How Taraji P. Henson Guilted Idris Elba Into Doing ‘No Good Deed’
Actor Idris Elba and Empire star Taraji P. Henson collaborated for the first time in the feature No Good Deed. But it was a film that Henson joked she had to guilt Elba into doing.
Taraji P. Henson really wanted to work with Idris Elba in ‘No Good Deed’
No Good Deed saw Elba playing a villain in the 2014 thriller. Henson’s character attempts to help Elba in a bind, but her generosity backfires, and Elba ends up threatening her life.
Henson was on a mission to cast Elba in the film from the very beginning, especially since she hadn’t worked with him before.
“It was always Idris, because I had never worked with him. I had just finished working with Michael Ealy on Think Like a Man, I’ve worked with Morris Chestnut, all of the names we started tossing around I had already worked with,” Henson once told Complex. “We thought Idris was fresh and new. And as a producer—now that I’m producing—that’s what I want to see. I want to see nice and fresh and I want to present ‘fresh.’ New faces, or new combinations of talent. People would expect Idris and I to do a love story. This is totally opposite of what people are expecting.”
But she also asserted that it took a bit of convincing to get Elba on board.
“I played the single mother card and said my son is about to go off to college, that he already promised to do it, that I put this money to the side, and he couldn’t leave me floating in the wind like this! I totally guilted him into it,” she remembered.
But Elba was already committed to another feature at the time, which meant they had to film No Good Deed in a rush.
“It only took one phone call. But then the schedule is ruined because we had to hurry up and schew him out because he had to be in Africa by a certain time to star in Mandela,” she said. “So literally, I wrapped on Person of Interest, jumped in the car, ran to the runway, jumped in a private jet, and went straight to Atlanta, got my hair done, and started work the next day. And we worked six days a week for a month, we only had Monday off. That’s the only way we could do it with Idris.”
The cast for ‘No Good Deed’ looked very different before Taraji P. Henson got her hands on the script
Initially, neither Henson nor Elba were considered for the project. But this changed when the script found its way to The Color Purple actor.
“The script was originally written for a different studio—and even though it doesn’t specify—it was with two white leads,” she said. “[Producer] Will Packer found it and brought it to me. We were looking for a white lead when he brought me the script, but we couldn’t get one. Then we started thinking and said, why don’t we just make it—I hate this phrase—a ‘black movie,’ and get two black leads, and that’s when we started brainstorming and Idris was the best choice. We just pursued him.”
Henson also asserted she might not have even heard of No Good Deed if it wasn’t for the fact that she was doing another movie.
“I’ve had this script since before Think Like a Man, that’s how I met Will Packer. He brought No Good Deed to me, and then that project got put on hold because Think Like a Man came. They had the money and the cast ready to go, so that’s how I got into Think Like a Man: I was supposed to do No Good Deed first. But once Think Like a Man wrapped we started working on No Good Deed,” she said.
Taraji P. Henson hurt Idris Elba’s feelings doing ‘No Good Deed’
Henson confided that she and The Wire alum got along well enough behind-the-scenes. Their personalities meshed well, with Henson asserting that she couldn’t help tease Elba from time to time during the movie.
“I play a lot on set because it is work so I live in between takes, and I was kind of glad that he’s that kind of actor, too. It helped with our chemistry,” Henson once told Rolling Out.
But Henson wondered if she might’ve gone too far when quipping with the actor. However, Elba’s sensitive nature made his performance even more terrifying for Henson.
“Idris is an amazing actor because he is a big teddy bear, and he’s quite sensitive. Because I joke a lot, and I think I hurt his feelings a couple times. Then [director] Sam Miller yells, ‘action’, and he turns into a monster right before your very eyes. I mean, really scary,” she said.
