Laurence Fishburne on his character CDC deputy director Ellis Cheever in Contagion
Laurence Fishburne: Ellis Cheever, deputy director of the Center for Disease Control. Probably his first real big assignment in terms of dealing with an infectious disease like this one. You know, smart guy. Competent guy. He's really the voice of reason in all of this. He's the guy that you look to, who's going to tell you that everything is going to be fine. We are in control of the situation. We have the best people working on this situation. We're going to figure out what it is. We're going to contain it. We're going to find a protocol, by which to create a vaccine and make sure that this thing does as little damage as possible. He's really sort of the still calm voice throughout the picture. He's the person you wanna look to for reassurance, that it's gonna be okay.
He, as the head of the CDC, has a responsibility and an obligation to keep this information from going out. But as a human being, as a husband, as a man, he has an obligation to protect his family. And so he's conflicted and he makes a choice.
A love the size of it. I love sort of the international scope of it, that it takes place in so many different parts of the world. Some that happen to be my favorite parts of the world also. So the size of it was really the thing. And it's very global. It's this global thing. And there's something about that, that appeals to me.
