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Mistyped: Donald Faison Thinks Your Impression Of Him Is Wrong
Posted by Jawn Murray on Jun 5th 2009 7:47AM
Filed under: Interviews, Movies, Television
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Donald Faison'Scrubs' star Donald Faison feels the public perception of him is all wrong.
"The biggest misconception about me that I think people view me as is the black white dude. I think that's what they view me as. I haven't been in Jet, Ebony or any of those magazines and I imagine that's one of the reasons why. Maybe people can't relate to me. Maybe my journey has been a lot different than others actors have," he shared when we spoke during a recent interview at the W Hotel in Westwood, Calif.
The actor, who plays Dr. Chris Turk on the recently-renewed ABC medical comedy, confessed that though the false impression does annoy him, he isn't on a crusade to change public perception.
"I don't think it's something that I would consciously like to change; I'm very happy being me. I feel like I give back to my community tremendously, but I'm not going to go out of my way to change how people view me or how I view myself," he explained, before adding: "I don't necessarily know if people view me that way; this is how I think people view me."
The New York native also feels that casting options for acting work have sometimes been limited because of the perception of him.
"For the longest time, I have been the only Black guy in anything. All of my successful projects, [like] 'Scrubs' and 'Clueless,' I was the best friend or the token [Black]. I'm not saying that's a bad thing because it paid my rent for a very long time. From my past projects, I think I'm looked at as the white-Black guy; the guy who hangs out with the White folks," he conveyed.
Faison, a divorced father of four, admitted that the beauty of doing his last movie 'Next Day Air' was being able to work on a project that had an urban theme.
"When doing a movie like this, I don't know if I'm always the first person that people think of as a down-to-earth homeboy. In every movie or television show that I've done, I'm kind of similar to this character. I'm the mama's boy. This is the first time where there was a little bit of grit and grime in a character that I play. Usually, I'm the mama's boy who has troubles with the ladies and non-threatening. If anything, this was the first time where I was a little bit different," said the actor.
Though the 34-year-old talent thinks the general opinion of him is all wrong, he is happy that fans of 'Scrubs' declare that the comedic depiction of hospital life portrayed on the show is dead-on.
"It's weird to run into medical students or people who work in the medical field and them talking about 'Scrubs.' It's really odd to hear them say that it's the most accurate out of all the medical shows on television because we mess up a lot on that show; doctors mess up a lot. For some reason, that's something that is realistic. I guess that happens a lot and people have to deal with tragedy with comedy. When I heard that it made me not want to go to the hospital if I get sick. I'll just try and get some antibiotics and kill it that way. The last thing I want is to not be able to feel my finger because some doctor misdiagnosed my tonsillitis and then broke out into song afterwards and started dancing," he closed.
