The making of 'The Soloist'

Jamie Foxx on playing a schizophrenic...

“This was tough, because we’re dealing with schizophrenia, and we’re halfway crazy sometimes anyway, just as artists. You really feel antsy about playing someone who’s lost their mind. If I were to lose my mind, that’s everything. It’s like, all my creativity comes from there. If I’m not able to draw from that, I would be nowhere. Like the psychiatrist [I talked to about playing Ayers] said, when you’re schizophrenic, it’s like taking your brain and putting it into a meat grinder and then having to think. It’s a very hard place to be in. I remember being at a function where Steven Spielberg looked at me and said, ‘Are you OK?’ I was actually knowing why Nathaniel was acting the way he was acting, which may trip you out a little bit.”