Talk to Me

Will Don Cheadle live and die as unheralded as he is today? If so, it will be a major miscarriage of justice!

Just think of his career; "Hotel Rwanda," "Reign Over Me," "Ocean's" series (Cockney, no less!), "Crash," "The United States of Leland," "Swordfish," "Traffic," "The Family Man" (the angel), "Mission to Mars," "Bulworth," "Boogie Nights," "Devil in a Blue Dress," ..need I go on? These are just SOME of his movies, from a prestigious list, and I haven't touched his television work.

He says he has no notoriety because the paparazzi won't cover his kids' soccer games, the PTA meetings or the trips to the grocery store. He seems to be a hard-working professional actor who enjoys a happy and solid personal life. Wow! What a concept!

In "Talk to Me" he plays a real man named Petey Green, who was an ex con, a chain-smoking, fast-talking BS artist who bluffed his way into a job at a Washington DC radio station and played a significant role in quelling the riots that threatened the city when Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated. Martin Sheen plays the station manager.

This is basically a two-man show with Chiwetel Ejiofor (you say it, I can't!) sharing the honors. Mr. Ejiofor was last seen in "Kinky Boots" as a drag queen, and he is equally excellent in this current work. These two men OWN the screen when they are on! (Although I suspect they hired a body double for Cheadle's nude scene, otherwise he has been seriously over- looking an alternate career! Woohoo!)

Both characters have an interesting arc to their lives, although the real-life man that Ejiofor plays is still living and his life underwent the most radical change.

This is interesting as a period piece and as a slice of American History. It is flawlessly played and you owe it to yourself to take a look.