Josh Brolin Says He Nearly Came to Blows with Denzel Washington While Filming ‘American Gangster’

Josh Brolin once opened up about a tense moment he had with Denzel Washington while filming the 2007 movie American Gangster.

The actor talked about the incident during an appearance on In Depth with Graham Bensinger, where he shared that things nearly turned physical between him and Washington on set. “Denzel and I, by the way, get along very well now,” Brolin said. “We almost got into a fight.”

In American Gangster, directed by Ridley Scott, Brolin played a detective chasing Washington’s character, Frank Lucas, a real-life drug kingpin who ruled Harlem in the 1960s and 1970s. Brolin said working on the movie was exciting because he got to share scenes with actors he admired. But one day, things went off script, literally.

Brolin explained that during one scene, Washington changed some of his lines without warning. “I was trying to remember the structure, and then we rehearsed. It wasn’t that many lines, mostly mine,” he said.

“And I’m supposed to be super confident. It’s Denzel Washington, man. It’s, like, not easy. You’re just this actor who they’re trying out, seeing if he’s the real thing or not. And I forgot a line.”

Trying to keep the scene moving, Brolin reached out for help. “I put my hand on his shoulder and I said, ‘What’s the line?’ and he hit my hand off and he said, ‘Don’t ever f***i*g put your hand on me,’” he recalled. “And I was like, ‘Holy s***, I’m gonna scrap with Denzel Washington. This is crazy.’”

According to Brolin, Washington was fully locked into his character at the time and wasn’t being hostile personally. “In his mind, he was just doing his job. He was that guy. He was Frank Lucas, period. But I didn’t know,” Brolin said. “And then we got through that moment. I said, ‘Are you okay?’ He said, ‘Yeah. You?’ I said, ‘Yeah. Can I get my line?’ He said, ‘Go for it.’ It’s like he’d said what he needed to say.”

Despite the heated exchange, the two actors made peace soon after. Brolin said that when he ran into Washington about a year later, the Oscar-winning actor greeted him warmly, showing there were no hard feelings.

He added that working with actors of Washington’s level can be different because they approach filming in a very focused way. “You want to have an experience, and those guys are just trying to do their job,” he said. “It makes sense to me that they would kind of narrow outside life in any way that they can.”

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