Last year, “American Crime” gripped the hearts of America with its gritty, grueling storytelling, which followed the lives of several individuals during a racially-fueled trial; with an emphasis on how each were forever changed during the legal process. In the upcoming installment, the crime series highlights one of the most well known cases of our time, the 1994 O.J. Simpson trial. During a recent cover story for THR, Cuba Gooding Jr., who plays the former football star in the FX series, reveals how he prepared for the role and why he opted out of contacting Simpson himself.
“I have a lot of friends and family who are incarcerated, and I know what that jail cell does to your psyche. I didn’t want him to take me into that frame of mind,” said the 48-year-old, noting that the Simpson he’d been cast to play was at a very different stage of his life. “He was the O.J. Simpson whom everyone loved — not just an athlete but a movie star — and in that cage, he’s a broken man. Now, if I did a movie about O.J. Simpson in jail, I would do everything I could to sit with him and get into his mindset today, but I wanted to understand who he was when this crime happened.”
Telling Variety “It’s a minutia of watching tapes and reading interviews and watching video,” he said of researching for the role. “Usually, when you prepare for a role, you can spend weeks or months and then when you do it, you’re pretty much in it. But this is like, everyday, they’re like, ‘Oh, [he] did a workout video.’ … Everyday there’s something.”
Nevertheless, there were some real highs and lows that came along with taking on the controversial role: “There was one day after filming that I went to my trailer and I couldn’t stop crying because I realized I never [even considered the loss] for the Goldman or Brown family,” he added. “Some days it’s dark, really dark,” he continued.
As you may recall, on June 12, 1994, Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend Ronald Goldman were fatally stabbed. Their bodies were discovered early the next morning. Her ex-husband, O.J. Simpson, was acquitted October 3, 1995 of their deaths in a trial that divided many along racial lines. In 1997, the former football star was ordered to pay more than $33 milllion for their wrongful deaths. Simpson is currently serving a prison sentence in Nevada for kidnapping, robbery, burglary, assault with a deadly weapon and other charges for attempting to recover memorabilia he claims belonged to him.
According to a Washington Post poll taken at the time of the verdict, 72 percent of Whites thought Simpson was guilty, while 71 percent of Blacks believed him innocent. The 10-episode “American Crime Story: The People v. O.J. Simpson” will premiere in 2016 on FX. Will you be watching?
