INTERNATIONAL INTERNATIONAL MAN OF MYSTERY
By Ronda Racha Penrice

He acts, sings, plays piano, speaks four languages, and is all about his baby girl.
and he looks great naked. Is Boris Kodjoe TOO perfect?

the timeless melodies of the late, great Luther Vandross quell the idle chatter of the guests at Atlanta’s swanky Intercon-tinental Hotel, but it’s not some piped-in Muzak. The live entertainment comes from Boris Kodjoe, who is flexing in one of his other elements: singing and tickling the ivories of a baby grand piano—a talent he’s cultivated since childhood. “He can sing his ass off,” says Nicole Ari Kodjoe, his real-life wife and former onscreen love interest in Showtime’s hit series Soul Food. “I’m like, ‘Hello? Cut an album!’ And he’s so cool and calm, saying, ‘Soon... soon.’”

It’s exactly this composure that Boris uses to charm his audience today. In this stolen moment, the Austrian-born model-turned-actor looks every bit the Adonis whom ladies salivated over during his run on Soul Food. A crisp, tail-ored shirt accentuates his hard pecs and bulging biceps, while his slacks camouflage the chiseled quads that peeked through the shorts he was sporting prior to his clothing change for this photo shoot. Yet he’s set aside his star status and assumed the role of sensitive musician in tribute to Mr. Vandross, and the pleasantly surprised JEWEL photo and styling crew members applaud the actor’s impromptu concert. Boris’ Colgate smile and chocolate-brown eyes can hardly suppress his pride. This is no made-for-television kind of gent—he’s live and direct. And he likes to keep folks guessing.

Take his linguistic skills, for instance. At lunch, Kodjoe takes a seat at Au Pied de Cochon, the French restaurant of the Intercontinental Buckhead Hotel, overlooking Atlanta’s famed Peachtree Street. Hungry from a long day on the set of Tyler Perry’s upcoming flick, Madea’s Family Reunion (based on his off-Broadway play of the same name, a follow-up to his phenomenally successful play-cum-film, Diary of a Mad Black Woman), he comfortably orders his salmon in perfect French, one of four languages (including German, Spanish, and English) that he speaks fluently.

In fact, because Boris grew up in Freiburg, Germany with his German mother, who is a psychologist, and his Ghanaian father, a physician, German is actually his native tongue. The first time he really got to practice English was when he came to the States to attend Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond on a tennis scholarship—a sport at which he excelled until a back injury quashed his dreams of going pro.

“I was homesick at first, but one of the things I enjoyed about the States was being able to disappear,” he says. “Growing up at home, whenever I went anywhere, people would stare at me because I had a different skin color. Being able to blend in on a college campus was a great experience for me.”

This desire to blend in led him to acting. “I wanted to see if I could drop my accent,” says Boris, who actually used a dialect coach during his first season on Soul Food, where his infectious charm and fiiiiine looks transformed a guest turn on the series into a regular role.

Continued in Jewel Magazine Issue #1 - Subscribe Now!