Laurence Fishburne

The 41-year-old actor who played Morpheus in The Matrix takes a
spin as the King of Cali in Biker Boyz, a modern Western about an
underground African-American motorcycle club, which opens on Jan.
31.

SI: Are you a biker?

Fishburne: I am a motorcycle enthusiast. I am not a biker.

SI: What kind of bike do you own?

Fishburne: I own five or six bikes. As I say again, I am a
motorcycle enthusiast.

SI: How often do you ride?

Fishburne: Maybe once or twice a week.

SI: Where is the coolest place you've ridden?

Fishburne: Russia. I belong to the Guggenheim Motorcycle Club.
Most of our members are movie stars and millionaires. So I was
riding around St. Petersburg on a BMW 1200 LT, blasting Back in
the USSR. It was f------groovy.

SI: Dennis Hopper was on that trip with you. Can Hopper handle a
bike?

Fishburne: Totally. Come on, man, he's [Easy Rider's] Sergeant
Billy.

SI: You've done three movies with a basketball
connection--Cornbread, Earl and Me, Fast Break--and you did the
voice-over for Michael Jordan To the Max. Does basketball hold a
particular appeal to you?

Fishburne: I'm not a sports fan, but everybody's a Michael Jordan
fan.

SI: Did you get to spend any time with Jordan?

Fishburne: I've met Michael only once or twice. But from what I
heard, he loved The Matrix, and he loves my voice and he asked
that I be the person to narrate that film.

SI: You were raised in Brooklyn. Yankees or Mets fan?

Fishburne: After the 1969 Knicks, man, no sports mattered to me.
They were the guys. That was it for sports after that.

SI: You were born in Augusta, Georgia. If Augusta National
offered you a golf membership, would you accept it?

Fishburne: I would. Because they offered it to me and it's my
hometown.

SI: Your characters almost always have an edge. Are people born
badass, or can you train to be that way?

Fishburne: Oh, I don't know. I'm not much of a badass. I just
play one in the movies. --Richard Deitsch

For more from Laurence Fishburne, go to cnnsi.com/scorecard.

COLOR PHOTO: DREAMWORKS (FISHBURNE) "I'm not a badass."