TV - Movies
The Iconic Role
That Made Jamie
Foxx Physically
Ill
By NICK STANIFORTH
Fierce dedication to the craft has been on display throughout cinema history, and in the case of Jamie Foxx, his portrayal of music legend Ray Charles in 2004’s “Ray” demanded he act without a critical sense in order to deliver the most realistic performance. The result, however, came with some rather severe side effects.
As revealed in a 2004 interview in The New York Times, Foxx had his eyelids glued shut and agreed to wear prosthetic eyelids based on Charles' to emulate his loss of sight, rather than wearing opaque glasses to hide that Foxx could see without issue. In the early stages of applying the prosthetic eyelids, Foxx had regular panic attacks in the first two weeks of filming.
It was a choice that the actor admitted was worse than he predicted. Foxx told The New York Times, "There was a period of about four days when I was like, 'What the hell is going on with my body and my mind?'" Attempting to adapt to a total loss of sight was, understandably, a very demanding adjustment to overcome for the role and took up a lot of time weekly.