‘I Was in Pain All the Time’

Laurence Fishburne has plenty of sore memories from his time in “The Matrix.”

“We were essentially the first Western actors to work in the Hong Kong style,” he says of himself and co-stars Keanu Reeves and Carrie-Anne Moss. “And so [martial arts choreographer] Yuen Woo-ping was very concerned that we weren’t going to be able to [pull it off]. So he trained us really hard — training us like professional athletes. And it was in the middle of that training I realized why they pay professional athletes so much money: Because professional athletes are always in pain. Not in pain sometimes — like when you go to the gym and then you’re sore for a day. They’re in pain all the time.”

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The grueling effort clearly paid off, visible not only in the film’s now-iconic fight sequences but also in the muscle memory Fishburne still carries more than a quarter-century later. “It’s all — I mean, it’s still in the body,” he laughs. “We each had two trainers, and they worked us really, really hard!”

During a relaxed and rollicking conversation at this year’s Marrakech Film Festival, Fishburne reflected on a career defined by transformation. Over 90 minutes — with a few technical hiccups along the way — he traced his path from “a wise-ass street urchin” whose “universe was six blocks in Brooklyn” to his defining roles in “Apocalypse Now,” “King of New York,” “Boyz N the Hood,” and “The Matrix,” often stressing his need to defy expectations.

“I’m always looking for ways to surprise the audience,” he explains. “I’m always trying to change a little here, shift a little there, so it’s not familiar visually — not someone you instantly recognize or can predict. Instead, I want to create a character who surprises you, someone in whom you either see yourself or someone you know.”

That philosophy guided his portrayal of the loose-cannon Jimmy Jump in Abel Ferrara’s “King of New York.” Fishburne drew from a familiar archetype — “a classic ‘two-gun kid’ from American westerns,” he says. “That young, reckless guy with two guns, like the character Kevin Costner plays in ‘Silverado’” — while layering in costumes, mannerisms, and quirks to make for something entirely fresh.

“Jimmy Jump, for me, is the first hip-hop gangster on film,” Fishburne continues. “It came from intuition, from being from New York, spending time in those neighborhoods, going to hip-hop shows, knowing graffiti writers and breakdancers. I was very much part of that culture. I even knew someone who called himself a hip-hop gangster — he wanted to be a rapper but also had another side business. And I thought, ‘Why haven’t I ever seen this type of character in movies?’”

Fishburne experienced a different kind of recognition after his role as Furious Styles in John Singleton’s “Boyz N the Hood.”

“I was living in Venice, California, right after the movie came out, when a young man approached me,” he recalls. “He had tears in his eyes and didn’t quite know how to express himself, except to say thank you for the movie. I responded gently and thanked him, but I was deeply moved by the raw emotion he was showing.”

Roger Guenveur Smith, a friend and co-star from “King of New York,” put the encounter in perspective. “Roger turned to me and said, ‘You don’t understand what happened.’ I asked him what he meant, and he explained, ‘When you played Furious Styles, you essentially became the father to a fatherless generation of boys.’”

The actor maintained that fatherly demeanor once technical issues threatened to derail the talk – keeping measured as he calmed a restive audience. “You’re all so beautiful,” he said to cheers. “Thank you for being here.”

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