NEW YORK — Spike Lee celebrated his 49th birthday with a ring given to him by his wife, a cupcake from his daughter, a hug from his son and positive early talk on his new drama, "Inside Man."
The director wore, quite literally, his birthday suit to the movie's premiere Monday night at the Ziegfeld Theater, eliciting a shocked response from producer Brian Grazer. "Spike, in a suit! I've never seen you in one," he said to the director, who favors sportswear.
Lee said that he, in fact, owns several suits.
He gamely talked to press and posed for photos with his stars Clive Owen and Jodie Foster.
"You look great for 59," Owen cracked to Lee, who retorted that he was all of 49.
"We're having a couple of drinks tonight!" said Lee.
Foster plays a mysterious power broker in the thriller. Owen is a master criminal who holds a bank hostage, and Denzel Washington is the cop who negotiates with him. Foster says she'd make an awful lawbreaker, if she ever pursued a life of crime.
"I'd make a really bad one," she said. "Certain people, when something happens, like there's an accident, they immediately do the right thing. I freeze. I need 20 minutes to think. Let's all think here. I don't have the good wheels turning."
In fact, Foster, wearing Giorgio Armani, seemed ill at ease on the carpet and looked most comfortable chatting with a young boy.
Lee, meanwhile, was most enthusiastic about seeing his leading man and close collaborator Washington. This is their fourth movie together.
Washington flew in from New Orleans, where he's shooting "Deja Vu" and had a call time of 5:30 a.m. Tuesday. "I'm on a plane tonight," said Washington. "No partying tonight. I gotta hit it, I gotta do what I gotta do so I can do what I want to do. I gotta work. They call it show business."
Washington's gift to Lee? "He showed up!" said the director as the two men laughed.
So, who's the toughest negotiator Washington knows in real life?
"My wife," he said.
On set, say his stars, Lee is all business, skipping lunch and working without a trailer.
For Owen, concealing his face for the most of the film was "weird. You get this great script, this great part, and then you put a mask on and hide your face. But you get used to it.
"I told Spike all the time, 'Anyone could be doing this part.' "