Issue date:
May 22-24, 1998

Forest Whitaker:

The Waiting to Exhale director and Crying Game actor is Hollywood's "gentle giant." His calm approach works: This week he directs Sandra Bullock in a new movie.

small, portable waterfall gurgles in the corner of Forest Whitaker's office on a Hollywood movie lot. The actor-director finds the sound of trickling water therapeutic, and visiting him, you can't help but be drawn into his calm.

At 6-foot-2 and 250 pounds, the soft-spoken Whitaker has been called a gentle giant. The description fits. After winning praise for roles in Good Morning Vietnam, The Crying Game and Bird, he tapped into his feminine side by directing the female ensemble hit Waiting to Exhale. Now Hollywood's top actresses want him to helm their movies. Hope Floats, starring Sandra Bullock as a heartbroken former prom queen, is Whitaker's latest directorial effort.

Whitaker, 36, who grew up in tough L.A.-area neighborhoods, believes hope can keep you afloat, even in terrible times. You need an ability "to cherish things in a certain way," he says. Where others see only ugly cracks in a sidewalk, "you see the flower in the crack."

Whitaker's spiritual approach to dealing with people has helped to build his reputation as a women's director. Rather than barking orders on the set, he meets with everyone individually. "It's the only way," he says, "because everyone communicates differently." He suggests that all bosses "take the time to really look at people. Listen to them. See how they move. Most bosses do that only when something is going wrong."

Whitaker is gentle in other ways, too. During the filming of Hope Floats, Bullock's widely panned Speed 2 was in theaters. "Sandra asked me not to see it," Whitaker says. Though watching Speed 2 might have helped him understand Bullock as an actress, he honored her wish.

When Whitaker pauses, the only sound in his office is that soothing fountain, which cost him about $100. He says he recently gave one as a gift to a colleague, who then bought fountains for 10 friends. If the trend spreads, Whitaker could become the father of a fountain movement. "A lot of life," he says, "is about state of mind."

Photo Credit: WAYNE STAMBLER FOR USA WEEKEND

Zaslow is an advice columnist for the Chicago Sun-Times.