Blair Underwood Career Retrospective | Legacy Collection | Conversations at the SAG-AFTRA Foundation

Blair Underwood talks about his acting journey, including his performances in 'In Treatment', 'Just Cause' and 'LA Law'. Moderated by Anthony De Santis. The following interview was recorded on June 3, 2008.

This career retrospective is part of the SAG-AFTRA Foundation's Legacy Collection, a series of unique Conversations, recorded between 1979 and 2012, with influential actors and pioneering performers who explore the process and profession of acting. These interviews were captured on a variety of physical media formats and recently digitized in order to share with actors and the public at large.

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0:00:00 Introduction
0:02:15 Growing Up
0:07:40 Parts for Black Men
0:13:18 Faith
0:15:43 Family
0:17:30 Getting Career Starteed
0:19:30 Carnegie Mellon, Sidney Poitier
0:25:23 Being entrepreneurial
0:27:52 Working in an ensemble
0:28:58 Million Dollar Christmas
0:32:55 Choosing Roles
0:34:11 Balancing Acting and Producing
0:36:58 Auditioning
0:41:10 Lack of diversity on sets
0:47:05 Actors, Directors Blair admires
0:51:53 Being ready to direct
0:53:11 Rules of Engagement (2000)
1:00:07 In Treatment
1:03:01 Giving up Control
1:04:30 Objectives in Scenes
1:05:59 Just Cause, Sean Connery
1:08:24 Downtime and Family
1:11:20 Portraying Jesus
1:13:57 Nudity onscreen, Niecy Nash
1:17:08 In Treatment Character being Gay
1:21:13 Advice for emerging artists
1:40:15 Will Smith
1:42:00 Union membership
1:45:30 Next steps
1:48:00 Tyler Perry
1:50:00 What he tells his kids