The actor and director are joined by screenwriter Samuel D Hunter to discuss career comebacks, the hazards of Hollywood and the importance of human connection
The last time I met Brendan Fraser, he was bouncing off the walls of a Los Angeles hotel suite and looking every bit as popeyed, elastic-limbed and cartoonish as his animated co-stars in Looney Tunes: Back in Action. This was 2008. He was promoting the third Mummy film, Tomb of the Dragon Emperor, and not merely answering questions but turning the replies into zany skits or wackadoodle monologues. A jangling desperation, though, lurked just below the surface. It was never more apparent than when he recounted what he had said to a businessman who buttonholed him about the prospect of another Mummy sequel: “I don’t know! Leave me alone!”
Now we know why. Injuries sustained on that third Mummy picture led to seven years of hospital visits; there were operations on his back, a partial knee replacement and surgery on his vocal cords. In 2009, he and the mother of his three sons divorced. Then, in a 2018 interview headlined “Whatever happened to Brendan Fraser?”, he alleged that he had been groped in 2003 by Philip Berk, a former president of the Hollywood Foreign Press Association, which is responsible for the Golden Globes. (Berk apologised but denies any wrongdoing.)
