Forest Whitaker, 63, might be a bit of a workaholic.
“I’ve only taken about 10 vacations in my life,” the actor told Haute Living in an interview published on Monday. “Three times to Capri. Once to India. Once to Cancún. That’s pretty much it.”
His tropical getaway to Cancún, which he spent by the beach, was one of the most memorable. “It’s the greatest luxury I can imagine,” Whitaker said.
Apart from those international trips, all his other vacations were road trips from California to Texas to visit his family.
It’s not that he doesn’t want to rest; he’s just too consumed by his work, he said.
Whitaker won an Academy Award, a Golden Globe, and a BAFTA for his performance as Idi Amin, the former president of Uganda, in 2006’s “The Last King of Scotland.”
“I’ve been monk-like, hermit-like in the way I work sometimes — so obsessed and possessed by what I’m doing that the nurturing part of Forest doesn’t happen that often,” Whitaker said.
Looking back, Whitaker says he would change that and tell his younger self to embrace the moment and to “look for more opportunities to find joy in life.”
“Don’t let the work deplete your joy,” Whitaker said he would advise his younger self.
While Whitaker’s craft is acting, his work ethic mirrors that of many major tech CEOs.
In a blog post first published in 2004 and reposted in 2011, Mark Cuban wrote that he “went seven years without a vacation” when starting his first company.
In 2018, Elon Musk told The New York Times that he had not taken more than a week off work since 2001.
In a 2024 interview with Nicolai Tangen, the CEO of Norges Bank Investment Management, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang said he works every weekday and every holiday.
A representative for Whitaker did not immediately respond to a request for comment sent by Business Insider.
