of Tom Hanks in Philadelphia (1993). Like Hanks’s Andrew Beckett, Foxx’s Johnny D is a man confined, beaten down and ostracized from his community through no fault of his own, but who eventually finds salvation in the courtroom; not the least un-American of predicaments, it has to be said, nor the least used theme, but given the context of the primarily comedic careers of both actors to that point, and given the performances themselves, it’s impossible not to make the comparison and recognise the achievement.
(Coincidentally, in the midst of Just Mercy’s publicity campaign, during an episode of The Hollywood Reporter’s Round Tables it was Foxx and Hanks that - to my eye at least - warmed to each other the most.)
Perhaps more surprising than his emotionally nuanced turns on screen are the lack of vehicles provided to him to show them off, because when he’s afforded the opportunity, he’s genuinely great.
One might typically point to Ray (2004), the role for which he was awarded an Oscar, though it felt at the time like Foxx being Foxx, which is no insult - he’s incredibly entertaining and addictive - but it never seemed to stretch him. He didn’t need to dig too deeply, such are his talents.
Any Given Sunday (1999), Oliver Stone’s occasionally tense but mostly mediocre sports drama – Foxx’s first notable dramatic work – gave us glimpses of what might come later, though his role of Willie Beamen took a distant backseat to Al Pacino who consumes most of the scenes (for good or bad), and to Stone, whose hyperactive camera left little time or opportunity to examine anyone but its main star and the direction of the ball.
Tony Scott’s 2004 film, Collateral, stands out for many reasons, not least of which was having Tom Cruise play significantly against type, and making us believe it too. Foxx shone, too, way outside his comfort zone for maybe the first time in his career to that point, ostensibly playing a taxi driver caught in the violent path of a hitman, but giving us a man also confronted by his own inner demons. He would stray and misstep on occasion, but it was largely brilliant and a great showcase of his talent.
His title role in Django Unchained (2012) gave us a quietly confident Foxx, rightly playing second (or third) fiddle to the iconic Christoph Waltz’s Dr King Schultz and Leonardo DiCaprio’s Calvin Candie, before erupting in the final half hour with a much more Foxx-like swagger; appropriate, given both the character’s arc and his co-stars’ outsized alter-egos.
The pandemic means there’s few upcoming plans for Foxx outside of his roles in the new Spider-Man film, and a rumoured spot in the remake of The Wild Bunch, neither of which should test him, but which should undoubtedly prove entertaining nonetheless.