If nothing else, Cuba Gooding Jr proves the casting couch isn't the only way into Hollywood: he got his first agent after breakdancing in the opening ceremony of the LA Olympics. From there, having put his lino mat into storage, the son of 60s soul band The Main Ingredient's frontman (you guessed it) Cuba Gooding Sr went on to appear in - among others - Boyz N The Hood, As Good As It Gets and, perhaps most memorably, Cameron Crowe's Jerry Maguire. His latest project, feelgood thriller Instinct, finds him appearing as an ambitious junior psychiatrist opposite Anthony Hopkins and a gorilla.
You seem to gravitate towards "message" films...
I gotta tell ya, the way I choose my projects is by the director and by the co-stars. I like to work with directors I respect, and that really is my primary consideration. So, if the film-makers I liked were all doing westerns, I'd be sitting here talking about all the westerns I'd done, you know? The script itself is kind of secondary. The role almost doesn't matter. And it's great if there is a message, something morally challenging for people to chew on, but in the final analysis I don't care. Because if Scorsese calls me up and says he's making a movie about a plant and there's a great part for me in there, then I'm going to do Scorsese's plant movie.
Having just played a shrink, what's your opinion of psychiatry?
What I find funny is the whole idea of being a "professional". It's like agents get attacked because there's no real definition of what they do, so they get made fun of. And to me psychiatry's a little like that. I mean, everyone's got psychiatry in their lives. Even me sitting here with you is a form of therapy. If you were being paid to sit here and just listen to me rather than listen to me and write about it afterwards, they'd call you a psychiatrist instead of a journalist, you know? It's like, whatever floats your boat, brother.
Do people shout "show me the money" at you in the street?
Oh, every day. All day.
Bearing in mind your father's career, did music ever appeal to you professionally?
I recorded a couple of songs with my father at one point, just because he insisted on me trying. But it was never anything that really interested me because, one, he has a great voice and I don't, and two, singers have to be constantly promoting themselves, constantly away from home, and that's one of the things which really turned me off the music business. And it's also one of the things which troubles me about acting.
That doesn't sound particularly ambitious
No, I am ambitious. I mean, I'm interested in taking my career forward, and doing good work, and all that stuff. But you can't take this shit too seriously. Because I've put my career first, I've done that, and now I don't see the need to make four films a year and spend the rest of the time trying to get my face onto magazine covers. I have different priorities now. And, come on, it's not like we Hollywood actors have to work the whole time just to pay the bills. It's not as if we're on the breadline here.
Can you still breakdance? Oh yeah. I got the moves, dogg.
So how much would I have to pay you to spin on your head?
Man, have you seen how thick this carpet is? But, you know, another day, I'll show you moves you won't believe.
