Denzel on Diverse “Magnificent Seven” Remake: “I Just Wanted to Be in Chris Pratt's Movie”

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Two-time Oscar winner Denzel Washington can be seen this weekend in the highly anticipated remakeThe Magnificent Seven, which is, believe it or not, the first western in the acclaimed actor’s long career. 

Rather than the seven helping to defend a Mexican town from bandits as in the 1960 original — itself a remake of Kurosawa’s The Seven Samurai —  the new seven led by Denzel’s Sam Chisolm are mercenaries hired by widow Emma (played by Haley Bennett) to wrest an American town from a corrupt industrialist (Peter Sarsgaard).

Washington had to learn to ride a horse and convincingly quick-draw and fancily brandish a six-shooter into and out of a holster to mimic the skills of any self-respecting gunslinger of the time.

“You just practice,” Denzel said on Good Morning America of flipping around the firearms. “All day, every day…You’re with your horse everyday, you know, I like that.”

Washington leads a diverse cast of heroes, including Manuel Garcia-Rulfo, who is Mexican, Martin Sensmeier, a Native American, and South Korean Lee Byung-hun, as well as Ethan Hawke and Chris Pratt. “It actually speaks to the reality in the 1870s,” Denzel said of the diverse lineup. “That’s more typical than you know, movies of the 50s and 40s, where there’s nobody [that] looks like us…But we were there.”

“I can’t speak for the director,” Denzel said of the diverse casting choices, “but it wasn’t like, ‘Oh, we were going to do this for that reason.”
 
Then Washington signaled a box office changing of the guard, by continuing with a hearty laugh, “I just wanted to be in Chris Pratt’s movie.” 

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