Broadway-Bound Denzel Washington Regrets Passing on 'Seven'

Two-time Academy Award-winner Denzel Washington, who is set to appear in August Wilson's FENCES this spring, expressed some lingering regret in turning down the leading role in the 1995 thriller Seven (the role would famously go to Brad Pitt). Washington tells Entertainment Weekly, "The only film that was sort of dark that I'd turned down was SEVEN. They offered me the Brad Pitt part, but I was like, 'This is so dark & evil.' Then when I saw the movie, I was like, 'Oh Shoot.'"

Seven went on to gross $100.1 million in North America and $227.1 million in the rest of the world.

Despite turning down the role in Seven, Denzel Washington has stayed busy since 1995. His new movie, The Book of Eli, premiers nation-wide on Friday, January 15th. Washington will return to the Great White Way for the first time since starring in Julius Caesar (2005) in the first Broadway revival of FENCES alongside Viola Davis, the 1987 Pulitzer Prize and Tony Award-winning play by August Wilson. The production will also star Tony Award-winner and Academy Award-nominee Viola Davis. FENCES, directed by Kenny Leon, will open on Monday, April 26, 2010 at the Cort Theatre (138 West 48th Street). The strictly limited 13 week engagement will begin previews on April 14th.

Denzel Washington made his Broadway debut in Checkmates (1988). Other theatre credits include Richard III, The Mighty Gents, Ceremonies in Dark Old Men, When the Chickens Come Home to Roost and an Obie Award for A Soldier's Play. He is a two-time Academy Award winner for his performances in Training Day and Glory and received Oscar nominations for his performances in The Hurricane, Malcolm X and Cry Freedom. His other films include The Book of Eli, The Taking of Pelham 123, The Great Debaters (directed), Inside Man, Déjà Vu, American Gangster, The Manchurian Candidate, Out of Time, Man on Fire, Antwone Fisher (directed), John Q, Remember the Titans, The Bone Collector, Fallen, He Got Game, The Siege, Courage Under Fire, Crimson Tide, Devil in a Blue Dress, Much Ado About Nothing, Philadelphia, The Pelican Brief and A Soldier's Story, among others. He produced the Emmy-nominated documentary "Half Past Autumn: The Life and Works of GorDon Parks" for HBO and was executive producer for the Emmy-nominated "Hank Aaron: Chasing the Dream" for TBS.

FENCES will be produced by Carole Shorenstein Hays (who produced the original Broadway production) and Scott Rudin.

The original Broadway production of FENCES opened on March 26, 1987 at the 46th Street Theatre (now the Richard Rodgers Theatre). FENCES was one of the most critically acclaimed and successful plays of the 1980s, winning four Tony Awards including Best Play, the Pulitzer Prize for Drama, three Drama Desk Awards, including Best Play and the NY Drama Critics Circle Award for Best Play.

FENCES is one of the ten plays in August Wilson's sweeping Pittsburgh Cycle, focusing on the twentieth century African-American experience. FENCES takes place over eight years from 1957 to 1965. Denzel Washington stars as Troy Maxson, a Pittsburgh sanitation worker who once dreamed of a baseball career, but was too old when the major leagues finally admitted black players. As he faces off against the racial barrier at work and his own disappointments, Troy also grapples with his son, Cory, over the teenager's hope for a football scholarship and with his wife, Rose (Viola Davis), who confronts Troy over a child he has fathered with another woman.

Viola Davis won Tony, Drama Desk and Outer Critics Circle Awards for her performance in August Wilson's King Hedley II. She was nominated for an Academy Award, Golden Globe, SAG and Critics Choice Awards and won the National Board of Review Award for Best Breakthrough Performance for Doubt. Broadway: August Wilson's Seven Guitars (Tony, Drama Desk nominations, Outer Critics Circle, Theatre World Awards). Roundabout: Intimate Apparel (Drama Desk, Drama League, Obie, Audelco Awards). Public: Everybody's Ruby (Obie, Drama Desk Award, Outer Critics Circle Nomination for Featured Actress), Pericles, As You Like It. Off-Broadway: God's Heart (LCT). Regional: ACT, Sundance Theatre Institute, Trinity Rep, Goodman, Guthrie Huntington
Theatres. Film: Law Abiding Citizen, State of Play, Nights in Rodanthe, Disturbia, The Architect, Get Rich or Die Trying, Out of Sight, Solaris, Traffic and Antwone Fisher Story (Independent Spirit Award nomination). Upcoming films include Eat, Pray, Love; Trust; Knight & Day. TV: "The United States of Tara," "Stone Cold," "The Andromeda Strain," "Traveler," "Law & Order: SVU," "Law & Order: Criminal Intent," "Without a Trace," "Amy and Isabelle," "Life is Not a Fairytale: The Fantasia Barrino Story," "Century City," and "City of Angels." Viola presently lives in Los Angeles with her husband Julius Tennon.

August Wilson authored Gem of the Ocean, Joe Turner's Come and Gone, Ma Rainey's Black Bottom, The Piano Lesson, Seven Guitars, Fences, Two Trains Running, Jitney, King Hedley II and Radio Golf. These works explore the heritage and experience of African Americans, decade by decade, over the course of the twentieth century. His plays have been produced at regional theatres across the country and all over the world, as well as on Broadway. In 2003, Mr. Wilson made his professional stage debut in his one-man show, How I Learned What I Learned. His works garnered many awards, including Pulitzer Prizes for Fences (1987) and The Piano Lesson (1990), a Tony Award for Fences, Great Britain's Olivier Award for Jitney, as well as eight New York Drama Critics Circle Awards. Additionally, the cast recording of Ma Rainey's Black Bottom received a 1985 Grammy Award, and Mr. Wilson received a 1995 Emmy Award nomination for his screenplay adaptation of The Piano Lesson. He received many fellowships and awards, including Rockefeller and Guggenheim Fellowships, the Whiting Writers Award, the 2003 Heinz Award, the 1999 National Humanities Medal from the President of the United States and numerous honorary degrees from colleges and universities, as well as the only high school diploma ever issued by Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh. He was an alumnus of New Dramatists, a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, a 1995 inductee into the American Academy of Arts and Letters and posthumously inducted into the Theatre Hall of Fame in 2007. On October 16, 2005, Broadway renamed the theatre located at 245 West 52nd Street the August Wilson Theatre. Mr. Wilson was born and raised in Pittsburgh and lived in Seattle at the time of his death. He is immediately survived by his two daughters, Sakina Ansari and Azula Carmen Wilson, and his wife, costume designer Constanza Romero.

Kenny Leon directed the Broadway productions of August Wilson's Radio Golf (three Tony nominations), Gem of the Ocean (five Tony nominations) and the Tony Award-winning revival of A Raisin in the Sun; for the latter, he earned a Drama Desk nomination. Off-Broadway/regional: Emergence-See featuring Daniel Beaty, Blues for an Alabama Sky and From the Mississippi Delta (Huntington Theatre), Oregon Shakespeare Festival, San Jose Rep, Goodman Theatre, Hartford Stage, CenterStage, Public Theater, Center Theatre Group, Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park, Dallas Theater Center, GA Shakespeare Festival, Arena Stage and the Theatre of the Stars. Leon is founding artistic director of True Colors Theatre Company, dedicated to diversity and the preservation of African-American classics, and served as artistic director of the ALLIANCE THEATRE for more than a decade, where he produced ten world premieres, including Elton John's Aida and Debbie Allen's Soul Possessed. Leon served as artistic director for the Kennedy Center's 2008 staging of all 10 plays in August Wilson's Century Cycle. Other recent credits include the world premiere of Toni Morrison's opera Margaret Garner and the TV film adaptation of Lorraine Hansberry's A Raisin in the Sun. Leon is a graduate and honorary Ph.D. of Clark Atlanta.

Additional casting and production team for FENCES will be announced soon.