During our recent interview with Jake Gyllenhaal around the opening of his current film, "Nightcrawler," he told us how watching a particularly emotional performance inspired him to become an actor:
The first time that I knew that I wanted to be an actor, and I saw a piece of acting that made me feel that way was seeing "Glory" when I was a young boy. And watching Denzel Washington in the scene where he looks in the camera while he's being whipped. I remember ... the way he looks in the camera and the performance in that moment ... with great vulnerability and great strength in the same moment. And I realized that was something I wanted to strive for. Not only as an actor, but also as a person. To try and be open and vulnerable and, at the same time, be strong.
Washington won the Best Supporting Actor Oscar in 1990 for his role in "Glory":
