Don Cheadle talks about his close ‘bromance’ with Irish actor,
Brendan Gleeson, on the set of his latest film, The Guard.

Don Cheadle in new film, The Guard
Don Cheadle executive-produced, The Guard , in which he plays an FBI officer(Sony Picture Classics)

âIt kind of sounds like a clichÃ© and a bit of hype but itâs absolutely true, it was love at first sight,â laughs Don Cheadle on the LA set of his new US TV series, House Of Lies. Heâs talking about a male co-starÂ  but not his enviable roster of A-list Hollywood pals, which includes Brad Pitt , George Clooney and Matt Damon . No, Cheadle is smitten with the star of his new film, The Guard â Irish actor Brendan Gleeson.

âWe met when he was in Los Angeles to get the Emmy he wonÂ  for Into The Storm, his Churchill movie,â says Cheadle. âWe were so simpatico, we very quickly knew we were going to have a meeting of minds that was going to turn into what it turned into â a really fun, interesting and different kind ofÂ  a film.â No kidding.


The Guard and its irresistible tragicomic male pairing knocked Bridesmaids off the top of the box office chart in Ireland. Wearing his other hat as one of the filmâs executive producers, Cheadle proudly tells me it boasted anÂ  almost unheard of â152 per cent box office uptickâ in the US in its second week. âRidiculous,â he says. âIâm very happy.â

The off-screen bromance was the genesis for the sort of crackling chemistry thatâs vital for buddy movies, though Cheadleâs fish-out-of-water FBI officer (sent to crack an international drug ring) and Gleesonâs small-town Irish policeman are pointedly unique buddies. Suspicious of Cheadleâs officious corporate MO, Gleesonâs local policeman feels threatenedÂ  and lashes out with racist taunts so pointed there were myriad sharp intakes of breath at the screening I attended. Does Cheadle think weâve become too PC and should still laugh at the obviously inappropriate?

âI know that I have a sick senseÂ  of humour and I know BrendanÂ  and [writer/director] John Michael McDonagh also do,â he says. âSo this was my kind of humour. I like impolite people saying things to each other that I believe they actually say outside the confinesÂ  of polite conversation.

âJohn was brave enough and had the wherewithal to bring it into real conversation but it was still purely for comedy. If all the racist things Gerry [Gleeson] was saying to Wendell [Cheadle] were truly racist, it wouldnât have been funny at all. But itâs clear that heâs just trying to get a rise out of me.â


Cheadle, 46, is an old-fashioned kind of actor and doesnât mind who knows it. Though he has graced blockbusters and high-profile films galore (Iron Man 2, Oceanâs 11, 12 and 13, Traffic and 2006âs Academy Award Best Picture winner Crash), his agent notifies him of every single job offer. âItâs time-consuming but if you donât look, something like The Guard slips through the cracks and then youâre p***ed off,â he says.

Has Cheadle ever felt like a fish out of water? âFrom moving around a lot as a kid in the Midwest, yes,â he replies. âI was a degree brat.Â  My father was going to different colleges, my mother was going to different colleges. They were both getting their degrees so we moved around a lot.â

Cheadle says his parents â a teacher and a psychologist â were nothing but encouraging when he announced he wanted to be an actor.

âI started at ten and they never pooh-poohed it, I think because they saw I was serious about it,â he says. âIâm so lucky it worked out because there was no back-up plan â other than to be a musician. Because thatâs so much more reliable.â

Cheadle continues to have a peripatetic lifestyle but his LAÂ  home base, with actress wife Bridgid Coulter and their two teenage daughters, Ayana and Imani, is firmly fixed. It was working away from home on 2004âs Hotel RwandaÂ  (for which he earned a Best Actor Oscar nomination) that prompted a sea changeÂ  in his entire outlook.


âI was kind of pulled into this streamÂ  of activism about Darfur after goingÂ  there with a Congressional delegation,âÂ  he says. âThat was my entrÃ©e into the field.â Cheadle and Clooney founded a humanitarian organisation together âand meet up every once in a while toÂ  try and brainstormâ.

No wonder Cheadle feels the need to lighten up occasionally. In a video for comedy website Funny Or Die, for example, he espouses the benefits of a spa offering testicular services. âThat was just a bunch of us on the Oceanâs set being silly and talking about how to make the world better for men,â says Cheadle. âWell, how about a ball spa? That insanity was birthed between four or five idiots.Â  I wish I could take all the credit.â

The Guard is in cinemas from Friday.