MORGAN
FREEMAN

Morgan Freeman was born in Memphis, Tennessee, on 1 June 1937. His screen presence is often associated with narration, but his route to film stardom included children’s television and substantial stage work. As Easy Reader in The Electric Company, he became familiar to a national audience. His performance in The Mighty Gents earned a Tony nomination in 1978, and his theatre career also included the role of Hoke in Driving Miss Daisy. Those beginnings offer another way into a career frequently introduced through its later films.

Street Smart (1987) brought significant film recognition, followed by Driving Miss Daisy (1989) and Glory (1989). The film version of Driving Miss Daisy earned him the Golden Globe for a leading actor in a musical or comedy at the 1990 ceremony. FLM.RED’s reading of this period pays attention to relationships: who can speak freely, who must choose a response carefully, and how a conversation changes when the people in it occupy unequal positions. A small hesitation can tell us as much as a speech.

In The Shawshank Redemption (1994), Freeman played Red opposite Tim Robbins. He later won the supporting-actor Oscar at the 2005 Academy Awards for Million Dollar Baby, a film released in 2004. These are useful films to watch together for a question of storytelling: how does someone describe another person’s life while revealing something about his own? In FLM.RED’s view, the interest lies in the distance between a confident account and the emotions that remain difficult for its speaker to put into words.

His work also moves through the crime thriller Seven (1995), Lucius Fox in Christopher Nolan’s Batman films, and Nelson Mandela in Invictus (2009). That range gives a reason to look beyond the familiar sound of his voice and notice how each film uses authority. FLM.RED is interested in when another character trusts him, challenges him or asks him to explain himself. The American Film Institute presented him with its Life Achievement Award in 2011. The titles below are films currently linked to Freeman in FLM.RED, rather than a complete record of his film, television and theatre work.