The reason Morgan Freeman always wears a gold earring | CPT PPP Coverage

Ironically, embodying such a ruthless and vindictive character shot him to prominence, and he’s never played a character anywhere near as reprehensible ever since. Instead, Freeman set out his stall as the industry’s favourite wizened sage and deliverer of gravitas-infused exposition, lending his unmistakable tones to countless blockbusters, box office winners, and awards season favourites.

The entire time, the earring has been there. When he turns up to premieres and ceremonies or gets snapped by the paparazzi, it’s always firmly in place. Fittingly, it’s tied to another one of his great loves, with Freeman’s fondness for the sea and sailing the open waters in his spare time emboldening him to adopt a superstition he refuses to give up.

Herman Melville’s Moby Dick changed his life the first time he read it, with the novel enduring as one of Freeman’s favourite books, while the 1956 adaptation starring Gregory Peck has always been one of his favourite films. If he wasn’t an actor, then he’d probably be a sailor, which is why the earring has become so important.

The Academy Award winner admitted that “I get asked about them all the time,” but nobody could have expected the reason to be so grim. Unsurprisingly, he told The Guardian that “it has to do with my attachment to the sea.” It was his first wife who pierced his ear, which he fully embraced as a self-proclaimed “dyed in the wool blue water man.”

Of course, there’s more to it than that, with Freeman sharing that not only does he always have to have his earring firmly in place, but it can’t be a cheap one. He always ensures the jewellery is “worth enough for someone to buy me in a coffin if I die in a strange place,” as was the tradition among sailors.

Not to make an already dark story even darker, but say, for instance, the body of Morgan Freeman was discovered by a stranger or passerby. Would the first instinct be, ‘Well, he’s dead, but at least that earring looks worth enough to get him a coffin’? Probably not. It would either be, ‘Oh shit, that’s Morgan Freeman, and he’s dead’, or, ‘Hmm, that earring looks awfully valuable, and this dead guy definitely doesn’t need it anymore’.

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