Posted by Adam

Monday January 18, 2010

DENZEL Washington doesn’t take his work work home with him.

The American Gangster star says he can “shake off” a character as soon as he leaves the movie set.

“I’m not a leading man,” said Denzel. “I’m an actor. You get a part and you interpret the part. But the characters I play don’t touch me after I’m finished. I just shake them off.

“Maybe when you step into other people’s shoes a little piece of them stays with you because you’ve sort of lived their lives. But I don’t take it home with me.”

Washington, 55, recently revealed that he never set out to become a Hollywood star.

“I never set out to be a movie star,” he said. “I remember when I was an actor in New York after growing up in Harlem, I was just hoping to $300 a week. When I achieved that I thought I was on top of the world.

“Now, I’m starting rehearsals to head back to Broadway in August Wilson‘s Fences with Viola Davis, which opens this spring. I can’t wait. I couldn’t go to sleep for a few nights just thinking about getting ready to start.

“And I’m looking forward to giving my wife Pauletta a chance to get back on stage too. She sort of gave up her acting career to raise the kids and now that they’re out of the house she can do what she wants.”

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