Jeffrey Wright talks about portraying '80s artist Jean-Michel Basquiat.(Originated from Knight-Ridder Newspapers)

From: Knight Ridder/Tribune News Service | Date: August 16, 1996| Author: | Copyright information

Jeffrey Wright arrived in New York only a month before Jean-Michel Basquiat departed. It was the summer of '88, and Wright, then 22, had come from Amherst College, where he studied theater, to try to make it as an actor. Basquiat, who had risen from graffiti artist and street poet (his moniker was Samo) to shining star of the downtown art scene in just a few fast years, was 27.

Now, less than a decade after the self-destructive Andy Warhol protege died of a drug overdose, Wright is playing him in ``Basquiat,'' a hip, impressionistic biopic from artist-turned-filmmaker Julian ...

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