He already has an Oscar, a Golden Globe and a Golden Camera for his life’s work. But even at 85, Morgan Freeman is unstoppable. The actor continues to shoot and produce – and is active as a bee protector.

A few weeks before his 85th birthday, Morgan Freeman is reluctant to retire. “I’m doing my best to keep going,” said the gray-bearded Hollywood star in early May on the British talk show “The Screenlately Show”.

“I’m not retiring,” the actor affirmed. But at the same time he admitted in the video link that his memory had diminished. He was well on the way to old age, Freeman smiled. On Wednesday (June 1), the Oscar winner will be 85 years old.

In the interview, Freeman spoke passionately about his role as a producer of independent films, such as the father-daughter drama Princess of the Row. His colleague Lori McCreary, with whom he has run the production company Revelations Entertainment since the 1990s, was also connected.

Stirred up the «Kings of Hollywood»

Freeman also appears regularly in front of the camera. In the spring he shot the comedy thriller “The Minute You Wake Up Dead” in the US state of Mississippi; in it he plays a small-town sheriff. In 2021 he let himself be harnessed for the action thriller “Muti”. In it, a detective (Cole Hauser) and an anthropology professor (Freeman) go on the trail of a serial killer. Next up for Freeman in the role of a powerful tech guru is the sci-fi thriller 57 Seconds, as the industry journal Variety reported in mid-May.

There is really no trace of old age on the screen. Last year he mixed up the action comedy “Kings Of Hollywood” as a mafia boss alongside the veteran stars Robert De Niro and Tommy Lee Jones.

Professionally, Freeman was more of a late bloomer. The actor only really took off on the film scene at the age of 50. The shower of awards for him began with the gangster role in “Glitzernder Asphalt” (1987). She earned Freeman the first of five Oscar nominations. In the 1989 film “Miss Daisy and her Chauffeur” he shone as the patient driver of an old Southern lady and also received a Golden Globe for it.

There were other Oscar nominations for “The Condemned” and for his performance as South Africa’s first black president, Nelson Mandela, in “Invictus”. He eventually won the Best Supporting Actor trophy for the role of a retired prizefighter in Clint Eastwood’s Million Dollar Baby (2004).

He shone in dozens of films

Freeman has impressed in dozens of roles: as a sergeant in “Glory” (1989), as an old gangster in the Eastwood western “Unforgiven” (1992), as a prison inmate in “The Condemned” (1994), as a serene god in “Bruce Almighty” ( 2003), as Jack Nicholson’s terminally ill buddy in the tragic comedy «The best comes last» (2007).

In Christopher Nolan’s “Batman” series he mimed the smart manager Lucius Fox, in “The Unbelievable” a wily magician, in the terror drama “London Has Fallen” a cool US Vice President.

The father of four, who is already a great-grandfather, has two marriages behind him. In 2008 he separated from his second wife Myrna after 24 years of marriage. Ten years later, Freeman got caught in the wake of the

According to her description, Freeman is said to have made salacious comments and groped her, for example on film sets, the broadcaster CNN reported in 2018. He was not someone “who would intentionally hurt or knowingly make someone feel uncomfortable,” wrote the actor in a statement at the time. “I apologize to anyone who felt uncomfortable or disrespected – that was never my intention.”

He works to protect bees

Freeman lives far from Hollywood, on a ranch in the US state of Mississippi. He grew up in the southern states. The actor has been campaigning for the protection of bees for many years – his own farm has become a habitat for many bee colonies. In mid-May, on International Biodiversity Day, Freeman linked an earlier video on his Twitter account calling for bee conservation.

The screen veteran was recently asked on the British talk show “The Screenlately Show” how he was going to celebrate his 85th birthday. He doesn’t have any plans of his own, said the Hollywood star with a grin. «I will go to the party that is planned for me».