DON CHEADLE - CHEADLE STRUGGLES WITH MILES DAVIS RESEARCH

DON CHEADLE received no help from MILES DAVIS' family while researching his role as the jazz man - because no one had any recollections about the music icon's secret life. The Hotel Rwanda star felt sure recollections from Davis' family members would help him master the essence of the legend but Cheadle discovered he knew more about his subject than they did. He says, "I asked them about parts of his life and they don't have any idea. They don't know what was going on. "Miles Davis lived in a house on the Upper West Side in New York - in this converted church - for five years and they said, `There were days when we'd come to see him and he wouldn't let us in.' "I ended up with the soup of the person and who that person was spiritually... What his wife said, what his ex-wife said, what his girlfriend says, the nephew says, the son says, there are all these different perspectives on this one person." And when Cheadle turned to Davis interviews to help his research he didn't find a lot of help there either. He adds, "He'd tell a long story and the guy said, `That's amazing. Did that really happen?' and he'd say, `I don't f**kin' know.'"