Morgan Almighty

Several actors have played God over the years, including Graham Chapman, Charlton Heston, George Burns, Alanis Morissette, and even Groucho Marx. (Danny Boyle and Andrew Macdonald tried to cast Sean Connery as the Almighty in A Life Less Ordinary but he was having none of it.) No one has played Him Upstairs with more genial simplicity and grace than Morgan Freeman.

In Bruce Almighty he even handed over his powers to a disbelieving Jim Carrey. No such luck for Steve Carell's Evan Baxter in the sequel; all he gets is a rapid growth beard, public humiliation and 'Ark Building for Dummies'. Even so, Freeman doesn't seem like a capricious God. He's doing this because He cares.

And how does He convince Evan who He is? By becoming ubiquitous: everywhere Baxter looks, there's Freeman's darkly speckled face beaming back at him. At least that much seems real: recently the actor has averaged three or four movies a year.

Well over six foot tall, slim and elegant, Freeman exudes an innate calm authority. And then there's that voice: deep and measured, flavoured with a cackle of Tennessee smoke. In the most natural way in the world he's someone you want to look up at and listen to.

You might think that parts for an African American who just turned 70 might be a little thin on the ground. And it's true that leading roles don't come his way too often. But Freeman is as popular with film stars as he is with the public - perhaps because he doesn't need to play the centre of attention.

'I go to work with the idea of being part of a team,' he said a few years ago. 'The subtle danger in movies is when you're the lead character, everybody is seen to be pampering you… You're standing there, like God, but it's not about you at all… The costume people are very worried about their costumes, the make-up people are concerned about their make-up, the hair people are very concerned about their hair…'

Freeman was already 50 when he made his movie breakthrough, playing the charming, psychotic pimp Leo Smalls ('Fast Black') in Jerry Schatzberg's Street Smart in 1987. Although it was a small movie - straight-to-video here - it's still the performance he rates highest, and it earned him the first of his four Oscar nominations and shocked Americans who had grown up watching him on the kid. He consolidated his new-found reputation with Driving Miss Daisy on stage and then film (nomination number two), then Ed Zwick's Glory.

Unforgiven, Shawshank and Seven all came within a three-year time-span (1992-95), and they took him to a different level. To a generation of moviegoers he became a sort of eminence noir, someone who had seen the worst that life had to offer yet remained sage and largely unscathed.

'When I was young I wanted to be a star, ride in limousines, have all the lights in the sky, big crowds, people pointing…' he's said. 'As I took these little mincing steps toward it, and getting closer to it, I came to think, That's not really what I want. What I really want is to be able to work and disappear. That's what all character actor want to do.'

His acting is all about containment, economy and precision. 'I gravitate towards gravitas,' as he puts it. It's made him the go-to guy for sounding boards, mentors and old comrades. He's like a cushion, he allows his costars to come on and shoot some pool - and he absorbs them. Just by showing up, his presence bestows a certain respect on Tim Robbins in The Shawshank Redemption; Brad Pitt in Seven; Kevin Costner in Robin Hood Prince of the Thieves; Robert Redford in An Unfinished Life; even Clint Eastwood in Unforgiven and Million Dollar Baby.

He's directed just once: the contemporary South African drama Bopha!, in 1993. 'Directing was a wonderful experience, but I detest the studio politics involved,' he said. 'I understand their obligation is to make the movie make money, but your obligation is to make the movie true to itself. Money can be damned. Once you've hired someone, then you've got to step back as far as I'm concerned. I didn't like that part of it so much I don't want to do it again.'

All the same, he has his own production company, and he's planning to produce and star in another South African drama, The Human Factor, playing Nelson Mandela, no less. It's hard to think of better casting for this secular saint, and the project comes with Mandela's blessing. Mind you, Freeman has six more movies in various stages of production before that one gets rolling, including a buddy movie with Jack Nicholson (The Bucket List); another Batman film, and a key role in Ben Affleck's first film as director, Gone Baby Gone. Seems like it's not just the wicked who get no rest…

Tom Charity
tom.charity@lovefilm.com