Yahoo News Brendan Fraser tears up discussing his kids and The Whale : 'I have as much love as I'll ever need'
Brendan Fraser says his emotionally moving portrayal of a reclusive, dying professor in Darren Aronofsky's The Whale made him want to protect his three sons, Griffin, Holden, and Leland, from feeling ostracized by society.
In the film, the 54-year-old actor plays Charlie, a 600-pound gay man struggling to reconnect with his estranged daughter, Ellie (Stranger Things' Sadie Sink), in the final days of his life.
"[Charlie] has flaws, he's someone who's still, despite all of these things, somehow, eternally optimistic," Fraser tells EW. "He needed to make a decision about whether to just not exist, or to lean into what he knew he cared about — books, literature, teaching, and being an educator and drawing out truth and honesty from people as a way to their redemption. And at the same time, [the film's writer] Sam gave him a secret super power, and that's the ability to see the good in others, even when they can't see that in themselves. That's what made him infinitely humanizing to me. That's what made Charlie make me feel empathy and affinity for."
Image Press/Shutterstock Brendan Fraser with his sons at 'The Whale' premiere.
Fraser briefly pauses, fighting back tears as he analyzes the film's themes with relation to his own life: "I have three kids of my own," he continues of the children he shares with ex-wife Afton Smith. "I have as much love as I'll ever need for the rest of my life. The thought that they might someday be overlooked or forgotten is something that I can't imagine, if that was really a circumstance in my life that's similar to the one that Charlie lives, the pain that the man goes through."
Though the film has received criticism for casting Fraser in a role that required him to wear prosthetic enhancements to add weight to his body, he's also traveled the awards circuit as a likely contender for his first-ever nomination at the upcoming Oscars.
A24 Brendan Fraser makes an emotional comeback in 'The Whale'
In addition to critical praise, a wealth of Fraser's former costars — including Adam Sandler, Elizabeth Hurley, and Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson — have all publicly spoken in support of him as he navigates the Oscars circuit.
"I want him to go all the way, man," Johnson told MTV News. "I wanna see him on that Oscar stage, and hold that sucker up, and deliver, I'm sure, what will be an amazing speech."
The Whale is now in limited theatrical release via A24. Watch EW's interview with Fraser above.
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