During a recent appearance on SiriusXM's The Howard Stern Show Jamie Foxx recalled a period in his life during which he was on the bounds of blowing his success before an intervention staged by Oprah Winfrey helped him wisen up.
Foxx explained how after years of establishing himself as one of the world's most prolific entertainers, he wound up embracing the party life to a fault. “I’m having such a good time and I’m not knowing I’m f**king up. I’m drinking… I’m doing every f**king thing you could possibly imagine,” he told Stern. The 49-year-old actor dated his erratic behavior to have manifested around the time "Ray" was released.
One notable fan of Foxx's Academy Award-winning performance in the Ray Charles biopic was the legendary Sidney Poitier. Foxx would learn of Poitier's appreciation of the flick during a chance encounter that was made possible when Oprah invited him to a get together of some of the greatest African-American actors of the 1960's and 70's. What was a convening on Poitier's birthday, for Foxx wound up being a moment of clarity in his life. “I want to give you responsibility," Foxx remembered Poitier telling him. "When I saw your performance, it made me grow two inches’.”
The whole experience stemmed from Foxx's wild antics having caught Winfrey's eye. “‘You’re blowing it, Jamie Foxx. All of this gallivanting and all this kind of s**t, that’s not what you want to do… I want to take you somewhere, make you understand the significance of what you’re doing’,” Foxx says Winfrey told him, on a phone call he received from the industry heavyweight. In hindsight, he attributes that day one special party as the one that grounded him for the greatness that was yet to come. “To this day, it’s the most significant time in my life where it was, like, a chance to grow up,” he said.
Source: allhiphop.com
