Samuel L. Jackson has spent a lifetime with relatives with memory issues, 10 years trying to make a film about the challenges he faced.
With "The Last Days of Ptolemy Grey" they say that the two have become one.
In the AppleTV+ series, Jackson plays an old man suffering from dementia. Left without a caretaker, he is assigned to an orphaned teenager who learns of a treatment that can temporarily restore his memory.
"Ptolemy" fits into the real-life chronology of my life in terms of honoring all those who had Alzheimer's," he says during a Zoom conference. "It's an honest and, hopefully, enduring assessment of life's decline that many of us face when dealing with someone who is in our family."
Jackson says he has many relatives who have Alzheimer's. “I watched them change, deteriorate and become different people over the years,” he says. Giving the audience a chance to see that they were not alone in dealing with the issue was the key to making the film.
Based on the book by Walter Mosley, "Ptolemy Grey" embraces the relationship between an old man and a teenager, played by Dominic Fischbach.
"She comes when her family abandons her," Jackson says, "and she really behaves like a valuable person. It's something that a lot of people don't have."
To play the role, Fischbach wrote a journal for his character and shared it with Mosley and Jackson. "I really wanted to bring Robin from book to series as much as we could," she says. "Various quotes, I match the pictures and say, 'What if he did that?' And then I emailed it to Sam. It was a huge collaboration with both of them, so I'm really grateful."
Meanwhile, Jackson chose a different approach. "I'm not a method actor. I do everything I do before I get to work so that when it's time to get work done, I can just flow into it. Dominic's will tell you how many times I foolishly walk out of a scene like that." where she's totally emotional and crying and I just look at her and go, 'What's wrong with you?'"
Jackson says he's been thinking about the character for 10 years, "so when it came time to do those things, I just turned on the emotional assets that I've been able to access and do."
Although "Ptolemy Grey" has a fantasy element—Mosley creates a drug that will give the character his memory back—it also helps him solve a mystery that has haunted him for years.
"It's a fairy tale," Mosley says. "But a dark fairy tale in more ways than one."
Jackson, who also serves as the series' executive producer, met Fischbach through his wife la Tanya Richardson Jackson. Both were seen together in a series. “I remember sitting at home watching this Jamie Foxx movie and she was in it,” he says. "I called my manager and said, 'I got Robin.' I didn't know it was the same little girl I saw (in his wife's series)."
Both did a good job together. "It's not a competition when you find the right person to work with in a scene that embraces the goal of that particular scene," Jackson says. "There's an ups and downs."
Fischbach says that Jackson has a photographic memory, so he knows everyone's lines. "After all, Sam is a very giving actor. I remember there was a particular scene where Robin was talking about his mom. He leaned in, his eyes closed inside and I knew he was going to tell the story. I want to help."
Now 73, Jackson says he hopes to act "at least 20 more years."
"I was lucky to be blessed with a really great gene pool," he says. "There's a lot of Alzheimer's in my family, but people live longer, too."
A 94-year-old aunt (who takes credit for Jackson's success because she first saw the acting spark in him) is "smart as a whip".
To stay that way, he says, one must exercise, diet, and "understand how to take care of myself. Once I calmed down, I learned the value of sleep. I cherish it now."
He also teaches to exercise his mind and, "Luckily, I made enough money to get people to massage me and I discovered acupuncture. Hopefully all these things keep me important."